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The relationship between organizational justice and conflict style	[ "Justice", "Conflict resolution", "Conflict management", "Team working", "Leadership" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: In his latest book, The World is Flat, Thomas Friedman (2005, p. 8) argues that the global competitive playing field is being leveled - the world is being flattened. He identifies ten forces (e.g., workflow software, open sourcing, supply chaining) that are allowing \"...more people than ever before to collaborate and compete in real time with more other people on more different kinds of work from more different corners of the planet and on a more equal footing than at any previous time in the history of the world - using computers, email, networks, teleconferencing, and dynamic new software\". Arguably, many of these same forces are leading to the flattening of organizations as well. More people than ever before are collaborating and participating in decision making processes within all types of organizations. The days of the rigid, hierarchal chain of command are rapidly fading and being replaced with semi-autonomous work groups, self-managed teams, and matrix organizations. With all of this interpersonal interaction and sharing of ideas and viewpoints, conflict is virtually unavoidable. One very powerful source of conflict derives from the way justice issues are handled within an organization by those that serve as managers, leaders, and decision makers.\nIntroduction to organizational justice and conflict: Leaders in organizations are expected to create organizational systems that members perceive as fair, caring, and open. In a just and ethical organization, decisions that leaders make should reflect fair treatment of people and concern for their welfare. Addressing issues of fairness and just treatment of people is a vital part of the business strategy and decision making process. Failure to address these concerns can often lead to conflict and organizational dysfunction.Conflict will never be eliminated, and it is often constructive, but it can also be very destructive if issues of fairness and justice are not dealt with effectively. Regardless of the outcome of conflict, there are emotional costs (Levine, 1998). Win or lose, these emotional effects remain and can linger long after conflict has been \"officially\" resolved (analogous to plaque that builds up in arteries and later results in a heart attack). The parties involved can be trapped in their anger over a promotion lost, continue to gloat over beating a competitor, or constantly berate themselves over a missed opportunity. These emotional after-effects can be diminished if proper attention is paid to what has been called \"organizational justice\" (Colquitt et al., 2005; Cropanzano, 1993).Organizational justice has taken many forms over the years, but Greenberg (1993) has developed a taxonomy that has proven empirically sound and highly useful. Part of Greenberg's taxonomy categorizes organizational justice into \"structural justice\" and \"social justice\". Structural justice means that employees are involved in the decision-making process and the employer provides a fair distribution of outcomes. Social justice, by contrast, means that employees perceive the organization as openly sharing information with them, and they believe that the employer cares about their well-being. Some readers may be familiar with the distinction between procedural and distributive justice. The structural/social justice distinction not only incorporates distributive and procedural justice (see Folger, 1977; Folger and Konovsky, 1989), but also adds an important element of interpersonal interaction - how people are treated on an interpersonal level when an organization institutes its policies and procedures (Bies and Moag, 1986). Attention to structural justice has traditionally been viewed as vital to maintaining harmony and avoiding conflict within an organization. Recent studies (e.g., Eberlin, 2005; Tatum et al., 2003) suggest that perceived social justice, with its emphasis on the interpersonal dimension, is especially important in the minds of those asked to contribute to the organization.\nJustice and the manager-employee interaction: Whenever a manager and an employee interact, there is the potential for conflict. This conflict can be exacerbated when issues of structural and social justice emerge, either intentionally or unintentionally. Structural justice issues take the form of concerns about how decisions are made and whether the distribution of outcomes (e.g., raises, promotions, awards, bonuses) is fair and impartial. Social justice issues revolve around whether people are treated with respect and dignity, and whether information is shared in an open and honest manner. Fairness, justice, dignity, and honesty are key elements in these exchanges, and managers and organizations are well advised to avoid anything that might be perceived as favoritism, bias, or the lack of impartiality.One consequence of not being aware of the importance of organizational justice is that managers, leaders, and decision makers in organizations may be subject to legal scrutiny. For example, some researchers (e.g., Barrett and Kernan, 1987; Werner and Bolino, 1997) have linked categories of organizational justice to perceived fairness of performance appraisals. Through analyses of legal decisions it was determined that appraisal practices that promoted perceptions of fairness were also those that tended to withstand legal scrutiny. In fact, these researchers have concluded that issues related to fairness and due process carry more weight in important judicial decisions regarding organizational decisions and practices than more scientific issues of validation.\nConflict styles: Conflict is inevitable, but the way we handle or manage these conflicts will determine the quality of our relationships and long term emotional costs. There are many ways in which conflict can be managed. Thomas (1976) suggests five general approaches (or styles):1. competing;2. avoiding;3. sharing;4. accommodating; and5. collaborating.As shown in Figure 1, these five styles are distributed on a two-by-two grid formed from low and high values of two mutually exclusive dimensions (cooperative/uncooperative and assertiveness/unassertiveness). In any conflict situation, according to Thomas, individuals vary in their commitment to satisfying other's concerns, and the manner in which they assertively stand up for their own concerns.The first of these styles (competitive) reflects a strategy that achieves one's own goals at the expense of another's. This \"domination\" tactic is often referred to as a \"win/lose\" approach to resolving conflict. The second style (avoidant) reflects an approach to resolving conflict that demonstrates indifference to both parties' needs and concerns, and neglects the interests of either person. The third style (sharing) reflects an approach to resolving conflict by \"compromising\" between a dominating and appeasing approach. In this approach both parties involved in conflict give up something and get something, without completely satisfying either party's needs. The fourth approach (accommodative) is achieved when individuals seek to resolve conflict by simply giving in to the others person's needs and abandoning their own. In this approach, an individual has \"appeased\" the other person by making no effort to achieve his or her own needs. The fifth and last style (collaborative), attempts to resolve conflict by completely satisfying the needs of both parties. In this approach an \"integration\" of both parties' needs and concerns are incorporated, and seeks to develop a \"win/win\" solution.Is one conflict management style better than another? The answer is no. Conflict styles are situational and relational. One's cultural, organizational, and personal values can influence the way one style is determined to be most appropriate depending on the situation and relationship involved. For example, the competitive approach might be considered desirable in circumstances of athletic events. However, in organizational situations we strive for approaches that maximize our ability to reach outcomes that are win/win. Rather than generalizing a best approach for every situation, Thomas (1977) suggests that it is best to consider the relative advantages and disadvantages of each approach, and the circumstances for which each approach may prove most appropriate.\nAn analysis of two vignettes: The following two vignettes are presented to illustrate the influence of organizational justice and conflict in an organizational setting. One vignette represents the operation of high levels of justice (both structural and social) within a potentially high conflict situation (see Appendix 1). The other vignette portrays low levels of justice within a potentially high conflict situation (see Appendix 2). Table I shows how sensitivity to organizational justice issues affects different uses of conflict styles when managers are in a high conflict exchange with an employee.As indicated in Table I and illustrated in the vignette in Appendix 1, a manager that is sensitive to organizational justice issues is more likely aware of potential conflicts that might arise during an encounter with an employee. For these managers, awareness of justice and conflict go hand in hand. They are not seeking to dominate or compete with an employee (i.e. adopting a \"Competitive\" style: Style 1 in Table I), but rather they are there to deliver fair outcomes in this situation. They seek to encourage the employee, and display care and concern, while at the same time maintain a fair distribution of outcomes. The manager, for which justice sensitivity is abundant, does not avoid conflict (i.e. \"Avoidant\" style: Style 2 in Table I) or accommodate (i.e. \"Accommodative\" style: Style 4 in Table I) the employee unnecessarily during the discussion because then the employee would not have access to necessary information or be able to contribute to the process. The manager would only resort to the use of accommodating or appeasing the employee if the integrity of justice was served. Any situation that created an unfair distribution of outcomes, or withholding of information to others, would be unacceptable. The most likely and beneficial approach to addressing conflict for the manager who is highly sensitive to organizational justice issues is collaboration (i.e. \"Collaborative\" style: Style 5 in Table I). This method of resolving conflict affords the integration of both parties (manager and employee) to arrive at an outcome that promotes information sharing, employee involvement, and a genuine demonstration of care and concern from the manager. These managers leverage the use of structural and social justice elements to their advantage; building trusting and lasting relationships that persist well beyond immediate events.In contrast to the manager who is sensitive to organizational justice (intentionally attends to structural and social elements of justice), the insensitive manager tends to be more concerned with procedure than with the fairness or openness of processes (see Table I). During a potentially high conflict situation such as the one illustrated in the vignette in Appendix 2, the manager could easily resort to conflict resolution styles that would impose a competitive or dominating resolution tactic (Style 1 in Table I). Here, if the manager's objectives cannot be achieved, then the perceived fairness or just outcome is put aside. The manager who is insensitive to organizational justice issues is likely a manager who is seeking to get through the exchange with little effort and time. Consideration of organizational justice issues (structural and social) requires time and thought. A manager who is unable to entertain and attend to justice elements seriously is likely to opt for avoiding conflict altogether in an attempt to save time and effort (Style 2 in Table I). It is also likely that this manager will seek to appease or accommodate the employee (Style 4 in Table I) as the best method of completing the current discussion, thus escaping potential conflicts and getting the employee to accept the outcome. Oddly, the manager for which justice is of little concern might actually employ the conflict resolution approach of collaboration (Style 5 in Table I). In this case the manager is not acting to elevate the levels of justice embedded in the exchange; rather, this manager may chose this method to better expedite and complete the discussion with the least amount of resistance possible. The goal is not a heightened sense of justice, but a single-minded focus on finishing the task. The manager who chooses to operate with little or no concern for organizational justice is clearly not the ideal one would wish to emulate. Unfortunately, many managers do emulate this approach and their conflict management style reflects this choice.\nDiscussion and conclusions: Organizational change occurs when managers and leaders can achieve one or more of the following objectives:* raise performance;* improve processes and relationships;* enhance fairness and equity; and* increase subjective wellbeing.As researchers, practitioners, managers, and leaders, we should be concentrating efforts to ensure that what we do exemplifies these objectives. If we strive to attend to these objectives seriously, we need to account for the role that organizational justice plays in almost every one of these objectives. Organizational justice has been linked to critical organizational processes such as employee commitment, citizenship, job satisfaction, and performance (Colquitt et al., 2001; Colquitt et al., 2002; Greenberg, 1993; Tatum et al., 2002). The main point of this paper is that there is also an intimate relationship between organizational justice and conflict style.Win/win solutions are commonly referred to as optimal resolution approaches. Managers who consciously attend to organizational justice (structural and social) are more likely to achieve these win/win outcomes. Attending to organizational justice probably means that the conflict style of choice is collaboration. Integrating the needs of the organization with the needs of the employees is more likely to result in the perception of ethical treatment and fair play, and more likely to produce a fair and equitable distribution of outcomes. As shown in Table I, other conflict management styles can be used by managers and leaders who are concerned with justice, but the collaboration strategy is best suited in this situation. Of course, if a manager or leader does not care about sharing information, is not concerned with trust and respect, and cares little about fairness, then styles such as competitive or avoidant are more efficient ways of dealing with conflict.Organizations need to facilitate resolution approaches that afford the best possible outcomes for members who experience conflict situations. As the world becomes more flat, Friedman (2005) suggests that we need to learn to survive in less hierarchical environments and rely more heavily on semi-autonomous work groups, self-managed teams, and matrix organizations. In times when we are being asked to do more with less, the tight coordination of efforts and a shared vision can allow the miracles of teamwork to occur. Levine (1998, p. 165) states, \"The synergy of teamwork can be an extraordinary thing, and delivers results with incremental power (accomplishing more with less). It is the clear agreement with others that builds teams, teams that experience an exponential expansion of power\". The resolution process can afford great power by joining one's vision with that of others. For example, a Clydesdale horse can pull the weight of 7,000 lbs when working individually. By contrast, two Clydesdale horses can pull between 18,000 lbs and 25,000 lbs together. Resolving conflict and working together in just and fair systems is more important than ever in these times when the global playing field is being flattened. Careful attention to organizational justice will ensure that we deliver a workforce that is able to meet the new demands.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to investigate relationships between organizational justice and conflict management.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Two vignettes are described that illustrate: a manager who is highly sensitive to organizational justice issues; and a manager who disregards organizational justice issues. We describe likely conflict management styles adopted by these two managers, and the effects these styles might have on organizations and the employees.\nFindings: - A manager who is sensitive to organizational justice issues is more likely aware of potential conflicts that might arise during an encounter with an employee. The most likely and beneficial approach to addressing conflict for this manager is collaboration. In contrast, the insensitive manager tends to be more concerned with procedure than with the fairness or openness of processes. During a potentially high conflict situation, the manager who is not concerned with organizational justice tends to resort to conflict resolution styles that impose a competitive or dominating resolution tactic.\nResearch limitations/implications: - Because this article is theoretical and conceptual in nature, the findings must be confirmed with additional empirical evidence.\nPractical implications: - Recent changes in globalization suggest that we need to learn to survive in less hierarchical environments and rely more heavily on teams. Careful attention to organizational justice will ensure that we deliver a workforce that is able to meet the new demands with fewer distracting conflicts.\nOriginality/value: - Resolving conflict and working together in just and fair systems is important in today's global playing field. This article systematically integrates, for the first time, the literature on organizational justice and conflict management.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Modelling productivity shocks and economic growth using the Bayesian dynamic stochastic general equilibrium approach	[ "Tourism", "Economic growth", "Dynamic stochastic General equilibrium", "Bayesian method" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Productivity has been one of the most important issues in macroeconomics since Douglas and Cobb first identified it in 1928 (Berndt and Triplett, 2008). According to neoclassical economics, economic growth can only be achieved by improving physical and human capital productivity and total factor productivity (Lucas, 1988). The benefit of increased productivity is that output grows without any extra input to the production process. From a national perspective, productivity growth can raise living standards and reduce poverty (Bechler, 1984).\n2. Literature review: Scholars have been investigating the relationship between tourism and economic growth since the 1990s. Early studies examined the impact of tourism development on economic growth and national welfare using the international trade theory (Copeland, 1991; Hazari and Sgro, 1995; Nowak et al., 2003). Since Adams and Parmenter (1995) introduced the computable general equilibrium (CGE) model to the tourism field, more analyses have been conducted using the CGE model framework. Furthermore, since Balaguer and Cantavella-Jorda (2002) advocated the econometric method, it has become a popular approach to examining the tourism-led economic growth (TLEG) hypothesis. The following subsections critically evaluate the published studies on TLEG from different perspectives.\n3. The model: A circular flowchart of the model is presented in Figure 1. There are three types of representative agents in an open economy: households, firms and government. The economy can be divided into two sectors that produce tourism and non-tourism goods, respectively. In a tourism economy, the volume of inbound tourism is usually much larger than that of outbound tourism. Thus, only inbound and domestic tourisms are considered in the model, and imports refer to non-tourism products. For convenience without loss of generality, it is assumed that a few members of each household work in the tourism sector, some work in non-tourism sectors and some are unemployed.\n4. Selected destination and data: 4.1 The island of Mauritius\n5. Model estimation: 5.1 Prior distribution and calibration\n6. Findings and discussion: In macroeconomics, impulse response functions (IRFs) are usually used to measure an economy's reaction to an exogenous shock. The IRFs of selected variables in the Mauritian model are presented in Figure 3, which shows the response of each variable to a 1 per cent positive shock in tourism productivity. The bold lines in Figure 3 are the IRFs, and the space between the two black lines for each variable is the 90 per cent highest posterior density interval. The vertical axis is the percentage by which the variable fluctuates, and the horizontal axis is the quarterly timeline.\n7. Conclusions and implications: 7.1 Conclusions\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Most existing studies on the impact of tourism on economic growth adopt an econometric approach that is insufficient to confirm that tourism actually leads to economic growth. Moreover, it cannot explain the causalities of different variables. Taking Mauritius as an example, this study aims to use the dynamic stochastic general equilibrium approach to investigate the contribution of tourism to economic growth when there is a productivity shock in the tourism sector.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A two-sector, small, open economy is modelled under the dynamic stochastic general equilibrium framework. The model is estimated using the Bayesian method based on real tourism and macroeconomic data from Mauritius for the period from 1999 to 2014. The impulse response functions are used to simulate the contribution of tourism to economic growth when there is a productivity shock in the tourism sector.\nFindings: The simulation results show that the Mauritian gross domestic product (GDP) would increase by 0.09 per cent if the productivity of tourism is improved by 1 per cent, indicating that tourism could lead to economic growth. Considering the average annual growth rate of the Mauritian GDP, the contribution of tourism to its economic growth is significant. Furthermore, the effects of tourism on economic growth are moderated by price elasticities in international tourism demand.\nOriginality/value: This is the first study that estimates the dynamic stochastic general equilibrium model using the Bayesian method in tourism economic field. By correcting the prior information with real tourism and macroeconomic data, the estimation and simulation results are more robust compared with the calibration method, which has been used frequently in tourism studies.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Platform-based service innovation and system design: research opportunities	[ "Service innovation", "System design", "Network platform", "Research opportunities" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Platform-related studies have multiplied at an astonishing rate over recent years (Thomas et al., 2014). However, there are still few theoretical explanations of how new platform businesses have abruptly upended their industries (Van Alstyne et al., 2016), or what theoretical underpinnings and systematic guidance really work for the platformization of traditional businesses (Zhao et al., 2015). It has been pointed out that theoretical work on platform-based service innovations and system design has lagged behind business practice (Suarez and Cusumano, 2009; Thomas et al., 2014). This is partly because platform studies have been rooted in different intellectual traditions and distinct theoretical perspectives and levels (Gawer, 2014; Thomas et al., 2014). The consequent limited and divided research agenda constrains the exploration of both system design and service innovation actions; these areas require a comprehensive and coherent theoretical grounding (Gawer, 2014).\n2. Case study methodology: This study adopts a case study methodology based on grounded theory (Eisenhardt, 1989; Strauss and Corbin, 1990; Yin, 2009). This inductive approach is appropriate when examining new phenomena about which little explanatory theory exists (Suddaby, 2006; Gligor and Autry, 2012).\n3. Within-case analysis: 3.1 Tencent, a social networking platform\n4. Cross-case analysis, theoretical gaps and research opportunities: Based on the within-case analysis, we summarize, for each case, the platform architecture, types of participants and platform services, the path of platform evolution, and the problems in service innovation and system design. Table I shows the cross-case comparison. We then connect these practical issues with their theoretical backgrounds and derive nine research directions that have been neglected by previous studies. They exist mainly in three areas: ecosystem design and evolution; leader-participant collaboration; and transformation and platformization. We discuss each of the nine research directions according to current knowledge and propose detailed research questions in each direction and theories that might be used. We also summarize methodological suggestions for each research direction.\n5. Analysis approach and methodological suggestions: Thus far, we have explored research opportunities and summarized the kind of questions that must be analyzed for service innovation and system design based on a network platform. In this section, we discuss the analysis of these research questions and the appropriate methods for them according to their natures and units of analysis.\n6. Implications and conclusions: This study deepens our understanding of platform-based service innovation and system design and highlights the rich research opportunities in the fields related to operations management, information systems and strategic management. The main contribution of this paper is the determination of nine research directions from practical cases from various industries.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore research opportunities for service innovation and system design in network platforms by investigating representative case examples in an emerging market, China.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The authors provide four case examples to illustrate the manner in which network platforms facilitate and lead to service innovation and effective system design. Then, the authors propose nine research directions that present significant research opportunities, and the authors make theoretical and methodological suggestions.\nFindings: The results indicate that research opportunities exist mainly in three areas: ecosystem design and evolution, including role design, coherence and sustainability issues; leader-participant collaboration, including governance, co-opetition and innovation stimulation issues; and transformation of traditional industries, including process informatization, modularization and standardization issues.\nOriginality/value: This study extends the platform-related literature by showing new platform features represented by case evidence from emerging economies, and provides recommendations to guide and direct management practices and efforts in platform-based service innovation and system design.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Optimizing team performance: Employee-level factors that can make a considerable difference	[ "Team performance", "Employee engagement", "Organizational commitment", "Citizenship behaviors" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: When Aristotle stated that \"the whole is greater than the sum of its parts\", little did he know that his words would prove timeless. One might even argue that the sentiments expressed by this Ancient Greek philosopher have become more pertinent than ever.\nTeamwork matters: Firms that are team-oriented are much better positioned to respond quickly and find the right solutions. It clearly makes sense to pool knowledge, skills and resources rather than adopt a go-it-alone mentality. Organizations invariably perform at a higher level when members are pulling in the same direction and pursuing mutual goals.\nWhy employee engagement is important: The significance of employee engagement (EE) is widely acknowledged among researchers and practitioners alike. In certain quarters, EE is even deemed likely to become absolutely essential if an organization is to survive and flourish. Whether or not that proves to be the case, there's little doubt that this affirmative psychological state can be hugely beneficial.\nOrganizational commitment and citizenship behavior: Close relations exist between EE and organizational commitment (OC). Engaged employees tend to closely identify with their company, buy into prevailing values and develop a sense of pride in working there. A psychological bond is formed and this makes them even less inclined to leave. This is a reflection of \"continuance commitment\" which is one aspect of the attachment that also includes \"affective\" and \"normative\" forms. The former relates to an employee's passion, while his or her moral obligation towards the firm is captured in the latter commitment dimension.\nWhere leaders should focus: Given the positive relationships that exist between the constructs explored, managers should focus on trying to raise EE levels. Findings ways to increase commitment is an obvious step in the right direction. Shrewd operators will also note the importance of individual employees experiencing a sense of belonging and accordingly aim to strengthen their affiliation with the firm. It could also pay to be aware of the potential for demographic factors and organizational characteristics to shape EE, OC and OCB levels.\nComment: The review is based on: \"Why individual employee engagement matters for team performance?: Mediating effects of employee commitment and organizational citizenship behaviour\", by Uddin et al. (2019), published in Team Performance Management: An International Journal. Firms which boast highly engaged individual employees can anticipate more effective team performance. The positive impact of engagement is strengthened when employees likewise demonstrate strong commitment to the company and a willingness to demonstrate organizational citizenship behaviors.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: This paper aims to review the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoint practical implications from cutting-edge research and case studies.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This briefing is prepared by an independent writer who adds their own impartial comments and places the articles in context.\nFindings: Companies with highly engaged individual employees in their ranks can strengthen team performance. Engagement has a positive impact that can be increased when employees also show firm commitment to the firm and are prepared to demonstrate this by participating in various organizational citizenship behaviors.\nOriginality/value: The briefing saves busy executives and researchers hours of reading time by selecting only the very best, most pertinent information and presenting it in a condensed and easy-to-digest format.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
The role of Zakat in the provision of social protection: A comparison between Jordan and Sudan	[ "Jordan", "Sudan", "Zakat", "Social protection" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Zakat is one of the five pillars of Islam[1] and can be understood as a form of religious duty, purifying one's wealth and, at the same time, functioning as a means to redistribute wealth to those who are in need. In Arabic, Zakat means amongst others growth and purity (Dean and Khan, 1997). In Muslim-majority countries, Zakat has a long tradition in providing income, consumption goods and other basic services such as health and education to the poor and marginalised. A growing body of research has investigated the role of Zakat in the provision of social protection - understood here as income and consumption transfers with the aim to protect the vulnerable against risks - and its importance as a poverty-reduction mechanism (Ali, 2014; Hassan, 2010; Hassanain and Saaid, 2016; Ibrahim and Ghazali, 2014). Although much of the criticism around Zakat institutions evolves around missing coordination, efficiency and transparency (Johari et al., 2015), Zakat has several advantages when it comes to assisting the poor. In countries where state-provided social protection is limited due to ongoing conflicts, for example, Zakat can play a crucial role in providing support to those in need.This paper discusses the role of Zakat Funds in the provision of social protection in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, based on the examples of Jordan and Sudan. The purpose is to assess different modalities of Zakat in two countries where it is regulated in some form by the state. We provide an overview of their organisational nature, legal status, financing as well as the services they offer and the extent to which they reach particularly vulnerable groups. With this paper, we thus contribute to an assessment of the advantages and challenges of Zakat as a social protection mechanism and an instrument to reduce poverty and empower those in need.The findings are based on a desk review of academic, peer-reviewed literature as well as reports published by international organisations and information provided online by governments and national Zakat Funds. The choice of these countries was further motivated by the availability of literature in English and in Arabic. Large Zakat Funds also exist in other countries in MENA, such as Libya, Algeria, Yemen and the Gulf Countries. However, more detailed literature on the organisation of Zakat Funds and their services in these countries is still incipient.In what follows, we provide an overview of Zakat and its different modalities in the Muslim world (Section 2). Section 3 comprehends the analysis of Zakat Funds in Jordan and Sudan, with the aim to present their main characteristics and role within the countries' social protection systems. Next, Section 4 proposes a discussion on some of the common challenges based on the two cases analysed. Our concluding remarks are summarised in Section 5.\n2. Setting the scene - What is important to know about Zakat?: As put by Dean and Khan (1997, p. 198), \"Islam is not opposed to personal wealth, but to its accumulation at others' expense. Zakat functions to prevent accumulation and prevent exploitation or social conflict\". It needs to be differentiated from Sadaqah, which is a form of charity and meant to be voluntary. According to Hasan (2006), Zakat became a formal and compulsory transfer system in the second decade of Islam (622 AD)[2].The amount of Zakat is usually defined as 2.5 per cent of all productive wealth accumulated over one year[3]. The items of wealth considered to determine the Nisab - the minimum amount that one needs to have before being obliged to pay Zakat - can vary and include gold, silver as well as agricultural products and livestock. However, in modern times, business assets, bank accounts, financial assets and rentable buildings are also considered (Hassan, 2010). Many of the debates about Zakat are centred around exactly these two key concepts: Zakatability (the sources of wealth which are considered to calculate Zakat) and the Nisab.In the Quran, eight categories are listed that can claim the right to Zakat, the two most common ones being the poor and the needy[4]. The type of Zakat mainly referred to in this paper is also known Zakat as al-mal. Another related form of Zakat, which is usually paid by everyone who can afford it at the end of fasting in the holy month of Ramadan, is Zakat al-fitr. The collected amount is smaller and used to enable poorer Muslims to celebrate Eid al-fitr, the festival breaking the fast (Hasan, 2015a).As a century-old institution, Zakat is usually not tied to a political spectrum and often enjoys high levels of public trust (Malik, 2016). More recently, Zakat resources have become a relevant source of funding for humanitarian actions and, in some countries, it has been channelled through public institutions to support national poverty-reduction schemes.Estimates indicate that the volume of Zakat collected every year is not negligible. According to a study on Zakat in Indonesia, Malaysia, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Yemen, these countries alone collect at least US$5.7bn every year, while the global volume of Zakat surpasses tens of billions of dollars (Stirk, 2015). In Pakistan alone, it is estimated that Zakat was equal to 1.5% of GDP, or US$ PPP8.1bn in 2012 (Hasan, 2015b).The way Zakat is administered differs across the world. Nevertheless, in a significant number of countries, the state exercises some form of decision power or supervision. While in a few countries in MENA Zakat collection is legally imposed, such as in Saudi Arabia, Libya, Sudan and Yemen, others have structured systems for their collection, which are considered voluntary (Hasan, 2015b). In Saudi Arabia, Zakat is administered by a department within the Ministry of Finance. While, in Yemen, it is collected by the Zakat Chamber (diwan-azZakat) and funds are distributed at the governorate and district levels, as well as to the Social Welfare Fund, in which Zakat contributions are merged with other funds used for social protection[5]. In comparison, the central Zakat Fund in Lebanon is considered a civil society organisation (ESCWA, 2014).In Morocco and Tunisia, Zakat donations are voluntary and collected by mosques, although the introduction of a central fund in both countries is under discussion. Outside MENA, Malaysia is an interesting case and often seen as a relatively progressive system, where the use of private Zakat collection agencies has helped the country to increase Zakat Funds by 400 per cent since 1991 (Hasan, 2015b).\n3. Case studies: 3.1 Sudan\n4. Discussion: The type of collection, organisational structure and political motives can determine the role that Zakat plays in providing support to the poor and vulnerable. This section looks at some of the main challenges and opportunities of Zakat by pointing out the main commonalities and differences across the two countries analysed. 4.1 Financing - Zakat opening up fiscal space for social protection\n5. Conclusions: Zakat, the religious duty to give a certain amount of one's wealth to those in need, has played an important role in providing social assistance for centuries. Zakat Funds are increasingly more institutionalised and are part of many countries' social protection systems; providing cash, food, health and education services to the poor. This paper discussed the Zakat Funds in Jordan and Sudan. A number of key messages can be taken away from these case studies:There is no one-size-fits-all solution in terms of institutionalisation of Zakat, yet a decentralised system has shown to be an important feature. The cases of both Jordan and Sudan demonstrate that local Zakat Committees play an important role in collecting and distributing Zakat on the community level.Implementing an efficient collection system is also crucial to increase funding, yet the mechanisms to develop it (i.e. through a mandatory tax or voluntary transfers) are context-specific and need to be carefully evaluated, considering both advantages and disadvantages. For example, a mandatory system can help to increase Zakat resources but, at the same time, it can decrease people's trust in Zakat since they have always perceived it as a religious duty that people used to pay themselves without interference by the state.Improving coordination among state institutions is crucial to enhance the role of Zakat Funds as providers of social protection. For this, it is crucial that databases are shared and all relevant stakeholders collaborate. However, shared databases require a minimum of infrastructure and know-how as well, which take time and resources to establish. The commitment of all relevant stakeholders is also not a given and requires consensus-building.Although the potential of using Zakat Funds as a major source to increase fiscal space for social protection, the volatility of funds, especially when collection systems are voluntary, rises as a matter of attention, as the case of Jordan shows. Predictability of contributions is deemed central for the effectiveness of programmes as regular and adequate transfers are key to bring people out of poverty.This paper has further pointed to a number of areas that deserve more in-depth research in order to better understand the opportunities and challenges of Zakat as a poverty-reduction mechanism. Future research should focus on coverage and targeting analysis by investigating who is not yet covered by Zakat (and other state-provided services) and where they live. Likewise, it is relevant to analyse whether or not some vulnerable groups have less access to Zakat than others (e.g. religious minorities and refugees).In general, few studies exist that evaluate Zakat in terms of outcomes (access to services or poverty reduction), which can be partially explained by the scarcity of data. Evaluation in this direction could be helpful to further advocate for the strengthening of Zakat institutions. The consolidation and availability of data on Zakat Funds by managing authorities is crucial, not only to improve research accuracy but also to provide the means for increasing public transparency and accountability.When considering the overall context of subsidy reforms in MENA and increased redistribution of social spending into more targeted assistance measures (as illustrated in the case of Sudan), Zakat-funded schemes have shown to be important mechanisms to support new poverty-reduction strategies. Indeed, as stated in this paper, Zakat has been an increasingly relevant institution to promote wealth redistribution and poverty reduction. It is, however, important that the provision through Zakat Funds does not lead to a shifting of responsibilities, away from the State. Zakat and traditional state-provided social protection should complement each other, yet the former should not replace the latter.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: This paper discusses the role of Zakat Funds in the provision of social protection in the Middle East and North Africa region, based on the examples of Jordan and Sudan. The purpose of this paper is to assess different modalities of Zakat in two countries where it is regulated in some form by the state.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Findings are based on a desk review of academic, peer-reviewed literature as well as reports published by international organisations and information provided online by governments and national Zakat Funds. The choice of these countries was further motivated by the availability of literature in English and Arabic.\nFindings: The extent to which Zakat can be used to finance social protection measures varies not only in the way it is collected and administered, but also with the country's geographic and political conditions. In Sudan, Zakat is mandatory and reaches proportionally more households than in Jordan. While the Quran establishes the eight categories for those who should receive Zakat, the selection in both countries is at the discretion of the Funds' administrators.\nOriginality/value: The topic of Zakat is one that has received increased attention by researchers interested in Muslim values, social policy and public finance. However, little research has been produced on the intersections of these three topics.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Does communicating the customer's resource integrating role improve or diminish value proposition effectiveness?	[ "Value proposition", "Marketing communications", "Value creation", "Communicating value", "Customer resource integration" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Recent advances in marketing and service research such as service-dominant logic (Vargo and Lusch, 2004, 2016) and service logic (Gronroos and Gummerus, 2014; Gronroos and Voima, 2013) emphasize the customer's role in value creation. In particular, customers create their own value through resource integration. This implies that customers integrate the resources provided by an organization (i.e. goods, services, and/or information) with other resources and skills they can access to transform the potential value of these resources into real value or value-in-use (Gronroos and Voima, 2013; Hibbert et al., 2012).\nTheoretical background: Value creation and resource integration\nConceptual framework: To uncover the processes underlying the effectiveness of communicating the CRIR, this paper presents a conceptual framework that includes the three effectiveness criteria; their relationships as well as variables mediating these relationships (see Figure 1). To organize the effectiveness criteria of explicitly communicating the CRIR in the value proposition, this study departs from the Fishbeinian belief-attitude-intention framework (Fishbein and Ajzen, 1975). Fishbein and Ajzen (1975, p. 508) indicate that the evaluation of the outcomes of a communication involves \"a detailed analysis of the processes intervening between the manipulation and change in dependent variable\" and that this \"requires the distinction between beliefs, attitudes, intentions, and behaviors.\" These steps also reflect the hierarchy of effects model that describes the cognitive, affective, and conative steps receivers of an advertised message follow (e.g. Barry, 2002). The hierarchy of effects model specifies the sequence in which these steps take place (Eisend and Tarrahi, 2016).\nMethod: Settings\nStudy 1: Sample and procedure\nStudy 2: Given the focus on customers as resource integrators, it is important to consider customers' available resources when considering appropriate segments. As customer resource integration refers to the customer's activities and interactions that create value for the customer by using and combining resources from market-facing, public, and private sources (McColl-Kennedy et al., 2012; Sweeney et al., 2015), customers should have access to the necessary resources before being able to integrate them in a value creation process. After all, customers also need to bring a value foundation to the table: their skills and their access to the required additional resources. Customers without the required skills or without access to the necessary resources will be unable to attain value-in-use (Gronroos, 2011). Put simple, customers not possessing a toothbrush, brushing skills or time to brush cannot turn the toothpaste's potential value into real value. Resource availability, which involves whether the customer has the necessary resources (e.g. time, money, physical ability) to become a successful resource integrator, then becomes an important boundary condition in the customer's value creation process.\nGeneral discussion: This research contributes to the marketing and service literature by empirically investigating the effectiveness of explicitly communicating the customer's resource integrating role (CRIR) in value propositions. The combined results of two empirical studies in an indirect interaction (Study 1) as well as a direct interaction (Study 2) context contribute to a coherent picture, in which communicating the CRIR in the value proposition enhances value proposition effectiveness. This paper contributes to the literature in several ways.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine whether explicitly communicating the customer's resource integrating role in value propositions improves or diminishes value proposition effectiveness.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Based on existing research on value propositions, three effectiveness criteria are used: role clarity, expected customer value, and purchase intention. Two experiments manipulating the presence of the customer's resource integrating role in value propositions test the conceptual model in both an indirect interaction (Study 1, toothpaste, n=207) and a direct interaction context (Study 2, fitness program, n=228). Additionally, Study 2 includes the moderating role of resource availability.\nFindings: Explicitly communicating the customer's resource integrating role in value propositions increases customers' role clarity, which in turn influences customer's attitude toward the service and purchase intention through a service-related (i.e. expected benefits and expected efforts) and an ad-related (i.e. ad credibility and attitude toward the ad) route. However, these results only hold for customers high in resource availability.\nOriginality/value: This research provides initial empirical support for the often-stated claim that value propositions should include the (potential) value of the offering as well as the (resource integrating) role of the customer. Taking a broader perspective, this research provides initial empirical support for recent calls to develop marketing communication practices that facilitate value-in-use. This paper's findings show that adopting service logic in marketing communications seems to improve value propositions' effectiveness.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Hospitality finance research during recent two decades: Subjects, methodologies, and citations	[ "Hospitality services", "Finance", "Serials" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: A comprehensive review of prior research in a field can provide an overview of the boundaries and understandings of research subjects in a field, as well as practices and statistical techniques used in that field. In particular, research subjects, methodologies, and analysis techniques could be considered as the indicators of future research directions and methodological sophistication (Crawford-Welch and McCleary, 1992; Grazer and Stiff, 1987; Reid and Andereck, 1989). Many scholars have consistently reviewed and reported on research papers published in hospitality and tourism journals during the last two decades, providing the general trend of research subjects (Baloglu and Assante, 1999; Chon et al., 1989; Crawford-Welch and McCleary, 1992; Dann et al., 1988; Eder and Umbreit, 1988; Harris and Brown, 1998; Olsen, 2004; Olsen and Roper, 1998; Rivera and Upchurch, 2008). Most hospitality review papers simply provided a broad overview of the trends in topics but did not provide the details of subjects, samples, and methodologies. Only two of the hospitality review papers (i.e. Baloglu and Assante, 1999; Crawford-Welch and McCleary, 1992) provided details on hospitality subjects. However, the aim of these papers was to handle all fields of hospitality research broadly, not to target a specific field in depth.\nRelated literature: As noted, many scholars have investigated prior research in the hospitality and tourism field (Baloglu and Assante, 1999; Chon et al., 1989; Crawford-Welch and McCleary, 1992; Dann et al., 1988; Eder and Umbreit, 1988; Harris and Brown, 1998; Olsen, 2004; Olsen and Roper, 1998; Rivera and Upchurch, 2008). Dann et al. (1988) categorized tourism research into several subjects and also examined which methodologies were used. Based on the findings, the study claimed that tourism research lacks sufficient methodological sophistication. Eder and Umbreit (1988) also indicated that hospitality research needed to ensure research validity.\nMethodology: As mentioned previously, this study explored research articles published in four hospitality journals (JHTR, IJHM, IJCHM, Cornell) from 1990 to 2009. This study included full-length academic articles and research notes but excluded editors\nResults: From 1990 to 2009 the four hospitality journals published 3,039 papers. Out of those, 113 papers (3.7 percent) were about finance subjects. JHTR published 26 finance papers (5.8 percent) out of 446 studies, IJHM published 33 finance papers (4.6 percent) out of 710 studies, IJCHM published 12 finance papers (1.4 percent) out of 867 papers, and Cornell published 42 finance papers (4.2 percent) out of 1,012 published papers. The Cornell Hospitality Quarterly published the most hospitality finance papers, but the largest proportion of finance papers was published in JHTR. As Table I shows, in the 1990s the number and proportion of finance papers in hospitality journals were small. In the 2000s, the numbers of hospitality finance papers have increased dramatically. For example, in 2009 there were 14 finance papers, which accounts for 7.2 percent of all published papers at the four journals. Thus, it is clear that interest in finance research in hospitality is undoubtedly increasing.\nConcluding remarks: This study investigated various aspects of hospitality finance research. Over the last 20 years the number and proportion of finance studies published has dramatically increased. However, the subjects of hospitality finance papers have been limited to a few topics, such as risk management, financing, valuation and bankruptcy. Also, these papers mainly examined US hotel firms. In terms of statistical methods used in hospitality finance research, most studies provided descriptive statistics and the majority used regression analysis. Also, during the first decade of the sample period, the qualitative studies were the majority but since the new millennium quantitative studies have become the major stream of the hospitality finance research. In terms of citation, finance subjects providing fundamental theory and background, such as capital structure, have been cited more often.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this study is to understand hospitality finance research through content analysis by examining articles published during the past two decades (1990 to 2009).\nDesign/methodology/approach: This study identified subject areas, methodologies, and citations from hospitality finance papers published in four major hospitality journals (Journal of Hospitality\nFindings: A perusal of 113 hospitality finance articles suggested that researchers have focused on several subjects, such as risk management, financing, bankruptcy, and capital structure. Even though qualitative analysis was the most common method in the 1990s, the use of quantitative analyses dramatically increased during the recent decade.\nResearch limitations/implications: The data were collected from four hospitality journals. If data were collected from more hospitality journals, the most common subjects and citations might be different from the results of this study.\nPractical implications: This study offers readers a perspective on how hospitality finance research has been conducted recently and also suggests a big picture about the potential direction of future research.\nOriginality/value: This study provides valuable information about past and current research streams, as well as the direction of hospitality finance research. Compared with previous review studies, this study concentrated on a specific segment of hospitality research in order to improve basic understanding of what is going on in the hospitality finance research, which has never been examined before.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Digital newspaper preservation through collaboration	[ "Collaboration", "Partnership", "Digital libraries", "Newspapers", "Digital preservation", "Historical research" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: The Texas Digital Newspaper Program (TDNP) supports newspaper preservation and access for any title in Texas, from any date, any location and representing any community. As an active member of the Texas Press Association (TPA), TDNP also supports large-scale preservation of born-digital newspaper PDF issues for member publishers. This article will explore how the early days of TDNP built a strong foundation of collaboration and support for large-scale preservation projects, including support for preserving a state press association PDF newspaper collection.\nHistory and background: responding to community needs: In the early 2000s, Cathy Nelson Hartman, now Associate Dean of UNT Libraries, envisioned partnering with communities across Texas who hold primary source history materials to develop what has now become The Portal to Texas History: a unified, statewide digital repository for primary source artifacts. University of North Texas Libraries established the Portal in 2002 to help improve access to the rich archival resources held at cultural heritage institutions across Texas. During outreach visits with small and large partner organizations, a common theme emerged of communities that especially wanted to digitize and preserve their local newspapers. Dean Hartman discussed her experiences from when she spoke with different Texas groups on these outreach visits:\nNational digital newspaper program: To build staff knowledge, UNT Libraries, in collaboration with the Dolph Briscoe Center from American History at the University of Texas, was awarded the National Digital Newspaper Program (NDNP) grant in 2007:\nThe Texas digital newspaper program: Upon public announcement of UNT Libraries as a partner institution in NDNP, Portal staff were immediately inundated with requests from partners from across the state to digitize various titles that fell completely outside the scope of NDNP, including titles from small towns, post-1923 issues of titles and, in some instances, titles that were in languages other than English. To meet with these requests, the TDNP began. Portal staff spread the message that any and all Texas newspaper content was fair game for TDNP, whether it came from a town of 600 people or whether it represented Fort Worth during its cattle boom. The goal was that TDNP would serve as the hub of preservation and access needs to digital newspaper content in Texas.\nTechnology and workflows: The Portal to Texas History now manages three content streams for newspaper materials: microfilm digitization, paper digitization and born-digital ingests. This work is carried out by a team consisting of four full-time staff members and six student assistants. Once content has been digitized and organized by the newspaper team through metadata and page sequencing, it undergoes Optical Character Recognition (OCR) using an Abbyy Recognition Server cluster comprising 10 nodes and 48 OCR core. OCR enables full-text searchability, with the search hits appearing as highlighted in yellow (Figure 1, for an example of a search result for \"Sam Houston\"). To date, newspapers of nine different languages have been OCR'ed and included on The Portal to Texas History. In addition to OCR, every newspaper issue loaded into TDNP has an accompanying metadata record to ensure access points to the issues.\nBuilding partnerships: One of the founding goals of The Portal to Texas History is to unite content providers across Texas with UNT Libraries' capacity for digitization services, digital preservation infrastructure and open data access. Groups who partner with UNT Libraries to digitize their newspapers frequently cite the lack of fees for continuing access or continued sustainability to their communities as a deciding factor in their decision to digitize with UNT Libraries. One library director whose group had received a grant to digitize and preserve their newspaper in TDNP stated:\nThe Texas press association: As TDNP and its partnerships have expanded, the need to shape the identity of the program through public communication has increased tremendously. This need is a direct result of more newspaper preservation work, which has led to increased workload, increased staff and directly correlates to the need for greater financial support. Shaping the identity of TDNP has involved a series of conversations with external stakeholders and internal administrators. This process has included such work as developing better online information about partnering with TDNP (http://tdnp.unt.edu), as well as creating and deploying traveling newspaper banners to reside at area public libraries and schools. Also, this process has involved raising awareness of TDNP through participation in library conferences and TPA annual meetings.\nBorn-digital newspaper preservation: Born digital-newspapers serve as a significant content ingest stream for TDNP. This began in 2010 when Terrie Gonzalez contacted Portal staff to archive born-digital, print master versions of her newspaper, they were able to work with her to understand the specifics of born digital newspapers and develop a workflow that met the needs of both the publisher and the Portal. After successfully completing this first born-digital newspaper project, the Portal staff was poised to add a class of newspaper content into its workflows for newspaper digitization. Both the born-digital newspapers and the newspapers scanned from the large-format planetary scanner have the added benefit of providing full-color content to Portal users.\nResearch projects of note: Multiple research projects utilizing TDNP newspaper content demonstrate how a state hub of newspaper digitization can support the larger research conversation.\nRecommendations and conclusion: This paper is intended to represent a model of how successful collaborative efforts have contributed to large-scale preservation of a state's newspaper content. Individual strands of thread seem very small, but combining strands forms something much larger and more meaningful. The TDNP serves as an example of how combining the threads of resources, skillsets and content can lead to something much bigger and more all-encompassing than what would have occurred if UNT Libraries had determined that the Portal would be a stand-alone digitization effort.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The Texas Digital Newspaper Program (TDNP) supports newspaper preservation and access for any title in Texas, from any date, any location and representing any community. As an active member of the Texas Press Association, TDNP also supports large-scale preservation of born-digital newspaper PDF issues for member publishers. This paper aims to explore how the early days of TDNP built a strong foundation of collaboration and support for large-scale preservation projects, including support for preserving a state press association PDF newspaper collection.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This paper is a case study of a collaborative endeavor to create a large-scale, statewide digital newspaper preservation hub in Texas. This paper details how individual partnerships led to new and larger partnerships. Figures and tables represent numbers of partner institutions served, numbers of newspapers preserved and screenshots of how these items appear within collections on the digital repository environment of The Portal to Texas History. This paper concludes with recommendations for groups interested in developing their own collaborative projects.\nFindings: As a case study, the data explored include numbers of partnering institutions, materials contributed by partnering institutions and how these numbers help to forward the TDNP agenda.\nPractical Implications: The final recommendations are lessons learned through collaboration, and the implications are real-world advice from the partners developed through the TDNP.\nOriginality/value: Hosting over 3.25 million pages of newspapers, the TDNP has become an enormous hub of newspaper preservation in Texas, and it is unique in the numbers of partners it supports and the numbers of pages it is able to host for free access via The Portal to Texas History. This paper is intended to help other groups across the world build their own collaborative preservation efforts, and it offers pragmatic advice derived from hands-on experience.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
A high-dimensional classification approach based on class-dependent feature subspace	[ "Classification", "Feature selection", "Genetic algorithm", "Support vector machine", "Class-dependent feature subspace" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Classification is one of the fundamental tasks in business intelligence, data mining, machine learning, and pattern recognition (He et al., 2012; Chen et al., 2014). In the era of big data, classification often needs to be carried out on high-dimensional data (Wu et al., 2014; Cheng et al., 2016). However, many attributes or features in high-dimensional data may be redundant or irrelevant. For instance, out of a myriad of attributes collected in manufacturing, only a certain subset of features is relevant and adequate in identifying potential equipment failures. In most cases, high-dimensional classification suffers from the existence of many irrelevant features (Guyon and Elisseeff, 2003; Li et al., 2014). Therefore, dimensionality reduction is usually recommended in order to derive a better classifier for the high-dimensional data, as well as to reduce computational cost. Feature selection (FS), using only a subset of attributes as the discriminative features to monitor target data instead of using all available attributes, is a popular dimensionality reduction technique. Recently, using FS in high-dimensional classification has gained increasing academic and industrial attention (Akadi et al., 2011; Aydogan et al., 2012; Liu et al., 2010; Liu and Yu, 2005; Jensen and Shen, 2009; Zhu et al., 2015).\n2. Related work: Data collection is often overdone because of the explorative nature of data mining. As a result, the data sets often carry dimensions irrelevant to the classification task at hand. Data mining algorithms and classification models suffer from the high-dimensional data because many redundant attributes hurt the predictive accuracy of classifier and raise the training time. FS, a popular dimensionality reduction technique, is desirable in classification of high-dimensional data (Li et al., 2014; Lin et al., 2014). It plays a nontrivial role in speeding up learning, enhancing performance of classification and producing a more compact classification model with better generalization (Guyon and Elisseeff, 2003; Hu et al., 2008).\n3. CFS-based classification approach: The basic idea of the CFS approach is to identify a set of discriminative features and to train a classifier for each class. We argue that the class-dependent integration of discriminative features and classifier is beneficial to both classification performance and precise understanding of data. This section first explains the notion of CFS, and then describes the procedure of our CFS-based classification utilizing GA, SVM, and feature filtering using mutual information.\n4. GA design: This section develops a GA-based algorithm named GASVM to optimize CFS for each class. GA has been widely used in various application domains (Goldberg, 2005). GASVM repeatedly evolves CFSs until the best solution or a near-optimal solution is reached. To use GA, candidate solution must be represented as a chromosome (individual). The GA then creates a population of individuals and applies genetic operators such as crossover and mutation to evolve solutions in order to find the best one(s). To solve the problem of CFS optimization effectively and efficiently, we customize the GA design in terms of encoding strategy, fitness evaluation, and genetic operators including initialization, selection, crossover, and mutation.\n5. Experimental studies: We perform several experiments to validate performance of the proposed CFS-based classification method. These experiments are conducted on 12 UCI data sets (Asuncion and Newman, 2007). Main characteristics of considered UCI data sets are listed in Table I. Ten-fold cross validation is used to evaluate the classification performance.\n6. Conclusion and further study: High-dimensional classification often suffers from bad predictive accuracy and difficulty in understanding of the data and dimensions. The purpose of this paper is to develop an effective and compact classification model for high-dimensional data. Based on the notion of CFS, we develop a high-dimensional data classification approach named GASVM. Our approach can find a compact combination of discriminative features as well as a good SVM classifier for each class. The proposed method provides a concise interpretation of the high-dimensional data. Experimental studies demonstrate that feature filtering and the GA design contribute to the improvement of classification performance.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to build a compact and accurate classifier for high-dimensional classification.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A classification approach based on class-dependent feature subspace (CFS) is proposed. CFS is a class-dependent integration of a support vector machine (SVM) classifier and associated discriminative features. For each class, our genetic algorithm (GA)-based approach evolves the best subset of discriminative features and SVM classifier simultaneously. To guarantee convergence and efficiency, the authors customize the GA in terms of encoding strategy, fitness evaluation, and genetic operators.\nFindings: Experimental studies demonstrated that the proposed CFS-based approach is superior to other state-of-the-art classification algorithms on UCI data sets in terms of both concise interpretation and predictive power for high-dimensional data.\nResearch limitations/implications: UCI data sets rather than real industrial data are used to evaluate the proposed approach. In addition, only single-label classification is addressed in the study.\nPractical implications: The proposed method not only constructs an accurate classification model but also obtains a compact combination of discriminative features. It is helpful for business makers to get a concise understanding of the high-dimensional data.\nOriginality/value: The authors propose a compact and effective classification approach for high-dimensional data. Instead of the same feature subset for all the classes, the proposed CFS-based approach obtains the optimal subset of discriminative feature and SVM classifier for each class. The proposed approach enhances both interpretability and predictive power for high-dimensional data.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Human resources and manufacturing: where and when should they be aligned?	[ "Strategic management", "Firm performance", "Manufacturing strategy", "Environmental dynamism", "Human resources strategy", "Horizontal fit" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The formation of strategy is often seen as a top-down process (Hofer and Schendel, 1978) in which a business strategy needs to be translated into functional ones that are not only consistent with it (vertical fit), but also among themselves (horizontal fit) for their effective implementation, and therefore help to enhance firm performance. Our research seeks to further explore this latter type of fit or adjustment between a firm's functional strategies, analysing the specific case of the functions of human resources (HR) and production/manufacturing.\nHR and manufacturing strategies: Both systems - HR and manufacturing - have three interrelated aspects located at different hierarchical levels (Gonzalez-Benito and Suarez-Gonzalez, 2010; Kepes and Delery, 2007; Leong et al., 1990) (see Figure 1): objectives (strategy pursued), practices (means), and achievements (strategy achieved). The system's objectives are those specific goals or priorities that a firm establishes for each functional area. These functional objectives should likewise be aligned with the business goals and competitive strategy. Practices are the specific decisions made for implementing the strategy in each decision-making area (e.g. recruitment, training or remuneration in HR, and facilities, technology, and planning and control in manufacturing). Finally, achievements are the degrees of fulfilment of the objectives initially proposed.\nModel and hypotheses: The first step towards horizontal fit involves selecting competitive priorities. Each and every one of the links in a firm's entire value chain has to uphold the same priorities (or at least equivalent ones adapted to each function). Fit in objectives between HR and manufacturing may thus be understood as the outcome of a similar interpretation of the business strategy by both functions. It is an indication that functional managers understand the business strategy and have a shared vision of the rationale underpinning it; in other words, there is strategic consensus among middle management (Kellermanns et al., 2005; Gonzalez-Benito et al., 2012; Walter et al., 2013). The research on strategic consensus provides empirical support for a positive effect on organisational performance (Kellermanns et al., 2011). This prior agreement among functional managers over what the priorities should be facilitates internal communication and co-operation, and prevents political and self-serving behaviour (Kellermanns and Floyd, 2005). Likewise, emphasising the same priorities ensures a consistent message is conveyed to employees, which may be a source of motivation and foster their engagement with the organisation and its business strategy. Consistent messages within the HR/operations departments (and between them) enable employees to make confident attributions about cause-effect relationships, and thereby share a common understanding of the behaviours expected and rewarded in the organisation that will positively affect organisational effectiveness (Bowen and Ostroff, 2004). Therefore, fit in objectives involves greater consistency in the messages from the functional level (HR and manufacturing in our analysis), helping to build strategic commitment and leading to a more successful implementation (Dooley et al., 2000). In order to encapsulate this positive effect of fit in objectives, we propose the following hypothesis:\nMethod: Data\nResults: Effects of both fits on firm performance\nDiscussion of results: Effects of both fits on firm performance\nConclusions: This paper provides evidence of the influence that the horizontal fit between the areas of HR and production has on firm performance. In contrast to the prevailing stream in SHRM, we have focused our attention on functional priorities or goals, rather than on HR practices; and we have done the same in the production area. What is more, we have, in turn, identified two types of fit: in objectives and in achievements. This has enabled us, on the one hand, to verify the positive effects that both fits have on performance, while, on the other, it has revealed a mediating effect of the fit in achievements in the relationship between the fit in objectives and performance. Finally, dynamism in the environment has been found to have a moderating effect, which has proven to be a variable that reinforces the positive effects of fit. These findings not only provide evidence on the strategic importance of horizontal fit, and specifically the fit of the HR and production functions, but also show that they constitute a first step towards understanding their nature and identifying the main variables to be considered for extracting their full competitive potential.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to analyse the effect that a horizontal fit between two functions (human resources (HR) and manufacturing) has on firm performance, distinguishing between fit in objectives and fit in achievements.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This study uses 144 double surveys, addressed to two different respondents per company. Structural equation modelling was used to investigate the mediating role of fit in achievements in the relationship between fit in objectives and performance.\nFindings: The study provides evidence of the particular way in which the two components of horizontal fit that the authors distinguish (fit in objectives and fit in achievements) the impact on performance: fit in objectives has an indirect effect on performance, which is fully mediated by the fit in achievements. The results also show that environmental dynamism has a significant impact on both the advantages and drawbacks of fit.\nPractical implications: By highlighting the importance of both levels of horizontal fit and distinguishing between them, this paper calls upon HR and manufacturing managers to show a greater understanding of the key dimensions common to both areas.\nOriginality/value: This study analyses horizontal fit by developing a framework of priorities in HR management (HRM) similar to that traditionally used in production management. In particular, it adapts the framework of production competence to the area of HRM to study the fit between the two functional strategies. This study also supports the value chain model proposed by Porter (1985).\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Factors influencing online auction repurchase intention	[ "Auctions", "Internet", "Customer satisfaction" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Online auctions account for a large volume of the economic activities over the Internet, and have not faded even after many other web-based services have lost their initial popularity. At any time, there are millions of auction listings in thousands of categories on auction sites such as eBay and Yahoo. Such business activities have increased rapidly, leading to a retailing revolution - online consumer-to-consumer (C2C) auctions (Stern and Stafford, 2006). Online auctions involve three players with distinctive roles - seller, bidder, and auctioneer (Mollenberg, 2004; Sashi and O'Leary, 2001). Given the nature of the Internet environment, bidders cannot inspect the real item as they can in traditional stores, and then they may perceive differences between the imagined and the real product. This may cause the bidder to purchase an item once and not to buy again. It highlights the importance of the role of auctioneer and seller.Bidders form beliefs about product performance based upon prior experience with the product and communications about the product, which imply a certain level of quality. Perceived performance of these players should equal or exceed the bidder's expectation. Expectancy disconfirmation theory (EDT) describes the above phenomenon and becomes one of the most familiar theories in the marketing and IS field. It was developed by Oliver (1980) and originally proposed that a consumer's post-purchase satisfaction is jointly determined by pre-purchase expectation and expectancy disconfirmation. Satisfaction, in turn, is believed to influence post-purchase intention. The literature has numerous examples of discussions using EDT to examine customer satisfaction (Madrigal, 1995; Tse and Wilton, 1988; Spreng et al., 1996; Chen-Yu et al., 2001) and information technology continuous usage (Bhattacherjee, 2001a, b; McKinney et al., 2002; Wu and Padgett, 2004; Lin et al., 2005; Hsu et al., 2006). Thus, the purpose of this study is to draw on EDT to explore cognitive beliefs and affect the influence on an individual's intention to repurchase in online auctions.The proposed research model examines bidding behavior from three parties - bidder, seller, and auctioneer. In the bidder's perspective, this study is primarily concerned with repurchase intention. There are large numbers of business models on the Internet for shoppers to choose among. How to attract bidders and to maintain their loyalty are critical issues (Lin et al., 2005). In the auctioneer's perspective, the auction marketplace needs to develop the technology infrastructure and control mechanisms to ensure that every transaction happens smoothly. The auction marketplace not only establishes technical standards and security procedures to make the website reliable, but also acts as an intermediary between bidders and sellers to construct effective protection policies and warranty programs. Therefore, an online auction's policy and reliability play important roles in online bidding behavior. In the seller's perspective, sellers' prior performance influences bidders' repurchase intention. Sellers' reputation and service quality play important roles in online bidding behavior (Strader and Ramaswami, 2002). Online auctions allow feedback rating to evaluate the seller's performance, and then bidders can leave comments regarding the service quality of each transaction in the feedback forum. Hence, this study regards policy, reliability, reputation, and service quality as antecedents of disconfirmation, and proposes hypotheses to investigate the relationship between them.Overall, the paper is structured as follows: the next section puts forward a theoretical foundation that links online auctions and EDT. The third section describes the research model and hypotheses. The fourth section discusses the methodology and data analysis techniques used to validate the scales and test the model. The last section presents the findings and conclusions.\nLiterature review: Online auction\nResearch model and methodology: Research model and hypotheses\nData analysis and results: Reliability and validity of research constructs\nConclusion and limitations: Findings and implications\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this study is to integrate expectancy disconfirmation theory (EDT) to explore cognitive beliefs and affect influencing an individual's intention to repurchase in online marketplaces.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The paper used EDT to conduct an empirical study and data were collected from a total of 303 bidders of online auctions. A structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to assess the relationships of the research model.\nFindings: - The findings show that bidders' disconfirmation of online auctions is positively associated with their satisfaction, which in turn is positively associated with their repurchase intentions.\nPractical implications: - Both bidders' expectation of policy and auctioneers' performance of policy are important determinants of disconfirmation. Auctioneers need to recognize the distinctive roles of information policy in selling and bidding rules. Besides, neither bidders' expectation of sellers' reputation nor their expectation of service quality has a significant relationship with disconfirmation. This finding implies that in a mature e-commerce environment bidders pay more attention to the sellers' performance than their prior expectation.\nOriginality/value: - This study, which aims to shed light on bidder behavior in online auctions, is the first study that has applied an EDT-based model to investigate the determinants of repurchase intention in online auctions.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
When friends become enemies: co-opetition relationships between banks and third-party payment providers	[ "Alipay", "Third-party payment provider", "Upstream and downstream firms", "Co-opetition", "Loyalty" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: A mobile wallet is a form of mobile payment that enables users to conduct payment electronically through use of a mobile device (Chawla and Joshi, 2019; Singh et al., 2017). It replaces the physical wallet so that payment transactions can be completed at a merchant's location (Zhao et al., 2019). Mobile wallets are popular primarily because they integrate all of the benefits of existing physical and digital payment methods for firms and customers on a single platform that promotes higher operational efficiencies and greater convenience (Cao et al., 2018; Kalinic et al., 2019; Kumar et al., 2018; Zhu et al., 2017).In China, the typical mobile wallets are Alipay and WeChat Pay (China Internet Network Information Center, 2019). These mobile wallets depend on banks (Yin and Hu, 2009; Zhong and Nieminen, 2015). When customers use Alipay, they have to bundle their bank cards with Alipay according to China's policy. Customers' money in the Alipay payment system is deposited in Alipay's corporate account opened in banks. These banks can get the funds from Alipay's corporate account and then loan the money to other enterprises to get an interest rate margin (Guo and Bouwman, 2016; Zhong and Nieminen, 2015). Banks initially supported such payment platforms so that customers could store more money in their bank accounts (Chawla and Joshi, 2019; Lawson and Todd, 2003). With its advantages of convenience and speed, the third-party payment has seized a large number of payment market shares (China Internet Network Information Center, 2019). The customers bound by the new third-party payment have strong stickiness, so banks cooperating with the third-party payment providers can also get the savings of these users (Guo and Bouwman, 2016; Yin and Hu, 2009).However, with the launch of Alipay's savings business and its rising investment business, it now competes with banks to some extent. When Alipay gets the license obtained from the People's Bank of China, they can sell money funds to individuals and enterprises at a higher rate than banks, which competes with banks' saving business (customers will transfer money from bank cards to Alipay). Then, Alipay gets the loan license to conduct petty loans to individuals and small and micro-enterprises, which also competes with banks' loan transaction. Alipay's third-payment service competes with banks' intermediate business, too (Guo and Bouwman, 2016; Zhong and Nieminen, 2015). The same is true of WeChat Pay (Guo and Bouwman, 2016; Yin and Hu, 2009). It is clear, then, that banks and Alipay have formed a competitive relationship (Zhong and Nieminen, 2015). In recent years, new payment platforms have emerged without savings functions, like NFC technology (Apple Pay and Android Pay) (Zhao et al., 2019). Such platforms, therefore, do not create competition for banks (Yin and Hu, 2009). To compete with Alipay and WeChat Pay, it would seem that banks should support or build third-party payment systems that do not compete with their existing deposit systems. Banks in China, however, continue to maintain cooperation with Alipay and have not taken aggressive action to support friendly new entrants (Guo and Bouwman, 2016; Zhong and Nieminen, 2015).We identified a more surprising phenomenon in Canada (Global Banking News, 2018a), Europe (Global Banking News, 2016, 2017a, b) and other countries (Global Banking News, 2018b, c) where Apple Pay has occupied a certain market, Alipay--a competitive platform against banks--still attempts to enter the market, and some banks still want to choose to cooperate with it. In fact, it is revealed by the China Internet Network Information Center that Alipay and WeChat Pay have operated third-party payment service in more than 40 countries and regions in 2018 (China Internet Network Information Center, 2019).These details highlight an interesting phenomenon regarding cooperation and competition between banks and third-party payment providers (Bott and Milkau, 2014; Guo and Bouwman, 2016; Yin and Wu, 2009). The conventional advice in the supply chain market is that upstream firms should cooperate with downstream firms (Arntzen et al., 1995; Cetinkaya and Lee, 2000) and suppress the competitive downstream. There are, however, examples of upstream firms that still cooperate with competitive downstream firms even when they have noncompetitive options, such as in the case of banks and Alipay in China (Guo and Bouwman, 2016; Zhong and Nieminen, 2015).This study examines the cooperation and competition between banks and third-party payment providers in light of upstream and downstream firms. Specifically, this study explains decisions made by upstream firms and answers the following questions:In enterprise chain cooperation, when the upstream firm's interest is violated by the incumbent downstream firm, when and why is it optimal for the upstream firm to end cooperation with the incumbent firm or to continue cooperation?Do such strategies differ according to whether the upstream duopoly is symmetric or asymmetric?If the cooperation goes smoothly in the original partnership and there is no competition, and a new downstream firm that poses a competition threat to the upstream firm wants to enter the market, when and why can it survive?To address these questions, we develop a model including two upstream firms and two downstream firms (i.e. one competitive incumbent downstream and a noncompetitive new-entry downstream firm). After analyzing the upstream firm's profit function and its decision, we find that user traffic is important to all of the firms. When the upstream firm has more loyal users than the competitive downstream firms to a certain level, it would terminate cooperation with the competitive downstream firm; otherwise, it would maintain cooperation. This is true whether the duopoly upstream firms are symmetrical or asymmetrical.Our explanations are based on the interdependence of upstream and downstream firms, competition between different upstream firms and differences in consumer loyalty to upstream and downstream firms (Arya et al., 2008; Cachon and Zipkin, 1999). In the model, we assume upstream enterprises gain revenues by attracting users in two ways. One way is that they encourage consumer loyalty through their own efforts. Consumers eventually buy their products or use their services, no matter which downstream firm the product of service is from. Another is that they attract users by cooperating with downstream firms. Loyal users of one downstream firm will purchase the products or services of upstream firms that cooperate with the downstream firm. Even if they are not loyal to the upstream firm, they will buy its products through a favorite downstream firm.Comparing these two approaches, we highlight that user loyalty is particularly important to upstream and downstream firms. In this study, we recognize the importance of user traffic for upstream and downstream firms. If user loyalty is to an upstream firm, they may choose to follow an upstream firm to enter a downstream firm that has cooperated with it. If they are loyal to a downstream firm, they might go to the loyal downstream firm and buy only those products of the upstream firms that are cooperatively associated with this downstream firm. At the same time, we consider that the upstream firm is not a monopoly; the existence of competitors at the same level causes upstream firms to pay attention to cooperation with downstream firms.This paper includes five sections. The first presents the conceptual background and the main research questions. The second part relates the study to the existing literature in marketing and economics. The third part details the model. The fourth part analyzes the equilibriums of symmetric and asymmetric upstream firms and presents the results. The final section discusses the implications of findings for academics and practitioners, identifies study limitations and proffers suggestions for future research.\n2. Literature review: 2.1 Vertical competition and cooperation\n3. Model: Cooperation between upstream and downstream firms is necessary to make profits (Arya et al., 2007). It is difficult for a firm without a partner to make money (Cachon and Lariviere, 2005). If the upstream firm holds a monopoly, it has considerable power, which will determine outcomes for the downstream firms.P1. If the upstream firm holds a monopoly, and the incumbent downstream firm poses a competitive threat, when a new noncompetitive downstream firm emerges, the monopolist will abandon the competitive firm and cooperate with the noncompetitive firm.Therefore, the following model is concerned primarily with decisions made by an upstream firm in a duopoly when it is faced with new entrants. At the beginning, only one firm (a monopoly) exists in the downstream, and then a new firm enters the market. We set up the model by first describing consumers, upstream firms, downstream firms and then describing the decision sequence. 3.1 Users\n4. Equilibrium with analysis: 4.1 Equilibrium with symmetrical upstream firms\n5. Discussion: 5.1 Conclusion\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to investigate the conditions under which working with an incumbent downstream competitor could be a beneficial strategy for upstream firms as the case of the relationship between banks and third-party payment providers.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Using a game model, this study considers a market with two upstream firms (banks) and two downstream firms (third-party payment providers). One downstream firm is an incumbent that poses a competitive threat to the upstream market, and the other downstream firm does not.\nFindings: The results show that the optimal decision for banks depends on the number of loyal users the incumbent third-party payment providers and banks have. When the bank has more loyal users than the competitive third-party provider to a certain level, it would terminate cooperation with the provider; otherwise, the bank would maintain cooperation. This is true whether the duopoly banks are symmetrical or asymmetrical.\nOriginality/value: This study makes contribution to the theory of co-opetition lies in the fact that it examines a special case of competition and cooperation between vertical enterprises in the bank context. This study investigates how the upstream firms do when threatened by a downstream firm while the upstream firms have other options. This study also contributes to bank marketing theory through providing explanations for some of the incomprehensible cooperation in China's payment market, which is characterized by consumer loyalty. This study extends previous new-entry competition for banks by differentiating between incumbent and new-entry downstream firms.\nPeer review: The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/IJBM-11-2019-0414\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Somatic and cultural knowledge: drivers of a habitus-driven model of tacit knowledge acquisition	[ "Habitus", "Tacit knowledge sharing", "Chinese software organizations", "Continuous change", "Cultural knowledge", "Somatic knowledge", "Tacit knowledge acquisition" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction and research context: As proposed by Botha et al. (2008), rapid and continuous change is a characteristic of the modern business and social environment:Businesses are forced to transform themselves fundamentally to survive in a challenging economy. Transformation implies change in the way business is conducted, in the way people perform their contribution to the organisation, and in the way the organisation perceives and manages its vital assets, which increasingly are built around the key assets of intellectual capital and knowledge.(Botha et al., 2008, p. xvii)\n2. Literature review: 2.1 SW industry as a knowledge-intensive sector\n3. Research design: 3.1 Research Question\n4. Research findings: The theoretical and explanatory narrative presented in this section is the product of the Straussian GT process adopted. All interviews responses were taken into account in full. The process was started with open coding of an initial set of interviews and the extraction of all codes pertaining to the phenomena being studied, followed by an initial process of axial coding that defined early categories and subcategories that encapsulate these codes. This process was then continued elliptically until theoretical saturation was achieved. Every emergent and relevant code was checked against categories and already accepted codes using the process of constant comparison.\n5. Discussion: To define knowledge in a \"non-abstract and non-sweeping\" is extremely difficult (Alvesson, 1993). If knowledge is dissociated from practice and experience, it easy becomes \"everything and nothing\" (Wikstrom and Normann, 1994). This was very clear in the responses provided by the interviews in this research. Learning and tacit knowledge acquisition are not abstract concepts and are closely related to their daily practice, problem solving and difficulties. In their pragmatic view, there is no learning without purpose and need. There is no theoretical KM, but instead purposeful and intentional learning and sharing practices. Mostly unaware of academic theoretical and philosophical thinking as well as abstract conceptualizations of knowledge, their responses are pragmatically linked with their need for efficient work, aspirations for professional progression, peer recognition and at times self-rewarding learning. Bridging between the academic and practitioner worlds was one of the aims of this study as reflected in the first research question. As proposed by Nunes et al. (2005), more studies and publications in the KM field should focus on real case studies in order to close the gap between theoretical propositions and the reality of practice. This implies considering practitioners in knowledge-intensive organizations as much more than \"agents of formal knowledge\" (Burris, 1993) but active creators of knowledge through articulation and externalization of their own tacit knowledge, which is necessary in order to support others both in their companies and in the sector as a whole.\n6. Conclusions: This study was contextualized and grounded in the agency of practitioners in the SW industry in China. It clearly showed that this is a particularly interesting and unique context due to the unstoppable, relentless and increasingly fast change that characterizes the sector. The findings reveal that SW development practitioners are well aware of the need for life-long learning and continuous individual development. These processes were divided by the initial coding process into two main categories: individual learning and learning from others. The study confirmed that KS is a prevalent practice in the sector and within the organizations. This led to a clear theoretical understanding that the continuous change that faces the sector has led to individual acquisition of culture and somatic knowledge that, in turn, lay the foundation for not only the awareness of the need for continuous individual professional development, but also for the creation of habitus related to KS and continuous learning. This makes the SW sector different from other competitive sectors where secrecy and insulation of knowledge are characteristics. This is synthesized and described in the HDID theoretical model presented in the paper. Additionally, an analysis of the types of knowledge shared and acquired led to the SW industry knowledge taxonomy presented in Table I.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to identify and explain the role of individual learning and development in acquiring tacit knowledge in the context of the inexorable and intense continuous change (technological and otherwise) that characterizes our society today, and also to investigate the software (SW) sector, which is at the core of contemporary continuous change and is a paradigm of effective and intrinsic knowledge sharing (KS). This makes the SW sector unique and different from others where KS is so hard to implement.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The study employed an inductive qualitative approach based on a multi-case study approach, composed of three successful SW companies in China. These companies are representative of the fabric of the sector, namely a small- and medium-sized enterprise, a large private company and a large state-owned enterprise. The fieldwork included 44 participants who were interviewed using a semi-structured script. The interview data were coded and interpreted following the Straussian grounded theory pattern of open coding, axial coding and selective coding. The process of interviewing was stopped when theoretical saturation was achieved after a careful process of theoretical sampling.\nFindings: The findings of this research suggest that individual learning and development are deemed to be the fundamental feature for professional success and survival in the continuously changing environment of the SW industry today. However, individual learning was described by the participants as much more than a mere individual process. It involves a collective and participatory effort within the organization and the sector as a whole, and a KS process that transcends organizational, cultural and national borders. Individuals in particular are mostly motivated by the pressing need to face and adapt to the dynamic and changeable environments of today's digital society that is led by the sector. Software practitioners are continuously in need of learning, refreshing and accumulating tacit knowledge, partly because it is required by their companies, but also due to a sound awareness of continuous technical and technological changes that seem only to increase with the advances of information technology. This led to a clear theoretical understanding that the continuous change that faces the sector has led to individual acquisition of culture and somatic knowledge that in turn lay the foundation for not only the awareness of the need for continuous individual professional development but also for the creation of habitus related to KS and continuous learning.\nOriginality/value: The study reported in this paper shows that there is a theoretical link between the existence of conducive organizational and sector-wide somatic and cultural knowledge, and the success of KS practices that lead to individual learning and development. Therefore, the theory proposed suggests that somatic and cultural knowledge are crucial drivers for the creation of habitus of individual tacit knowledge acquisition. The paper further proposes a habitus-driven individual development (HDID) Theoretical Model that can be of use to both academics and practitioners interested in fostering and developing processes of KS and individual development in knowledge-intensive organizations.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Comparative in vitro hypoglycemic studies of unripe, ripe and overripe fruit extract of Musa paradisiaca (Indian banana)	[ "Banana", "Hypoglycemic activity", "In vitro methods", "Musa Paradisiaca", "Unripe", "Ripe and overripe fruit extract", "Yeast cells" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Diabetes mellitus has become a common and widespread disease that affects a large number of people in both developed and developing countries. It has been estimated that around 25 percent of the world population is affected by this disease (Bhutkar and Bhise, 2013; Bhutkar et al., 2016). The pharmacological therapies in current practice used for the treatment of diabetes mellitus include various oral hypoglycemic agents and insulin. However, these drug therapies fail to restore normal glucose homoeostasis and also have side effects. Therefore, in view of the adverse effects associated with existing drug therapies, drugs derived from conventional antidiabetic plants that appear to be safer, cheaper and more effective can be explored.\n2. Materials and methods: 2.1 Fruit material\n3. Results: 3.1 Glucose adsorption capacity of MPUF, MPRF and MPOF extracts\n4. Discussion: Diabetes mellitus is a debilitating hormone disorder in which strict glycemic control and prevention of associated complications are essential (Ojewole and Adewunmi, 2003). Many functional foods like Myristica fragrans (Bhutkar et al., 2018a, b), Tamarindus indica (Bhutkar et al., 2016), Murraya koenigii (Bhutkar et al., 2018a, b) have been previously studied for their hypoglycemic potentials. Also Musa sapientum (Bhinge et al., 2017) ripe and unripe fruit extracts have also been explored for its hypoglycemic activity. The utility of functional foods and spices as antidiabetic agents will prove effective in better management of diabetes and its complications. According to the review of the literature, it is known that the fruit of Musa paradisiaca has an antidiabetic activity as mentioned earlier in the introduction. It is available as unripe, ripe and overripe fruit constituting a part of diet (processed and unprocessed food). However, among this which one showed better antidiabetic potential is unclear. Therefore, an attempt was made to explore antidiabetic potential of Musa paradisiaca fruit. This is the first attempt to determine the hypoglycemic activity of the fruit of the Musa paradisiaca using different in vitro models, namely, glucose uptake in yeast cells, kinetics of amylolysis, glucose adsorption capacity and glucose diffusion. According to our study, it will be useful to include the type of fruit in the diabetic diet. Furthermore, our results revealed a greater adsorption capacity extracting Musa paradisiaca (MPUF, MPRF and MPOF) attributable to its fibers constituents. It has also been previously reported that the insoluble and soluble constituents together with fibers of different origins may contribute to the adsorption of glucose (Ahmed et al., 2011). It has been observed that MPUF, MPRF and MPOF extracts could also effectively adsorb 5 mM glucose concentration, thus reducing the amount of glucose available for transport through the intestinal lumen. This activity of MPUF, MPRF and MPOF extracts may be responsible for blunting the postprandial hyperglycemia. The findings are in accordance to the observations reported by Chau et al. (2004) for insoluble fiber-rich fractions isolated from Averrhoa carambola.\n5. Conclusion: Banana acts as a complete food for even low socio-economic classes of society, owing to its rich nutritional values. In conclusion, the results of the present study have verified and compared the hypoglycemic properties of the unripe, ripe and overripe fruit extracts of Musa paradisiaca as implied by the various in vitro methods. However, based on the results it may be concluded that the unripe fruit extract possess better hypoglycemic potential than the extract of ripe and overripe fruit of Musa paradisiaca. Our research advices that along with antidiabetic medicines and regular physical exercises it is advisable to consume unripe banana fruit regularly which will contribute in effective management of blood glucose level and further may offer an advantage for reducing the dose of allopathic medicines. Thus, our finding will be beneficial in the betterment of socio-economic life of the society. In addition, the effects exhibited by extract of unripe fruit of Musa paradisiaca need to be confirmed by employing clinical trials for its effective utilization as a therapeutic agent. Limitations include the focus on only four in vitro models to assess the hypoglycemic activity of Indian banana which needs to be further comparatively verified in animal model for ripe, unripe and overripe banana.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: In the Indian system of medicine - Ayurveda, Musa paradisiaca has been mentioned as a remedy for various diseases and ailments. Based on the folkloric use, the purpose of this paper is to verify and compare the hypoglycemic potential of unripe, ripe and overripe fruit extract of Musa paradisiaca.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Hypoglycemic activity of fruit extracts has been evaluated using various in vitro methods, namely, determination of glucose adsorption capacity, glucose uptake in yeast cells, amylolysis kinetics and glucose diffusion.\nFindings: The extracts of unripe, ripe and overripe fruits of Musa paradisiaca adsorbed glucose, and the adsorption of glucose increased remarkably with an increase in glucose concentration. In the amylolysis kinetic experimental model, the rate of glucose diffusion was found to increase with time, and all the extracts of unripe, ripe and overripe fruits of Musa paradisiaca demonstrated significant inhibitory effects on the movement of glucose into external solution across the dialysis membrane as compared to the control. The extracts under study also promoted glucose uptake by the yeast cells in all the five glucose concentrations used in the study.\nPractical implications: Here, the authors have verified and compared the hypoglycemic potential of Musa paradisiaca, its unripe fruit extract was found to show a better activity than ripe and overripe fruit extracts.\nOriginality/value: Banana, being an all season readily available fruit, is widely consumed due to its ready availability and low cost. It acts as a complete food for even low socio-economic classes of society, owing to its rich nutritional values. Even in a processed and unprocessed manner, it is an important constituent of diet. The research suggests that instead of consuming ripe and overripe fruit, the unripe fruit will help in management of diabetes.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
The conceptualization of novel organic food products: a case study of Polish young consumers	[ "Poland", "Experimental study", "Bakery and confectionery products", "Sensory characteristics" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Indroduction: Interest in organic food products is growing throughout the world in response to concerns about the environment, food safety and human health. Organic foods refer to food products that are safe to consume, of fine quality, nutritious and produced under the principle of sustainable development (Wee et al., 2014). The organic sector in the EU has been rapidly developing during the past years[1]. Most of the organic land (78 percent) and organic farms (81 percent) are situated in the EU Member States, which joined the EU before 2004 (DG Agriculture and Rural Development, 2016). In these countries, the organic food market is developed to a large extent in comparison to the organic food market in Poland. Polish organic area accounted for 5.2 percent of the organically farmed land in the EU-28 in 2015[2] (Kobuszynska, 2017). The Warmia and Mazury Province wherein we conducted our study has the largest number of organic farms in Poland (Statistical Yearbook of Agriculture, 2017). Despite this, organic farming's share is still much lower in Poland than in the EU leading organic producer countries. One of the reasons behind this situation is the fact that Poland's social and economic conditions are not yet conducive to achieve organic consumption to a level similar to that observed in many other European countries. In spite of that a trend is observed in behaviors of Polish consumers, which relies on adapting consumption patterns growing out of ecological trends, including those associated with the purchase and consumption of organic food (Escher and Petrykowska, 2015). An upward trend in organic area is expected in the near future, as the demand for organic products and the organic market are forecasted to grow in Poland (Kobuszynska, 2017).\n2. Literature review: Changing consumption trends cause the necessity of continuous extension, verification, and updating knowledge related to consumers' attitudes and behaviors. There have been a number of studies investigating consumer behavior related to organic foods (e.g. Shepherd et al., 2005; Magistris and Gracia, 2008; Tsakiridou et al., 2008; Chen, 2009; Aertsens et al., 2011; Voon et al., 2011; Xie et al., 2015; Ditlevsen et al., 2019; Prentice et al., 2019). Some studies have indicated that health issues represent the main reason why organic foods are purchased (Irianto, 2015; Xie et al., 2015; Yadav and Pathak, 2016; Ueasangkomsate and Santiteerakul, 2016) and have become as important or just behind the sensory attributes during the organic food buying decision making (Meixner et al., 2014; Baudry et al., 2017; Oroian et al., 2017). Other researchers have concluded that despite the fact that there are no significant differences in nutrients' content or health benefits of organic foods, when compared to conventionally produced food products, consumers perceive organic foods to be healthier, tastier and better for the environment than the conventional foods (Nutrition Today, 2009; Hoefkens et al., 2009; Nasir and Karakaya, 2014). Consumers' behavior related to organic foods should also be seen through the filter of their awareness and knowledge about food of this type (Grzybowska-Brzezinska et al., 2017).\n3. Materials and methods: 3.1 Expert interviews and product conceptualization\n4. Results: 4.1 Consumer acceptance of novel organic bakery and confectionery products\n5. Discussion: This study is focused on consumers' attitudes toward novel organic food products prototypes. The contribution that this study makes to the understanding of consumer behavior toward novel organic food products is noteworthy, as it analyzes the behavioral intentions that were established during of product prototypes testing. Our study investigated the value of the perceived sensory characteristics of the novel organic food products characterized by health-related attributes. Sensory evaluations are used while developing new products; however, they are unfortunately seldom used by small- and medium-sized food companies (Halagarda and Suwala, 2018). Sensory quality should be considered as a key factor in food acceptance, because consumers seek food with certain sensory characteristics. The acceptance of a food will depend on whether it responds to consumer needs and on the degree of satisfaction that it is able to provide (Heldman, 2004; Costell et al., 2010). A product's acceptance in the market is determined by a consumer who plays a fundamental role at each stage of product design, including initiation of a novel product development, product testing as well as implementation of its production process and its retail (Czajkowska et al., 2013).\n6. Conclusion: Our study has demonstrated that the young consumers had ambivalent or negative attitudes toward the sensory attributes of many variants of organic bakery and confectionery products enriched with a combination of fresh and dried fruits and vegetables, free of saccharose, sweeteners and chemical pulverizing agents. One sample was selected from among the evaluated prototypes, whose recipe was most acceptable to the young consumers. However, its implementation into the production process would require further research works aimed at improving the attributes of its sensory quality. It has been concluded that in the case of young consumers, taste is the key factor affecting their attitudes toward organic food and driving their purchase intentions. The choice of organic food by young consumers is not strictly related with the concern over their health. Awareness of health-related attributes of the evaluated products does not guarantee the intention to buy them once they appear in the market.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore young consumers' attitudes toward novel organic food products by analyzing their acceptability and perception.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A mixed method approach was applied to conceptualize (sensory profiling of organic bakery and confectionery products) and then to evaluate young consumer's willingness to buy (consumer survey) innovative products: ten variants of rolls and ten variants of shortbread cookies made of certified raw materials originating from bio-farming, enriched with a combination of fresh and dried fruits and vegetables. Product recipes were free of saccharose, sweeteners and chemical pulverizing agents. To evaluate consumer orientation toward novel organic products, 200 consumers from Poland (Warmia and Mazury region) were surveyed regarding their hedonic opinion about these concepts. A Likert-type scale was used in the consumer survey to assess the perception and declared willingness to buy the evaluated products.\nFindings: Research results demonstrate that the young consumers had ambivalent or negative attitudes to sensory attributes of many variants of the organic bakery and confectionery products. This could be explained by the taste of most of the products, which appeared unacceptable to consumers. It has been concluded that the choice of organic foods by young consumers is not strictly related to the concern over their health nor to the awareness of health-related attributes of these food products. Taste turned out to be the key factor affecting consumer attitudes toward organic foods and driving their willingness to buy these products.\nOriginality/value: Despite the constant development of research in the area of the organic food market, the current scientific findings still have some cognitive gaps that concern attitudes and expectations of consumers, especially of young consumers, toward new ecological products. This study contributed to the young consumers' behavior knowledge by analyzing their attitudes toward novel organic bakery and confectionery prototypes produced manually. The empirical findings from this study also have practical potential for organic food market applications. Information of this type is useful in understanding and predicting the demand for certain products, which helps managers develop effective strategies.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Characters-based sentiment identification method for short and informal Chinese text	[ "Information technology", "Text mining", "Data mining", "Chinese character", "Sentiment identification", "Short text" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: With the rapid development of the internet, and the advent of Web2.0, text sentiment identification has been a hot research area with a range of applications in market intelligence, recommendation system and social public feelings analysis (Xia et al., 2010; Zhong and Deng, 2012; Zhang et al., 2010; Tang et al., 2007; Manek et al., 2017; David et al, 2016). As a burgeoning technology, text sentiment identification can automatically analyze documents from the huge and expansive text information, providing convenience for commodity evaluation, public opinion control and investor sentiment research.\n2. Related work: Sentiment identification can be regarded as a sentiment polarity classification problem. Existing approaches to sentiment identification can be grouped into four main categories:\n3. Preliminaries: As we know, vector space model is a common-used model for representing text document, which represents each document as a feature vector:\n4. Sentiment identification based on Chinese characters: The method to build our sentiment identification model is shown in Figure 2. Here, all documents in the original corpus are organized as training data according to their sentiment orientation categories. Four key steps exist in the training process: calculating CF, calculating document frequency (DF), calculating classification index (CI) and extracting feature characters (FC). For the sake of simplicity, the method is named as CharSI (Character-based Sentiment Identification). It should be noted that this process does not require any data preprocessing such as word segmentation, stop words removal, de-noising and so on, which are indispensable for words-based methods. Details are described in the following parts. For the convenience of description, we use subscript i, j and k to respectively index a certain character, a document and a sentiment category.\nAlgorithm 1: character frequency calculating algorithm: Function CF=Calculate_CF(doc)\nAlgorithm 2: Document frequency calculating algorithm: Function DF_Tabk=Calculate_DF(CF_Tabk)\nAlgorithm 3: CI calculating algorithm: Function CI_Tab = Calculate_CI(m)\n5. Experiments and results analysis: Our experiments are carried in three aspects: the performance, the efficiency and the impact of parameters. The experimental environment is based on Win10 (64 bit) system, 8 core i7-6700 3.40GHz CPU, memory 16GB and program language is Python 3.6.0, PyCharm (v.2016) is used as IDE.\n6. Conclusions: Chinese characters are ideograph and contain rich semantic information. Compared with Chinese words, the total number of Chinese characters is very small, which greatly reduces the dimension of the feature vectors, and brings the advantages in the time and space complexity, and greatly enhance the processing efficiency. Even so, experiment results show that the accuracy of CharSI is comparable with the classical methods based on Chinese words and even better than them for texts with much informal words like slang and buzzwords which are popular in the social media. Moreover, the removal of preprocessing steps like word segmentation, stop-words removal bring not only the improvement of efficiency but also the convenience of operations. In addition, because no requirements of predefined dictionaries, e.g. no need to prepare a sentiment dictionary, CharSI method is much more convenient, after all, the sentiment dictionary is usually domain dependent, to construct such a dictionary is non-trivial and labor intensive. Finally, it should be pointed out that CharSI proposed in this paper is just an implementation of methods based on Chinese character, which adopts the characters and their frequency as the information source for sentiment identification. In the future, other information source based on Chinese characters could also be considered in the model. For instance, some co-occurrence of two or more characters, sequence of some characters, etc., which might provide more information to improve the accuracy of identification while still keeping the advantage in complexity over word-based methods.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Sentiment identification of Chinese text faces many challenges, such as requiring complex preprocessing steps, preparing various word dictionaries carefully and dealing with a lot of informal expressions, which lead to high computational complexity.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A method based on Chinese characters instead of words is proposed. This method represents the text into a fixed length vector and introduces the chi-square statistic to measure the categorical sentiment score of a Chinese character. Based on these, the sentiment identification could be accomplished through four main steps.\nFindings: Experiments on corpus with various themes indicate that the performance of proposed method is a little bit worse than existing Chinese words-based methods on most texts, but with improved performance on short and informal texts. Especially, the computation complexity of the proposed method is far better than words-based methods.\nOriginality/value: The proposed method exploits the property of Chinese characters being a linguistic unit with semantic information. Contrasting to word-based methods, the computational efficiency of this method is significantly improved at slight loss of accuracy. It is more sententious and cuts off the problems resulted from preparing predefined dictionaries and various data preprocessing.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Diversification-based learning simulated annealing algorithm for hub location problems	[ "Simulated annealing", "Diversification-based learning", "Hub location problems" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Nomenclature\n1. Introduction: Hub location problems have been instrumental in aviation, transportation and telecommunications industry. With the surge in e-commerce and logistics, hubbed networks have found extensive applications. Hub location problems (or) hubbed networks utilise the economies of scale of traffic in busy nodes to cut down the network costs. These models came into existence after 1975 when the US aviation industry got decentralised. They were developed primarily for the aviation industry (Campbell, 1992; Mackenzie-Williams, 2005). Their relevance in industrial applications is only surpassed by their complexity (Drezner and Hamacher, 2001). Hub location problems are NP-Hard (Farahani et al., 2013). That means their solution times increase exponentially with a linear increase in their dimensionality. For this reason, exact solution algorithms have fallen short of solving large sized instances of such problems with reasonable computational effort. In realistic industrial applications such as aviation, the number of nodes in the network are significantly more than what can be solved by exact solution algorithms(Goedeking, 2010), Thus, several meta-heuristics have been proposed to explore expeditious approaches to find near to optimum solutions in reasonable time (Alumur and Kara, 2008). In a bid to achieve faster convergence in such heuristic approaches, several aspects have been investigated such as mimicking nature inspired processes, attribute selection strategies, conditional relationships, etc. Of all such aspects, recent attempts have occurred under the banner of learning strategies. Opposition-based learning (OBL) has gained quite prominence among learning strategies in meta-heuristics (Sorenson et al., 2018). OBL is based upon finding opposite solutions in the solution space in initialisation, generation jumping and generating neighbourhood solutions (Rojas-Morales et al., 2017). More recently, Glover and Hao (2017) have put forth a more encompassing approach to OBL which is based upon considering an \"opposite collection\" of solutions rather than a single \"opposite solution\". This learning approach which is motivated from OBL is termed as diversification-based learning (DBL). It is based on the idea that considering opposite solutions ensures diversity in the solution search space and thus, handles the trap of falling in local optima more effectively and leads to faster convergence. It searches a diversified set of solutions in the feasible solution space based on the max-min principle that the minimum distance of the solutions from each other (or) from any specific solution is maximised (Glover et al., 2017). This set of diversified solutions contains the opposite solution as a specialised case. The diversified set of solutions is termed as an \"opposite collection\" because each solution is opposed to every other solution in the diversified set.\n2. Literature review: Hub location problems were brought to fore by O'kelly (1986). They were primarily applied in aviation industry (Campbell, 1992). Campbell (1994) and Ernst and Krishnamoorthy (1998) played a pivotal role in advancing hub location research by providing four-indexed and three-indexed formulations respectively. Ebery et al. (2000) compared four-indexed and three-indexed formulations and concluded that the four-indexed formulation provided tighter bounds, whereas three-indexed formulation provided loose bounds. On the other hand, four-indexed formulation was found to be computationally intensive as compared to the three-indexed formulation.\n3. Problem description and formulation: This study formulates a p-median hub location problem which extends the three-indexed formulation of Ernst and Krishnamoorthy (1998) by incorporating a direct flow feature between nodes. This formulation incorporates the features of hubbed network strategy and point to point flow strategy by accounting for discount factors like a, d and penalty factor kh.\n4. Diversification-based learning: A diversified set of plausible solutions is an \"opposite collection\" of solutions that are at maximum possible distance from each other within the feasible solution space (Glover and Hao, 2017). This \"opposite collection\" is generated on the basis of max-min principle which states that the minimum distance between the solutions should be maximised. It can be done in two ways: either the minimum distance of solutions from a specific solution can be maximised, or the minimum distance of all solutions from each other can be maximised. This work subscribes to the latter of the ways. The distance between the solutions can be calculated by using various metrics such as centre based sampling, quasi-opposition, super-opposition, etc. (Rojas-Morales et al., 2017). This work extrapolates the type-I quasi-opposition (Rojas-Morales et al., 2017) measure in the case of diversified set of solutions. This measure considers the coordinates of the solution point in the feasible search space. A diversified set of solutions is such that, if xis and xjs are the solution vectors and lms are the weights assigned to every (xi, xj) pair by the decision maker, where i[?]j and m[?][1(N(N-1)/2)], then:(12)\n5. Diversification-based learning simulated annealing algorithm (DBLSA): SA is a local search algorithm which is inspired from the annealing process of crystalline materials. It was proposed by Metropolis et al. (1953) and was brought to fore by Kirkpatrick et al. (1983) when it applied SA in optimisation problems. Since then, it has been successfully applied in various combinatorial optimisation problems such as travelling salesman, quadratic assignment, timetabling, network design, etc. (Murray and Church, 1996). SA has been observed to perform well in solving discrete combinatorial optimisation algorithms (Gendreau and Potvin, 2010).\n6. Computational experiments: In order to test the effectiveness of the DBLSA, two widely used data sets, namely, CAB data set and AP data set, from the hub location literature are used. The CAB data set was proposed by O'kelly (1987) and is based on twenty five cities in the USA. It is the oldest data set that has been used in hub location problems. It was developed in 1970 for the US aviation industry. The parameter a, which signifies the economies of scale for hub to hub flow, is set at three levels, namely, {0.2, 0.4, 0.6}. In total, 36 experimental instances have been generated based on four problem sizes N[?]{10, 15, 20, 25} for three levels of a[?]{0.2, 0.4, 0.6} and at three values of the number of hubs, p[?]{2, 3, 4}. The hub to non-hub factors have been set at d=0.8. Since, the model also considers point to point flows between two non-hub nodes, a penalty factor is set to account for lack of economies of scale between two non-hub nodes as kh=1.2.\n7. Discussions and conclusions: Hub location problems have been instrumental in aviation and telecommunications industry. Their relevance is outmatched only by their complexity. These problems are NP-Hard and require extensive computational effort with higher dimensions. Thus, in this paper, a novel DBLSA for hub location problems is proposed to solve instances of higher dimensionality with reasonable computational effort and accuracy. It emulates human learning by applying a social learning operator and encompasses features from tabu search algorithm to avoid repetition in solutions. DBL is a recent development which is proposed by Glover and Hao (2017). It is nascent and has not been applied in computing and optimisation. The parameters are tuned by applying Taguchi methods. The effectiveness of the algorithm is tested on the widely used CAB and AP data set. This algorithm is also compared with OBLSA. Mann-Whitney tests were conducted to determine whether there were significant differences in the results of the DBLSA and OBLSA. The results suggest that the convergence rates of DBLSA are higher than OBLSA significantly. It is noteworthy that DBL is an encompassing approach to OBL which itself has lately become popular in metaheuristic applications. Thus, this result opens up a plethora of possibilities in the domain of computing and optimisation. In total, 36 instances each were generated on the CAB and AP data set. The CAB data set was benchmarked against optimal solutions solved with CPLEX solver executed on GAMS. It is observed that the DBLSA algorithm was able to achieve optimal solutions for smaller data sets in reasonable time. In instances with higher dimensionality, the gap (%) between the DBLSA solutions and optimal solutions was found to be reasonably less (not exceeding 0.1 per cent in any instance). The focus of our work was not on minimising computational times as it depends on efficiency in coding the algorithm and the execution platform, system configuration, etc. This study focusses on the convergence rate of the proposed algorithm and found that it provides precise solutions in reasonable time.\n8. Theoretical contributions and managerial implications: This paper examines and finds evidence substantiating the proposition by \"No free lunches theorem\" that incorporating problem-specific features lead to a more efficient heuristic. The DBLSA algorithm proposed in this paper incorporates elements of human learning and diversification-based strategy in the SA algorithm. We find that it outperforms the OBLSA algorithm in terms of convergence rate, thus leading the way for an in-depth investigation of DBL structures in the context of other metaheuristic algorithms.\n9. Future implications and limitations: This paper has applied DBL in the context of finding solutions to hub location problems. More attempts are solicited to investigate the veracity of DBL in other metaheuristic applications. Also, future works can attempt to compare the performance of DBL among various algorithms. This work adopts a max-min diversification strategy. There are other diversification strategies as well, such as Progressive gap method (Glover et al., 2017). Future works can explore such methods. Also, this study examines the performance of the DBLSA algorithm in the context of p-median hub location models. The effectiveness of an algorithm depends upon the type of model. Future researches can explore other models like p-centre, p-covering hub location models, etc. This study has considered a diversified set of solutions that is approximately equally inter-distant from each other. Other possible way would be by defining a diversified set with respect to a single solution. In fact, the efficacy of deploying a learning mechanism depends upon how it is embedded in the algorithm. DBL is a new research avenue. It solicits further investigation and research inquiry to come up with effective solution methodologies in hub location problems.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the efficacy of diversification-based learning (DBL) in expediting the performance of simulated annealing (SA) in hub location problems.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This study proposes a novel diversification-based learning simulated annealing (DBLSA) algorithm for solving p-hub median problems. It is executed on MATLAB 11.0. Experiments are conducted on CAB and AP data sets.\nFindings: This study finds that in hub location models, DBLSA algorithm equipped with social learning operator outperforms the vanilla version of SA algorithm in terms of accuracy and convergence rates.\nPractical implications: Hub location problems are relevant in aviation and telecommunication industry. This study proposes a novel application of a DBLSA algorithm to solve larger instances of hub location problems effectively in reasonable computational time.\nOriginality/value: To the best of the author's knowledge, this is the first application of DBL in optimisation. By demonstrating its efficacy, this study steers research in the direction of learning mechanisms-based metaheuristic applications.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Marketing channel length in rural India: Influence of the external environment and rural retailer buyer behavior	[ "Marketing channels", "India", "Channel length and small retailers", "Channel relationships", "Rural areas", "Retailing" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: In India close to 72 percent of the population lives in rural areas and they are the single largest market segment of the Indian market, accounting for substantial portion of sales of fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) and durable companies. But reaching these markets has always been a challenge. The study makes an attempt at understanding the structure of distribution for rural areas, by understanding the influence of external environment and rural retailer buyer behaviour on channel length. Interest in studying \"emerging\" consumer base or low income segments (D'Andrea and Lopez-Aleman, 2006) or subsistence consumers (Viswanathan et al., 2010) has increased in the recent past, and this probably will add to that pool of research.Studying the structure of distribution has been acknowledged as one of the fundamental tasks of channel research (Sharma and Dominguez, 1992) and there is a critical link between understanding structure and developing a viable distribution system (Robenson and Kollat, 1985). The study assumes importance owing to the fact that not much is known about structure of distribution in rural areas. Though in the recent past there has been a lot activity in retailing in urban India with the entry of many new players both domestic and multinational and country-specific analyses of retail in India has been done (Sengupta, 2008; Srivastava, 2008), but the focus has been predominantly urban India.Even for best of the organizations with substantial presence in rural markets the distribution channel structure after the wholesaler or agent at the district or the taluka[1] level is not known. The details of how the product actually reaches the retailers in the village, the linkages, and number of intermediaries and whether it is received directly or through the wholesale channel is not known, and Viswanathan et al. (2010) have noted that this final step in the distribution process has proved vexing to companies. And, most of the current work done in rural marketing is mostly non-empirical and journalistic in nature and there is a dearth of good quality work done in the area (Kashyap, 2003; Srinivasan, 1983).\nObjectives of the study: This study has a three-fold objective; first to describe the existing structure of distribution in villages across the states which have been selected for the study. The structure of distribution translates to the number and type of retail shops in the villages, the purchase pattern of retailers and the distribution structure, which exists to serve them. The second objective is to understand the influence of the external environment variables like the road and rail connectivity and population density on the number of intermediaries in the distribution channels. The third objective is to study the rural retailer buyer preferences, in terms of quantity and frequency of his purchases and its influence on channel length. The overarching goal is to improve the understating and working of rural distribution channels in India, and provide pointers to practitioners keen on entering these markets.The paper is organized as follows; the section after introduction is on rural India, highlighting the context of the study. The next few sections are devoted to the review of literature, on channel structure, influence of external environment on channel structure and rural retail. Then a section on methodology where the design of the study has been described followed by findings and conclusion.\nRural India: The rural economy contributes nearly half of the country's GDP (ETIG, 2003), which is mainly agriculture driven and monsoon dependant. Census of India defines rural as any habitation with a population density less than 400 per sq. km., where at least 75 percent of the male working population is engaged in agriculture and where there exits no municipality or board, and the same definition has been accepted for the paper here.Many researchers and practitioners agree to the fact that to tap these markets distribution systems is the most critical component (Rao, 1973; Sarin et al., 1988; Krishnamoorty, 2000) and perhaps even a barrier to be overcome (Prahalad and Hammond, 2002). Mahajan and Banga (2006) assert that even the best conventional distribution systems have been unable to penetrate beyond about one-sixth of India's rural villages. The low density of population and inaccessibility makes the problem of servicing villages individually difficult and often uneconomical.In the country we have 636,000 villages out of which only 13 percent have population above 2,000 and 15,000 have population above 5,000. The top 85,000 villages are home to 40 percent of the population and account for over 60 percent of rural consumption. Table I gives us an idea of the spread and population of villages in the country.Retailing in rural area tends to very different from urban markets. The village retailers are predominantly small in size and are dependant on a long chain of intermediaries for getting their supplies. Sometimes the number of intermediaries through the product passes through before it reaches the retailer could be as high as five. The predominant form of retailers is the permanent and semi-permanent small retailers who are based in the village. Apart from them there are also mobile traders who move from one village to the other carrying their stocks and the Haats and Melaas[2]. A more detailed description of the nature of retail in rural is give in the findings section (Figure 1). The diversity, number and nature of retail in rural areas add to the complexity of distribution channel management in rural India.In spite of the challenges the market remains a very attractive one for marketers, according to NCAER (2003), the number of rural middle class households at 27.4 million is very close to their urban counterpart at 29.5 million. The improvement in the support prices being offered to farmers also has an impact on the disposable income with the farmers. Between, 1981-2001 there has been tremendous improvement in the literacy levels, poverty and rural housing in the villages of the country. Rural literacy levels have improved from 36 to 59 percent, the number of below poverty houses have declined from close to half to 46 percent and the number of pucca[3] houses have doubled from 22 percent to 41 percent.These figures provide us with a clear picture that rural India with the increase in agricultural income and improving standards is on the verge of becoming a large untapped market, which marketers have been aspiring for a very long period of time. The future potential of rural markets has been emphasised by the McKinsey's (2007) Golden Bird report on Indian market, in which they estimate that in the next 20 years Indian rural market will be larger than the total consumer markets in countries such as South Korea or Canada today, and almost four times the size of today's urban Indian market at the estimated of $577 Billion. Thus both in the present as well as in the future rural markets in India will remain a very attractive market.Then there is a developmental angle to reaching the rural populations as well, as has been identified by Vachani and Smith(2008) in their work on socially responsible distribution, where they say that reinventing distribution channels is a creative market-based alternative to increase access through innovation by identifying different routes to reach rural consumers. According to Stern and Weitz (1997) channels of distribution have a role in the economic development of a country, especially in the developing world.\nLiterature review: This section is devoted to the review of literature which is relevant to the study and starts with definitions of channel structure and channel length. Then moves on to understanding how the external environment influence's distribution channels have been described in the literature and the related research questions. The issue of rural retailing, retailer buyer preferences and the related research question which is being investigated are also elaborated in the section.Distribution channel length\nMethodology and data collection: The methodology adopted to seek answers to the research questions posed in the paper is predominantly survey based. A structured questionnaire was administered by the researcher himself to the respondents. The majority of the respondents were village retailers and a few of the other channel intermediaries involved in the distribution were also interviewed.The sampling units were selected at three levels, starting with the retailer at the village level. At the second level, the intermediaries were selected in the nearest small town or taluka, on the basis of the information collected at the village level. The last level was the district head quarters where the distributors for the categories identified were interviewed. Distribution structure for the proposed categories was traced from the terminal points till the agents and wholesalers and distributors in the nearest small town or district headquarters.The six talukas were selected on the basis of the variation of rural contextual variables (see Table II). The contextual variables were operational zed based on population density, road length in kms per 100 sq kms, railway track in kms per 1000 sq kms and proportion of villages having access to all weather roads. Census data on each of these four variables was used to classify the talukas into three groups, high, medium and low. High for talukas which were high on population density and accessibility and low for those which were low on these variables and those falling in between were classified as medium. The final selection of the villages in which the questionnaires are administered was decided by talking to local experts at the taluka level. The local experts were the traders and company salespeople who were familiar with the villages and markets in the area.The sample consisted of 686 village retailers spread across 103 villages in six talukas of the states of Karnataka and Gujarat, in India. The population of the villages varied from 50 households to 1,500 households, with 2 to 18 retailers respectively. The distance of the villages from the nearest small town varied from 1.5 to 28 Kms. In the villages selected a census of all the retailers was done and structured questionnaires were administered to the retailers in the village. The distribution structure for two product categories in the FMCG category, tea, and detergents were studied. The categories were chosen taking into consideration the high penetration that these categories had in the villages. Wholesale and feeder market information were sought at the village level to identify the markets from where they source and these markets were visited and the intermediaries there approached with semi-structured questionnaire. The major distributors for all the product categories were approached in the taluka or district headquarters and semi-structured interviews were used to collect data. The next section is devoted to sharing the findings from the study starting with the descriptive of the retailing in the villages and the correlation analysis to answer the research questions.\nFindings: In this section the findings of the study are shared. The section is further subdivided into two subsections; the first one looks at the first two research questions, related to the influence of external environment variables on channel length. It begins with an elaborate description of number of retailers, stocking pattern and the channel lengths for tea and detergents. The second sub section focuses on sharing the findings on the retailer buyer preferences and channel length.Retail penetration and channel length in the villages\nDiscussion: The study makes an attempt at understanding the influence of external environment and rural retailer buying preferences on the channel structure in general and length in particular. The results show that the lengths of distribution channels for the two product categories which were studied were significantly different in the six talukas. The talukas were picked up with varying external environment variables and thus the findings point to the influence of the external environment variables like the road and rail connectivity and population density on the number of intermediaries in the distribution channels. The aspect of individual village population did not have the predicted impact on the channel length, which is sort of goes against the logic that a larger market should be able to attract different modes of distribution. The possible reason for this would be that the distribution channel length decision is something which is taken at the taluka level and individual villages do not influence it much.The second set of issues which were investigated in the study was the rural retailer buyer preferences and the influence on channel length. The fact that most retailers in villager still buy from wholesalers in the nearest small town was confirmed in the findings. This reinforces the findings of Aman and Hopkinson (2010) in Pakistan that traditional partners represent the bulk of trade and were likely to retain the status in more rural areas for some considerable time. The study also showed that the most of the rural retailer buy in smaller quantities and their frequency of purchasing was very high, as high as twice a week in some cases. And it was shown that this buying habit of the rural retailer had a significant impact on channel length. These buying habits of the retailer are driven by the smaller shops size, and shortage of working capital. The findings also pointed out that the rural retailer has to provide credit to his customers in the villages, which would put additional burden on him.The contribution of the paper is in terms of the description of the existing structure of distribution channels in villages in India, and the further reinforcement of the influence of the external environment on channel length in a new context that is rural areas in an emerging economy. The study also brings out the influence of rural retailers on channel length which again can be considered as a contribution because of presence of small retailers in large number is a part of reality in rural areas and needs to be taken into consideration before planning for rural distribution.\nManagerial implications: The implications of the findings for a manager working for fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) company planning rural distribution would be that he/she first needs to understand the external environment at the taluka level in rural areas and then do the distribution planning. He/She needs to take into consideration the buying preferences of the rural retailer in terms of quantity and frequency of purchase and credit requirements. And also accept the reality that perhaps direct distribution in many of these markets is not a feasible option. The idea of considering rural distribution as an extension of urban distribution may not be advisable.\nLimitations and directions for future research: There are a few limitations of the study. The first one is the evolutionary aspect of distribution structure. The current study is not a longitudinal study and thus does not look into the evolutionary issues of the channel structure and thus the findings can be applied to the current status of channel structure in rural areas. The second limitation is the type of retail shops which were included in the study. The survey questionnaire was administered only to the permanent or semi-permanent retail shops in the village, who would form a part of the formal retail structure in a village and those retailers who were either mobile or those who would put up their shops on certain days of the week as in the case of Haats and Melaas have not been included in the survey. The number of product categories which were included in the study was limited and very similar in nature; impact across more diverse product categories could be tested.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The aim of this paper is to understand the influence of the external environment and rural retailer purchase preference on the length of channels in rural areas in India.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The methodology involved the survey of over 686 rural retailers in 103 villages across rural India, to trace the structure of distribution channels.\nFindings: - The correlation analysis and ANOVA test show that channel length varies in regions based on variation in the external environment. Village retailer with his unique buying preferences also influences the distribution channel.\nResearch limitations/implications: - The study involves only two product categories and ignores the evolutionary aspect of distribution channels.\nPractical implications: - The study provides pointers to marketers interested in gaining access to rural markets.\nOriginality/value: - The paper is one of the first empirical studies which focuses on understanding the distribution channel in rural areas, by starting from the village retailer onwards to the channel intermediaries in the nearest small town.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Perceived employability and psychological functioning framed by gain and loss cycles	[ "Perceived employability", "Employed workers", "Gain and loss cycles", "Psychological functioning", "Unemployed job seekers", "Conservation of Resources (COR) theory" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: In the current era of continuous change, the notion of employability (i.e. the ability to be employed; Hillage and Pollard, 1998) has gained prominence as individuals need to manage their employability in order to secure employment (Clarke, 2009; Cohen and Mallon, 1999; Hall, 2004; Vanhercke et al., 2014). In this respect, the individual's perception of his/her employability plays a critical role.\nThe COR theory: First, we provide a general introduction into the COR theory with a focus upon perceived employability and psychological functioning as resources. Then, we describe the gain cycle vs the loss cycle in parallel with the COR theory insights. We argue that the gain cycle resonates more strongly with employed workers. Conversely, the loss cycle may specifically fit the context of unemployed job seekers. In order to rule out alternative causal pathways to our hypotheses, we will perform all cross-lagged analyses in the employed and unemployed job seekers samples.\nMethod: Data collection and sample\nResults: Descriptive results\nDiscussion: Main findings\nConclusions: With this study we established the gain and loss cycles advanced by the COR theory among employed workers and unemployed job seekers in outplacement, respectively. More specifically, perceived employability positively affected well-being among the employed and ill-being negatively affected perceived employability among the unemployed job seekers.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to test the gain and loss cycle ideas from the Conservation of Resources (COR) theory with regard to perceived employability and psychological functioning among employed workers and unemployed job seekers, respectively.\nDesign/methodology/approach: More specifically, the authors argue that perceived employability may trigger a gain cycle toward well-being among employed workers (H1), while ill-being may trigger a loss cycle toward reduced (perceived) employability among unemployed job seekers (H2). The authors test these ideas with cross-lagged analysis.\nFindings: Results confirm the hypotheses: perceived employability at Time 1 positively affects well-being at Time 2 among employed workers and ill-being at Time 1 negatively impacts perceived employability at Time 2 among unemployed job seekers.\nResearch limitations/implications: Future research should study the gain and loss cycles with more than two waves of data as this allows for a more adequate test of these ideas.\nPractical implications: As for practitioners, the results suggest that investing in the worker's perceived employability by offering training, career counseling, and networking opportunities, pays off as it promotes the employee's psychological functioning. With regard to unemployed job seekers the authors advise investing in psychological counseling: the unemployed job seeker will be more able to invest in a job search, and hence perceive employability if helped in coping with job loss.\nOriginality/value: This study offers a new perspective on the relationship between perceived employability and psychological functioning by involving the principles of COR theory, in particular the gain and loss cycles.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Parks as business opportunities and development strategies	[ "Urban neighborhood park", "Users' needs and preferences", "Development strategies", "Social business", "Communities", "Malaysia", "User studies" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Parks have been known to be a valuable contributor to the physical and aesthetic quality of urban neighborhoods. Parks have important influence on public health, youth development and community building. As a result, there is more investment needed in this regard from both the private and public sector. Thus, how are we able to encourage policy makers, practitioners, and community developers to invest more in this field?By changing traditional view of parks as places that only incur social expenses to a new viewpoint that look at them as revenue and social business places, the new approach suggested by this study views Neighborhood Parks from a different perspective. Compared to traditional value of parks as places of recreation and visual assets to communities, the new view of parks focuses on larger urban policy objectives such as business opportunities, and other development strategies.This modern viewpoint expresses that by investing more in neighborhood parks and enhancing the quality, both investors and park users would benefit significantly. For instance, studies conducted by Hammer et al. (1974), and Correll et al. (1978) revealed a statistically significant linkage between property values and proximity to green space, including neighborhood parks and urban forested areas. On the other hand, Fox (1990) indicated that the enhanced value of properties around the neighborhood areas lead to an increase in property tax revenue by the city. A survey conducted for Community Development Corporations (CDCs) reveals that about 20 percent of CDCs now invest in open-space programs, and that this activity area is undergoing the most rapid expansion (Walker, 2004). It was also mentioned that parks can offer job opportunities for neighborhood residents.Based on what we have mentioned above, to achieve the goals of this new viewpoint, attracting more users to neighborhood parks can be viewed as a starting point. Design quality is one of the main criteria to attracting users. To achieve good design, designers should have direct interaction with users and neighborhood residents to gain knowledge about their actual needs (Amouzegar et al., 2010). The advantages of neighborhood parks include serving as a challenging and interesting place for both children and adults, physically and socially safe, accessible within walking distance, appropriate density for neighborhood population, and the ability to attract people who live around the park. For instance, a study by Cunningham and Jones (1999) indicated that good quality public open space was perceived by parents to be an important influence on their child's active free-play. Parents also reported that if a good quality park was nearby, they were more likely to take their child to that park. The design of play environment is usually a compromise between providing play opportunities for children and satisfying adults' concerns with children's safety and with monitoring their activities. Therefore neighborhood park design should balance play value with safety issues. As Wallach (1999) mentioned, providing as much fun as possible with as much safety as necessary, is the most important criteria in playground design. As a result, urban planners need to revisit neighborhood park design to make the parks and playgrounds interesting for a wider group of people while remaining safe.Based on previous experiences, designers should focus on some characteristics of a good neighborhood park design such as separate age appropriate areas, safe play equipment, accessible for people of all abilities, protective surfacing, signs, fencing, internal routes, internal landforms, vegetation and related structures (Wadell, 2001), enhance interest by adding special features like water jets, climbing hill. Whereas users do not have much direct influence in planning for play (Rasmusson, 1998) the utilization of their experiences and preferences should be one of the main principle in the design process (Jansson and Persson, 2010). As public play provision is altering and new ways are developed (Jansson and Persson, 2010), this new approach in planning and management of Neighborhood Park will support other types of development and impact business strategies. The overall aim of this study is to identify factors that users find important in their use of the neighborhood parks, (to evaluate design of the neighborhood park from view point of users) and to consider how well the design of the neighborhood park impacts on business strategy as a new view of park compared to traditional view.\nMethod: The population of this study was drawn from park users and neighborhood residents. A sample of 300 users was selected from this population. Park visitors were conveniently sampled through an intercept survey method. Data was collected from Taman Sri Nibong Park, one of the biggest neighborhood parks in Pulau Pinang. A total of 173 questionnaires were returned. The data was analyzed through the use of descriptive statistics.Why Taman Sri Nibong Park was chosen as the focus for this study?\nResults: As shown in Table I, from this population 51.2 percent were males and 48.8 percent were females that answered the questionnaire. The age of respondents varied between 21 to 60 years old. After categorizing them and dividing them into four age groups, the frequency of these four groups is illustrated in Table I. About 91.3 percent of the respondents live in this neighborhood park area. Only 8.7 percent were users that came from other places. From the population who live in this neighborhood, ten years is the mean of duration they have lived there. The majority, 59.3 percent of families were Chinese, 29.6 percent Malay, 7.6 Indian and 3.5 percent were families with other ethnic backgrounds. The research participants had moderate education levels, 38.0 percent had degree levels of education, 25.2 percent had a diploma, and 21.6 percent completed SPM. Only 7.6 percent completed college, masters or Phd level education. 4.7 percent of respondents were in PMR level and 2.9 percent had STPM. Most of the respondents (83.8 percent) were employed. Mean family net income for 70 percent of respondents in this neighborhood was approximately RM 6000.00 with a minimum of RM 500.00 and maximum of RM 80,000.00. This study grouped the residents into three groups - higher, middle and lower class related to socio-economic levels based on their income. The results show that most of the residents are in the middle class category.To find the level of agreement or disagreement of park users about conditions of Taman Sri Nibong Park, a frequency table was developed as shown in Table II. This study prepared a question for each of them in four levels comprising of \"agree,\" \"agree somewhat,\" \"disagree somewhat,\" and \"disagree\". Results were encouraging because most of the users believed that the playground equipment is suitable for children. They perceived Sri Nibong Park neighborhood as quite good for kids to grow up playing. After these two factors, most respondents thought that depth of drains around the park is appropriate in relation to safety, and the distance of the playground from the road is also appropriate. Compared to the first four variables in regards to level of agreement, there was a decline about adequate and consistent lighting in this park to be able to get a good look at another person from a reasonable distance. Also, respondents reported that they would like to see more of an adequate boundary to separate children from the area outside the park, quality of maintenance should be improved, enough signs about play safety in the playground were needed and proper spacing between adjacent activity-settings. It was also revealed that the establishment of a fence around the park could further prevent users' perceptions of crimes occurring.To shed some light on which methods can be incorporated to make the park safer from crime and personal injury, participants were required to choose which factors (as illustrated in Table III) they thought can lead to a reduction from a crime perspective.The results shown in Table III indicate most of the respondents believe having more supervisors is the first factor to reduce crime or injury. Redesign of Sri Nibong Park or its facility for better surveillance should be the second priority. After these two factors, they perceive increasing lighting and initiating foot patrol can make the park safer to avoid crime. But in their opinion, maintenance, installation of barriers (fences, restrainers), and control access entrance/exists and immediate repairs respectively are much less effective ways to reduce crime or injury.\nDiscussion and conclusion: In this study, characteristics of Neighborhood Park were examined by conducting a field study and the effects of users' needs and preferences on developmental strategies were discussed. From the analysis and results mentioned above, this study found that among research sample who were park users and neighborhood residents, the number of males and females varied, but were approximately equal to provide a good sample to measure both males and female' preferences. The majority of the respondents lived in the Taman Sri Nibong neighborhood. In terms of ethnic background, the majority of the respondents were Chinese followed by Malay. In general, the level of education of this neighborhood was high and most of the respondents were employed. In relation to the socio-economic levels, this area encompassed all three low, middle and high income levels. Local needs and preferences may be important aspects to consider in park planning and management (Jansson and Persson, 2010). One of the reasons why the concept of user preferences and needs related to the condition and design of the park should receive considerable attention is the notion that it can influence business strategies to attract more investment by the community developer. This new approach can contribute to the future of the society and its sustainability.This study concludes that users agree that the Taman Sri Nibong neighborhood park remains a good place for play. However, they would like to see this neighborhood park safer from crime and suggested redesigning the park and facilities. Users also identified safety of the environment such as road safety as most important to them when visiting a park. They recommended more supervision related to feeling safer in the park. This finding is consistent with the result of Walker's (2004) study related to job opportunities of parks for neighborhood residents, as he mentioned \"parks can also offer longer-term job opportunities for neighborhood residents, as well as beneficial training opportunities that equip both young people and adults to join the workforce with marketable skills and experience\". Related to the effectiveness of design on park user's perception and preferences, this study found that park users perceived some elements of environmental design like physical barriers of fences and hedges between playground and football field as effective in protecting users from accident and injury in the park. By designing a cycling route separate from walkways, injuries caused by accidents between cyclist and children or walkers that can be a threat for safety can be prevented. Another suggestion, which users made was for more supervisors to be in the park or playground to take care of the children while they play with the equipment. The present study concludes that more effort should be made to create particular qualities in designing neighborhood area to attract more visitors.Future studies are needed to explore how design strategies of Neighborhood Parks can satisfy urban neighborhood population and also support social business development. The current study is limited in its scope because of the need to complete the study within a limited time and budget. The directions for future research are identified as more research should be conducted in this regard and more neighborhood parks should be considered allowing for comparison among them. This study would enable landscape architects and environmental designers in addition to the business and community developers to match the specific developmental goals of urban neighborhood environmental planning.\nRecommendations: Although this study considered needs and preferences of park users about the design of a neighborhood park to have impact on better design of the park and playground, it is not the purpose of this study to generate specific guidelines. The following points are outcomes from users' suggestions as well as research observations.* Increase lighting encourages people to use the park during night time and increases natural surveillance. Providing good lighting for this neighborhood park can improve the look of the area and encourage people to use the street at night increasing personal safety, and often low in cost.* Appropriate sign boards related to safety especially related to playground equipment to identify equipment with age design, was another recommendation to enhance the park.* More police patrol providing formal surveillance to avoid crime and criminal activity in Taman Sri Nibong Park.* Maintenance of park equipment is necessary.* Design separate routes for cyclists to prevent conflict between walkers and joggers with cyclists.* Level and redesign the pathway for walkers and joggers to provide a flat pathway with proper slopes to drain rain water from pathway surfaces.* Install more speed bumps to reduce speed of vehicles, which will provide road safety for this neighborhood.* Install a fence between the playground and football field.* Provide some facilities for park users such as suitable chairs and tables with rain shield, toilet, dustbin, drinking water, public phone.* Install some safety elements such as CCTV, emergency buzzer press alarm.* Establish park committee for residents to contribute to make the area safer.* Employ supervision for playground especially during peak times at the park.* Rearrange trees and remove bushes and shrubs with sharp leaves from the park.* Provide special space for pets.* Increase number of age related equipment for children.* Turf maintenance is another important point that should be taken into consideration.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The aim of this study is to identify factors that users find important in their use of the neighborhood park (to evaluate design of the neighborhood park from the view point of users) and to consider the impact of well designed neighborhood parks on business strategy compared to the traditional view.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The population of this study was drawn from park users and neighborhood residents. Park visitors were conveniently sampled through an intercept survey method form. Taman Sri Nibong Park is one of the biggest neighborhood parks in Pulau Pinang. A total of 173 questionnaires were returned. The data were analyzed through the use of descriptive statistics.\nFindings: - By knowing the needs and preferences of visitors and neighborhood residents, the present study concludes that more efforts should be made to include certain qualities in designing neighborhood areas to attract more visitors and investors. Related to the effectiveness of design on park users' perceptions and preferences, this study as well as observations has found that park users perceive some elements of environmental design, like physical barriers of fences and hedges between playground and the football field, effective in protecting users from accident and injury in the park. Another suggestion, which users made was for more supervisors to be in the park or playground to take care of the children while they use the equipment.\nResearch limitations/implications: - The current study is limited in its scope because of the need to complete the study within a limited time and budget. Future studies are needed to explore how design strategies of Neighborhood Parks can satisfy urban neighborhood populations and also support social business development. The directions for future research are identified as more research should be conducted in this regard and more neighborhood parks should be considered allowing for comparison among them.\nPractical implications: - This research would enable landscape architects and environmental designers as well as business and community developers to match specific developmental goals of urban neighborhood environmental planning. It can influence business strategies to attract more investment by the community developer, and also this new approach can influence the future of the society and its sustainability.\nOriginality/value: - The paper challenges the traditional view of parks as places that only incur social expense to a new perception that views them as revenue and social business places.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Developing a storytelling experience: the case of craft spirits distilleries in Chicago	[ "Craft spirits", "Craft distilleries", "Luxury", "Spirits", "Storytelling", "Marketing", "Case study", "Content analysis", "Direct observation" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The spirits market has recently seen the emergence of a new, compellingly distinct market category, that of craft products. The American Craft Spirits Association (ACSA, 2019) defines crafts spirits which meet the following criteria:\n2. Literature review: 2.1 Conceptualizing the consumption of luxury spirits\n3. Methodology: Various definitions have been used to delimit and describe the case study method. For example, Malhotra et al. (2017, p. 909) defined it as \"a detailed study based upon the observation of the intrinsic details of individuals, groups or individuals and organizations.\" For the purpose of the present study, we respected the broader definition of Yin (1994, p. 13) of case study research, \"an empirical inquiry that investigates a contemporary phenomenon within its real life context, especially when the boundaries between phenomenon and context are not clearly evident.\" The case study approach has been widely used in many sectors including wine marketing, e.g. Strickland et al. (2013), and as argued by King and Grace (2005, p. 283), \"allows the phenomenon, to be described 'in-depth' and 'in the round' and in doing so, providing the detail that would otherwise be overlooked if another methodology [sic] were chosen, e.g. survey\".\n4. Findings and discussion: In our sample of firms, we identified the following seven categories of storytelling themes or drivers. These are discussed below. Although there is an overlap between some of the categories, both functional and emotional components are present.\n5. Conclusions, implications, limitations and future research: 5.1 Conclusions\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this study is to identify how craft spirits distilleries use elements of the storytelling narrative as part of a storytelling marketing strategy.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A case study approach was undertaken based on seven craft distilleries in and around Chicago, IL. Data were collected from various sources including direct observation and secondary data based on online press coverage company websites and social media.\nFindings: In the sample of firms, the authors identified the following seven categories of storytelling themes: craft, innovation, origins, myth, celebrity, provenance and collectability. These categories comprise both functional and emotional components which are strongly associated with the concept of authenticity.\nOriginality/value: This research is the first of its kind to investigate storytelling within the craft spirits sector. The results are relevant to develop strategies for marketing craft spirits brands. Findings are relevant for spirits distilleries in Chicago, IL but have transferable learnings for beverage categories who desire to stage meaningful, valued customer experiences.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
China's policies on foreign-invested travel agencies upon its entry to the WTO: What can foreign investors do?	[ "China", "Travel", "International investments" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: With its accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001, China committed to gradually opening up its travel service market to foreign investors, which it has achieved with a step-by-step liberalization of the travel service market. For example, a commitment was made that foreign investors would be able to become major shareholders in joint venture travel agencies no later than January 1, 2005, or within three years of China's WTO entry. A further commitment required that by December 31, 2007, or within six years of China's WTO entry, wholly foreign-owned travel agencies be permitted to run travel service businesses in mainland China without any restriction on establishing branches. In practice, a majority of China's WTO commitments on the travel service industry were formally met ahead of time.Since China's accession to the WTO, several milestones have been recorded in the course of introducing foreign direct investment (FDI) to the travel service market. In 2003, Jalpak International Company Limited (JPI China) from Japan was approved as the first wholly foreign-owned travel agent in Beijing. In the same year, TUI China Travel, which had German TUI AG (75 percent) as a major shareholder and China Travel Service (25 percent) as a minor shareholder, was recognized as the first foreign-holding travel agency in the Chinese tourism industry. In the following year, the second wholly foreign-owned travel agency, ANA International Travel Service, which is part of the Japanese All Nippon Airways (ANA) group, was set up in Beijing. The third wholly foreign-owned travel agency established was affiliated with Gullivers Travel Associates from Hong Kong, while the fourth one was Star Cruises from Malaysia, which obtained a license in Shanghai during 2004. The same year also saw the establishment of a foreign-holding travel agency in Shenzhen. In 2005, the first wholly foreign-owned travel agency in Guangzhou was founded under the umbrella of the Kuoni Travel Group from Switzerland. By August 2007, there were 25 foreign-invested travel agencies registered with the Ministry of Commerce of the People's Republic of China (MOFCOM), including 11 wholly foreign-owned, five foreign-holding and nine Chinese-holding joint venture travel agencies (Luo, 2007). Detailed information on selected major foreign-invested travel agencies is given in Table I.During this period, China purposefully promulgated travel service-related policies in an exercise of governmental power aimed at exerting an influence on the nature and pattern of FDI in the travel service industry. In a political environment, foreign investors who are interested in entering a certain market are concerned about their entry modes and operating strategies. Despite the previous research in this area (Edgell, 1983, 1990; Hall, 1994, 1995, 2000; Richter, 1980, 1983, 1989), the policy-making process in the tourism industry has yet to receive sufficient attention from academics. In addition, while FDI is a significant component of tourism studies, it is often ignored. Therefore, it is hoped that this study, by integrating an assessment of both the policy-making process and FDI in tourism, offers both theoretical and practical significance. It seeks to build on previous knowledge to facilitate an analysis of China's policies on foreign-invested travel agencies upon the country's entry to the WTO, and to provide suggestions to foreign investors regarding their entry modes and operating strategies.\nLiterature review: China's tourism market and the travel agency sector\nMethodology: Qualitative research is undertaken to assemble an in-depth understanding of human and social behavior and investigate the reasons behind them. It is built from a philosophical perspective that is broadly interpretive, in the sense that it is concerned with how the social world is interpreted, understood, experienced and produced (Mason, 1997). This study employed a qualitative method to gather both primary and secondary data on China's travel service-related policies following its accession to the WTO and formulate suggestions for foreign investors. The secondary data were collected from various sources, including articles and editors' notes published in newspapers, the Internet, professional magazines, and the CNTA monthly and annual reports. They were triangulated for the purpose of understanding the subject from different perspectives (Decrop, 1999).The primary data were gathered from six senior managers who had extensive work experience in the travel service market. This sample size is considered acceptable, with Jennings (2001) indicating that the qualitative methodology differs from the quantitative one in having a holistic-inductive paradigm in which analysis is focused on themes rather than on specific variables and/or constructs. Having thoroughly understood the essence of the qualitative approach, Ap (2003) argued that collecting the corresponding data does not require a large number of respondents or cases, unlike the quantitative approach. Researchers therefore seek to understand the phenomenon of interest by observing individual respondents or cases, rather than to generalize the findings to the rest of the population (Ap, 2003).Of the six industry professionals who participated in this study, two senior managers were from the headquarters office of CITS, China, which is one of the local behemoths in the market. One departmental manager was from Swire Travel, Hong Kong, which is an active player preparing to invest in the Chinese market. The other managers were affiliated with three foreign-invested travel agencies, Star Cruises (Shanghai), TUI China, and CITS AMES. It is noteworthy that these three firms are wholly foreign-owned, foreign-holding and Chinese holding joint venture travel agencies, respectively. The individuals involved were invited to participate in personal interviews, and after obtaining their agreement, detailed times and places were discussed with them. The interviews were conducted either at the participants' offices or at places where they felt comfortable. Lasting one-two hours on average, the interviews were voice-recorded and the content analyzed at a later time by two of the authors of this study (Decrop, 1999). The primary data compiled were analyzed and then presented in conjunction with secondary data on, for example, the actual experiences of existing foreign-invested travel agencies.This study seeks to apply Hall's (1994) four-component policy-making model by interpreting the cross-referenced findings of suitably engineered interview questions. Hall's model has been successfully used to assess the dynamic tourism policy-making process in different historical periods of modern China (Zhang et al., 1999). This study is limited to the political and economic environment dating from the start of China's WTO membership, which is an appropriate setting for Hall's model. The questions used in the interviews were mainly based on the five following categories:1. The demands for travel service-related policies in line with the WTO commitments.2. The outputs and impacts of the relevant policies in line with the WTO commitments.3. Suggestions and recommendations for foreign investors in terms of their operating advantages and entry modes.4. Strategic purposes of FDI and equity expansion in China.5. The choices between earlier and later entry, direct entry and acquisition, and full and partial ownership.\nChina's travel service-related policy-making process: Policy demands\nSuggestions for foreign investors: The investment environment\nConclusion: By tracking the circumstances closely and meeting the forces of change, this study has successfully extended the knowledge of the policy-making process in Chinese tourism. This process took place during the period following China's accession to the WTO. During this period, FDI was gradually introduced to the travel service market. This study also sheds light on the Chinese tourism market by providing insightful implications for foreign investors.As a result of China's commitments on its entry to the WTO in 2001, the liberalization of travel services has been an ongoing process involving the gradual introduction of FDI to the travel agency sector. In recent years, a series of interim policies based on the WTO commitments have been issued. These policies were implemented ahead of time and have controlled the number of foreign travel service giants in the Chinese market. The four aspects of the policy-making process (Hall, 1994) have been analyzed in detail by referring to a set of both primary data taken from six interviews with industry players and secondary data taken from a variety of sources. The results showed that: the policies adopted were needed owing to the governmental concern over a sudden influx of foreign investors into China's travel service market; the decisions made were reached in a sequential manner that gradually opened up the market by lifting the special requirements and conditions for foreign investors; the outputs of the policies implemented have included limiting the number of foreign-invested travel agencies in the Chinese market; and the impacts of these policies were mainly intended.In addition, some suggestions have been given to foreign investors in relation to their entry mode choices and the elements of their operating strategies in China. Despite the stepwise liberalization of the travel service market, foreign investors have been reminded of the government protection that is part of the market. In terms of entry mode choices, three equity investment purposes that might be considered by foreign investors have been highlighted. These are related to targeting tourists from the country of origin, handling both Chinese tourists and tourists from the country of origin, and keeping the entire tourism industry in view. The existence of these three purposes, in conjunction with market internalization factors, ownership and locational advantages, have been shown to be important in determining whether FDI is necessary. Determination of the entry mode has been discussed in terms of the choices between earlier and later entry, greenfield investment and acquisition, and full and partial ownership. Regardless of whether earlier or later entry is adopted, foreign investors have been advised to take their equity investment purposes, in accordance with the three entry mode choice-related theories, into sober consideration in making a decision on the extent of ownership. None of the interviews conducted for this study clearly indicated any support for acquisition in preference to greenfield investment. Finally, for both existing and potential foreign participants in the market, some operating strategies that were gleaned from the interviews undertaken have been suggested. The detailed strategies suggested include brand building campaigns, tourism product differentiation strategies, localization management tactics and business network establishment.Future researchers tapping into this subject may be interested in examining FDI in the tourism sectors of developing countries other than China. It is beyond the scope of this study to comprehensively and extensively respond to tourism industry professionals in developing countries who call for theoretical support and guidance with regard to FDI (UNCTAD, 2008). Furthermore, the political dimensions of the tourism industry, particularly in developing countries, need to be investigated more thoroughly and systematically. Finally, this study provides a departure point for an integrated examination of FDI and the policy-making process in tourism; future research may extend the footprint left by this study.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - Based on the commitments made when it joined the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001, China began to allow the establishment of foreign-invested travel agencies. During this transition period, China promulgated travel service-related policies and paid a great deal of attention to this specific business market. This paper aims to analyze the said tourism policies and provide suggestions to foreign investors for their future business activities in this promising market.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The study uses both primary and secondary data to specify China's policies on foreign-invested travel agencies upon its accession to the WTO and discuss foreign investors' entry modes and operating strategies for joining the market. Hall's model is employed to examine the policy-making process, including policy demands, policy decisions, policy outputs, and policy impacts.\nFindings: - Some foreign investment-related tourism policies were implemented ahead of the schedule to which China committed upon its entry to the WTO. The tight nature of the policies implemented meant that only 25 foreign-invested agencies had survived in China by August 2007. Industry professionals recruited for this study commented that the nature and pattern of FDI in this market has been successfully framed by the policies adopted.\nPractical implications: - The entry modes that foreign investors in China's travel service market should adopt and the detailed operating strategies they should use are discussed.\nOriginality/value: - The paper can be seen as a successful and enlightening attempt to pave the way for future researchers to engage in further discussions about FDI in tourism in a political environment, particularly in developing countries.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Forming a community partnership to enhance education in sustainability	[ "Partnership", "Sustainable development", "Universities" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Environmental Studies (ES) Programs at undergraduate institutions face considerable challenges because they are inherently multi-disciplinary. This has led to a criticism of many such programs for curricular incoherence, shallow and hyper-diverse curricula and a lack of program planning and vision (Soule and Press, 1998). As a relative newcomer to the growing number of ES Programs, Ithaca College (IC) sought to develop a focused curriculum in ES that incorporates the most successful aspects of other programs and the suggestions of critics of the academic discipline to provide a new model of education in ES. We chose to academically unify our curriculum by focusing on the concept of sustainability, and to broaden our course and research project offerings, while encouraging student community action, by formalizing our partnership with a local model community of environmental sustainability, EcoVillage at Ithaca (EVI). This approach was suggested by Penn State University's successful combination of curriculum and community affiliation. While the Penn State Program addresses scientific indicators of sustainability over time on campus, we apply scientific analysis to a model sustainable community and to local sites where students develop perspective on real-world environmental problems and solutions. Many universities have developed excellent curricula in sustainability (Leal Filho, 2002), which have provided many valuable insights for our own program. What distinguishes our program is that it is the first true educational collaboration between a college and a sustainable community.IC's ES Program and EcoVillage established a teaching/research partnership organized around issues of community sustainability. The partnership and the ensuing projects were made possible by a 3-year grant from the National Science Foundation's Curriculum, Course and Laboratory Improvement Program in 2002. This partnership and theme of sustainability have become cornerstones for the ES major. Initiated in 1998, IC's interdisciplinary ES Program was constructed on a strong scientific grounding. The core curriculum includes topics recommended by Soule and Press (1998) including specific environmental courses in science, chemistry, field biology, ethics, politics, history and economics, as well as courses in computer applications and statistics. In addition to core courses, majors are also required to pursue 21 credits in a self-designed area of concentration: to date, the majority of students have chosen the natural sciences for their area of concentration. The major also requires a capstone experience, which can take the form of a research seminar, internship, or independent study. The capstone provides students with an opportunity to apply theoretical knowledge, refine research skills, and integrate information from multiple disciplines, all essential for solving real-world environmental problems (Hoagland and Fathe, 1998; Maniates and Whissel, 2000).The ES Program is growing rapidly. The number of majors more than quadrupled - from 9 to 53 majors - between 1998 and 2004. The number of minors increased to 15 in 2004. As the number of majors and their areas of interest expand, so do the challenges of developing curricular coherence and assuring meaningful capstone experiences. The courses on sustainability provide a practical and appealing curricular option that is both flexible (in terms of internship and research options) and coherent (in its emphasis on scientifically grounded approaches to sustainability). They offer preparation and venues for high quality \"capstone\" experiences for the growing cadres of majors and minors now in the pipeline.Moreover, ES majors and minors are only the core of those students served by the curriculum. A number of departments offer courses related to ES, such as environmental law and policy (in business), environmental anthropology (in anthropology) and nature and society (in sociology). Students in these classes, who have an interest in environmental issues but who do not choose ES as a major or minor, find the courses attractive for practical study of environmental problems. In other words, coursework in sustainability serves students across the IC campus.IC is fortunate to be located in close proximity to a model sustainable community. Less than two miles from Ithaca's downtown and Cayuga Lake (and about three miles from IC), EVI is a growing intentional community of 60 households dedicated to exploring and modeling innovative approaches to ecological and social sustainability. Its unique habitat integrates the best aspects of urban and rural living and includes co-housing, organic agriculture, and natural areas, preserving and restoring over 80 percent of the land as green space. The residential component of EVI comprises tightly clustered co-housing neighborhoods surrounding a village green. The 176-acre site of farmland and woods borders a nature preserve. EVI is a participant in living routes, a consortium that brings together EcoVillages and academic institutions from around the world to cooperate in developing sustainable physical and social systems for communities. The EcoVillage Education and Research (EVER) Center aims to explore and teach systemic solutions to the environmental and social crises of our time through practical programs, reaching out to a wide range of population groups. Residents include university professors, software developers, green building contractors, organic farmers, school teachers, and renewable energy installers. EcoVillage has gained an international reputation for sustainable community development, and has been featured on CNN, PBS, NPR, The New York Times (Vizard, 1997), The Wall Street Journal (Aeppel, 1994), and Popular Science (DiCristina, 1996). Thus, EVI represents access to a remarkable array of talents and models upon which Ithaca students may draw.\nProgram goals: Our goals for this program are to advance opportunities for undergraduates to learn about sustainability and to become involved in science-based community ecological projects. Our specific objectives are to:* develop a teaching/research partnership between IC and EcoVillage to expand the curriculum in ES and the natural sciences by hiring EVI residents to teach specialized courses as adjunct instructors;* develop new, scientifically-based courses and course modules on sustainability;* strengthen the scientific understanding of sustainability in the ESP curriculum already established;* educate students in applied scientific techniques of sustainability indicators and footprinting by evaluating two diverse communities as long-term case studies;* provide science-based and sustainability-based internship and practicum opportunities for IC students and other students in the region; and* provide scientifically grounded advice to encourage environmentally sustainable practices in the local community.We focus our curriculum on comparative community analysis of indicators. Our motivation stems from the experience of IC and other institutions that community partnerships offer unique and valuable educational opportunities (Herzberger and Chapdelaine, 1998; Zlotkowski, 1996). Further, we emphasize the interrelationships among human-nature systems by examining these connections in detail at EcoVillage and the larger community.By combining the scientific evaluation of sustainability with study of the integrated ecological and social systems of EcoVillage, we are developing a unique program of study that IC and other institutions can build from in the future. Through focus on place-based perspectives on the environment, students will be directed towards a \"scholarship of engagement\", to quote D. Benzing (Hoagland, 2000). Students explore the environmental impact of campus life, but also consider \"how it could be\" by studying EcoVillage and other model communities that attempt to use ecologically appropriate technologies to achieve their vision.IC's willingness to financially match the funding from the National Science Foundation has allowed us to build a unique program. What began as a relatively modest effort to create a distinctive learning experience for ES students has mushroomed into a campus and community-wide initiative and commitment to sustainability.\nProject components: With these stated objectives, we launched several project components: course development, research and internships, faculty development, and public outreach. As such, we developed four new courses to be taught through the IC ES Program, along with a series of Independent Studies and Individual Student Research Projects. Small Summer Curriculum Grants were also offered to IC Faculty and EcoVillage residents to develop course materials and modules devoted to some aspect of the science of sustainability.New course development\nConclusions: What we could not have guessed two years ago was that the collaboration between IC and EcoVillage would have even more far-reaching effects than a handful of courses could offer. As the small coordination team of three IC faculty and two EVI residents has worked together, we have joined with others to begin building a critical mass which has the potential for creating major, positive changes at both IC and EcoVillage, as well as within the surrounding region. By drawing on the inspiration and expertise of outside consultants, as well as our own experiences, a clear vision has gradually emerged.At IC, the vision includes creating a firm campus-wide commitment to environmental sustainability. Although it is too early to tell exactly what direction this will take, some curricular initiatives suggested were a first-year seminar such as \"Sustainability 101\", guest lecturers in classes, and a minor or major in sustainability studies. There have also been discussions about the possibility of creating a sustainability institute, which would focus multi-disciplinary approaches to researching solutions to ecological problems faced by both the public and private sectors.At EcoVillage, the vision includes an increasing commitment to creating successful learning experiences for students and residents alike, while developing our internal capacity for teaching college-level courses. We would like to develop housing for some students to live and work on-site at EcoVillage. In the long-term, we hope to build a Sustainability Education Center. This would be complementary to any facilities which IC develops.The small group of \"burning souls\" which has carried out the core work of developing curriculum on the science of sustainability has rapidly expanded both its members and its mission. The flame of interest in creating a genuinely sustainable world - one that pays attention to the triple bottom line of human capital, ecological resources, as well as economic well-being - is burning high.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - To provide an example of how colleges can partner with local EcoVillages to further sustainability curriculum on campus and the educational mission of the EcoVillages, and to strengthen ties with the community.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Describes four structured courses developed for the Environmental Studies Program, including sustainable communities, sustainable land use, sustainable energy and environmental futures. Additionally, independent research opportunities in wind energy, solar photovoltaics, and GIS/GPS developed as part of the curriculum. Describes numerous ancillary activities that have promoted sustainability across campus and the community.\nFindings: - Provides information about how to develop educational partnerships with community groups, foster sustainability education on campus, recruit additional faculty involvement, and influence college operations with respect to sustainability.\nPractical implications: - A very useful source of information for those involved in building sustainability curriculum and linking it to campus operations and community outreach.\nOriginality/value: - This paper describes a unique partnership between a college and an intentional community that serves as a model for other colleges and universities.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Determinants of effective university-business collaboration: Empirical study of Saudi universities	[ "R&D", "KSA", "Knowledge-based economy", "University–business collaboration" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: University-business collaboration (UBC) encompasses the processes through which the knowledge developed in universities becomes the knowledge applied by businesses for their operations and future strategies. UBC is neither an end nor a collection of outputs, but many different ways of using knowledge, which exists in many forms. To some extent, UBC underpins key drivers of economic prosperity; these include innovation, foreign direct investment, human capital, scientific infrastructure, intangible assets, knowledge transfer, intellectual property and firm creation. It is also an important source of revenue for universities. Promoting UBC and extracting its value can help universities address decreasing public funds, help businesses gain and maintain their competitive advantage in dynamic international markets, contribute to the economic development at regional and national levels, and meet the demands of the labor market to provide more relevant knowledge and skills.\nLiterature review: Benefits of UBC\nDeterminants of UBC in Saudi Arabia: We conducted two different surveys to understand the causes of low UBC from both the business sector and university perspectives.\nDeterminants of receiving government funding for research: We conducted a linear regression analysis to explore the role of several factors on the funded projects. We used two separate models to capture the determinants on research funding by the government and private sector. The first model is constructed as follows:\nDeterminants of receiving private sector funding for research: The second regression model explores the determinant factors for receiving private sector funding for R&D projects. The model is constructed as follows:\nConclusion: The faculty survey indicates important factors affecting low R&D projects funded by the private sector. The opinion questions reveal that faculty members are confident about their research capacity, but take an issue with the lack of awareness in the private sector. They believe that the university leadership needs to expand its guidance on pursuing private sector funding, but consider high teaching load to be a major obstacle for pursuing funded projects.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The attention to the university-business collaboration (UBC) for its role in the knowledge-based economy is growing in many countries. In this context, the purpose of this paper is to conduct two surveys to explore the causes of low collaboration between the private sector and academia in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The first survey covers nearly 50 companies to learn their perspectives. Using the findings of the first survey, a second survey was conducted of university researchers to understand the determinants of private and public funding of research and development projects. The survey provided two types of data, namely, categorical and continuous, which were subjected to reliability and normality tests. A linear regression analysis also was utilized to explore the role of different factors on the funded projects by the two sectors.\nFindings: There is a perception among researchers that the private sector is woefully underestimating research capacity of Saudi universities. One interesting finding is that publishing in journals from the International Scientific Indexing (ISI) is a strong predictor for government funding, but not for private funding. From the private sector perspective, publishing in ISI-indexed journals is not sufficient evidence of research capability. Moreover, high teaching load is a major obstacle in acquiring private funding, but not so for public funding.\nPractical implications: The paper provides two main recommendations to improve collaboration. First, universities should incentivize publishing in high-impact journals more than in ISI-indexed journals to increase the faculty's research capabilities. Second, universities should reduce the teaching load of faculty involved in research projects, particularly those funded by the private sector.\nOriginality/value: The outcomes of this survey-based study are very valuable to the ecosystem of academia, business and government in general and for Saudi Arabia in particular, where there is a vital need to implement the right policies regarding UBC in the country.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Impacts of the sectoral composition of growth on poverty reduction in Vietnam	[ "Poverty", "Vietnam", "Economic sectors", "Endogenous", "Sectoral composition of growth" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The relationship between economic growth and poverty reduction has been virtually admitted by a number of studies in the literature. However, it is also evident that there is a sizeable difference in the impacts of a given rate of growth on poverty. Therefore, it is not easy to come to the conclusion that the sectoral composition of growth affects poverty reduction through economic development. The answer to this problem was found to be different from one country to another. From the different findings discovered in various countries, many incomprehensible questions as to which pattern of economic growth has the biggest impact on poverty reduction have arisen in developing countries.\n2. Literature review: The close relationship between poverty and sectoral economic growth has been studied and confirmed in numerous theoretical and empirical studies. The first theory of a dual-sector model (Lewis, 1954) shows that national prosperity is achieved when structure of economic sectors tend to increase industry sector. Similarly, Kuznets' (1955) model argues that poverty and inequality will increase in the first phase of economic development when industry sector increases, and, in the later period, poverty as well as inequality will be improved with slowdown economic growth of the industry sector. Living standard of the poor will be sanitated. On the contrary, some theories argue that shifting the growth structure toward the trend of promoting the agricultural sector will lead to better poverty reduction from an early stage for developing countries (Oshima, 1993). Supporting this view, a number of theoretical studies also provide some convincing evidence that for poor countries, the process of economic growth should move in the direction of increasing the proportion of agriculture (Mellor, 1979). Different from the two-sector model, the theory of Fourastie (1949) introduces a three-sector economy. From the author's perspective, the trend of shifting to services is positive and will have an impact on increasing quality of life, social security, education and culture, and reducing poverty.\n3. Methodology and data: 3.1 Methodology\n4. Empirical results and discussions: 4.1 Empirical results\n5. Conclusions: Through empirical analysis in the previous section, we can draw the following conclusions about the relationship between the sectoral composition of growth and poverty reduction in Vietnam.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to assess the impact of sectoral economic growth and other factors on poverty reduction in Vietnam in the period 2010-2016.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Originating from the question of whether there is an endogenous problem between the structure of economic growth by sector and some other factors in the process of impact on poverty reduction, the paper has used the 2-Stage Least Squares method to deal with the endogenous issues.\nFindings: Increasing the proportion of the industrial sector and the agricultural sector had great impacts on poverty reduction. In contrast, the increasing proportion of the service sector made the poverty rate higher. One noticeable thing is that economic growth was not significant for the goal of poverty reduction in 2010-2016. In addition, the process of urbanization, the increase in the labor rate and literacy rate contributed positively to poverty reduction achievements. Finally, population growth was also one of the reasons hindering Vietnam's successful poverty reduction process.\nPractical implications: Accelerating the process of economic restructuring in the direction of increasing the proportion of the industry is accompanied by more attention to agricultural development than the service sector. Employment creation policies should be promoted. Maintaining population control by educating poverty reduction awareness for the poor will have a positive effect on long-term poverty reduction.\nOriginality/value: Research on the growth structure by sector affecting poverty reduction in Vietnam is still relatively limited. The study of relationships in the context of endogenous existence is still quite limited in Vietnam. Therefore, this paper has focused on the question of sectoral economic growth affects poverty in the interrelation among sectors in the process of economic development.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Development of performance-based service strategies for the oil and gas industry: a case study	[ "Oil industry", "Gas industry", "Business performance", "Critical success factors", "Cost drivers", "Norway" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction and background: The oil and gas (O&G) industry operating on the Norwegian Continental Shelf (NCS) is gradually stepping into a new stage of development, as many of the O&G fields are coming closer to the end of their plateau phase and some fields are entering the tail-end phase of their production life (NPD, 2003; 3i, 2004; NPD, 2005). At these stages it becomes essential to reduce the operational expenses (OPEX)[1], or to raise the O&G production volume to extend the production period and to prolong the economic lifetime and tail-end production phase. If possible, both alternatives should be explored. Production may be increased by connecting new deposits to existing production facilities or by implementing measures for enhanced O&G recovery from existing deposits (see, for example, Schulte et al., 1993). However, this is often not feasible. Reducing OPEX can delay the production cut-off, but can be challenging since the production facilities, equipment and machinery are often old, worn and deteriorated, and therefore may have increasing failure rates. Moreover, compared to modern technology, the production facilities may be ineffective and inefficient, lacking, for example, instrumentation for modern control and condition monitoring. Figure 1 depicts the potential increased profits and extension of the production period based on improving operational strategies to reduce OPEX.In general, advanced and complex technology requires skilled operational and maintenance personnel. Such technology is most often not maintenance-free, and therefore usually requires spare parts, diagnostic assistance, and other product support. Often such systems employ advanced electronics and control software that need to be upgraded and/or modernized. In addition, services are required for enhancing operational skills and improving product performance (see, for example, Lele and Karmarkar, 1993; Mathieu, 2001a, b). Such services demand intimate knowledge of a customer's operational requirements, operating environment, and geographical location, as well as other influencing factors (Kumar and Kumar, 2004a).Traditionally, companies outsource non-core activities and activities that require special expertise and tools to specialist companies that are able to deliver these services better and more cost-efficiently. Companies outsource activities to ensure production and achieve cost benefits, while improving the performance of services and their delivery capability (Kakabadse and Kakabadse, 2002). Responsibility and control over these activities are partially transferred to the service provider. Outsourcing is normally considered to be a long-term strategic decision (see, for example, Lysons and Gillingham, 2003; Bragg, 1998). Allen and Chandrashekar (2000) point out that \"hotels outsource concierge services, airlines outsource maintenance and customer services, insurance companies outsource actuarial services, banks outsource mailrooms and manufacturers outsource customer support\". In the O&G industry, companies often outsource drilling operations, well completion, geophysical logging, facility construction and modification, etc. Lately, some operators have been outsourcing production facility operations and maintenance activities to specialist companies that are able to run the production facility at reduced OPEX. On the NCS, some O&G operator companies only own and administer the O&G field, while the operation of the O&G production facility is outsourced to specialist companies.Players involved in the O&G production process want the best possible performance (e.g. concerning profit, availability, deliverability, health, safety and environment, etc.) from the production process at the lowest possible cost, as shown in Figure 2. To achieve this, the parties who are involved in and/or influence the operational performance of the production facility need to deliver the expected performance according to the defined needs, wants, and preferences. The owners and the operators need to decide performance goals, resource use, and support service requirements. On the other hand, the service providers need to decide on how they can help their customers to achieve their performance goals, and find ways to deliver the services in the most efficient way to reach their own performance goals (Anderson and Narus, 1995). The objective is to create a win-win situation for all parties involved. This becomes even more critical in the tail-end of O&G field recovery.Against this background we believe that there is considerable potential for improving O&G production facility operational performance through developing improved and better-formulated service strategies.\nDevelopment of a performance-based service strategy framework for the O&G industry: Services can be described as deeds, processes and performance (Zeithaml and Bitner, 2000). Deeds are activities that solve problems that customers cannot solve independently. A service process is used to carry out the necessary deeds. Performance concerns how well the deeds are performed and encompasses service process effectiveness and efficiency. To provide excellent services, an organization needs to consider likely customer and project requirements and to make plans for delivering the service accordingly. Such an overall plan is often referred to as a service strategy (see, for example, Hope and Muhlemann, 1997; Gronroos, 2000).A service strategy is a plan for achieving the service goals of both the service receiver (buyer) and the service provider (seller). The plan states what services are needed (i.e. the service content and outcome), where they are needed (the location), how they are to be delivered (the service delivery process), when they are to be delivered and for how long time they are needed (timing and duration), to whom to deliver them and what resources are needed (personnel, skills, tools, equipment, etc.), and why the services are needed (the reason). The plan should also suggest approaches to fulfilling the defined service requirements to achieve the service goals, and define how to measure or evaluate the service performance (for more details, see also Hope and Muhlemann, 1997; Mintzberg, 1978; Manarro-Viseras et al., 2005; Chaharbaghi and Willis, 1998).A professional organization develops a short-term or long-term strategy to plan where it wants to go. Without such a strategy it is easy to get lost and deliver imperfect or wrong services, or deliver services ineffectively or with an unsatisfactory performance (Hope and Muhlemann, 1997). To develop a service strategy one needs to consider all the factors that will influence the service requirements (content), as well as the factors that will influence the core business activities for both the customer (buyer) and the service provider (seller) (Kumar and Kumar, 2004a; see also Nicoulaud, 1988). The strategy should focus on (long-term) performance and on assisting the customer in taking maximum advantage of a technical or organizational business process. Furthermore, the strategy should consider how to execute the strategy and how the services are to be delivered to achieve customer satisfaction, retention, and loyalty (Zeithaml et al., 1990; Zeithaml and Bitner, 2000; Gronroos, 1998). Therefore, it is essential to identify the performance parameters for both the service seller and the service buyer.In this paper a case study is conducted to validate the framework depicted in Figure 3 for the development of performance-based service strategies for the O&G industry. The framework is based on a conceptual framework for developing a service strategy for an industrial product based on a literature survey (Kumar and Kumar, 2004a). The framework illustrates the major factors that have influence on the development of the performance-based service strategies. Factors such as geographical location, maintenance needs, operating environment, and operational requirements have an influence on the specification of what services are required. As such, these factors need to be considered when defining the concrete service specification. These requirements create a foundation for defining a service strategy. In addition, the service buyers' strategy, the service sellers' strategy, and external factors will have an influence on the implementation and execution of a service strategy. Furthermore, each influencing factor has attributes that have a concrete impact on the performance of the service strategy implementation and execution. To reduce or avoid the gap between required and actually delivered services, a prudent service provider and a customer need to agree on performance measurement parameters which take into account critical success factors, performance killers, and cost drivers. Moreover, a performance measurement system needs to be in place to improve the service delivery and the service strategy on a continuous basis. To update the service strategy, one needs to reassess the influencing factors and their attributes periodically. The framework links a service provider's service delivery strategy (SDS) with a service customer's service reception strategy (SRS). The SDS and the SRS need to be aligned to avoid gaps and conflicts (see also Markeset and Kumar, 2005).The suggested performance-based service strategy framework should function as a foundation for delivering and receiving industrial services. Therefore the involved parties have to agree on what influencing factors, attributes, as well as performance measures, need to be considered when developing a performance-based service strategy.To verify and validate the suggested performance-based service strategy framework for the O&G industry a case study was conducted. The case study identifies current practices in the North Sea O&G industry and service strategy influencing factors (geographical location, maintenance needs, etc.) and their attributes. Furthermore, the case study identifies performance factors that can be used to assess the service delivery process, and the gap between delivered and required services. The case study focuses on the development process of a performance-based service strategy. The actual implementation and execution of the strategy is not discussed in this paper.\nCase study: The survey was conducted among O&G companies in Norway. We focused especially on external and internal services needed to support (or perform) O&G operation and maintenance activities. Examples of such services include:* insourcing of specialists to conduct work that is outside the competence area of the company (e.g. expertise from an original equipment manufacturer (OEM) needed to diagnose or repair an advanced piece of equipment/machine/system);* outsourcing of a part of the operation or clearly defined activities that are not part of the company's core focus area (e.g. maintenance and modification contracts of limited duration, design of a new module);* outsourcing of large-scale activities with an extended scope as part of a business strategy (e.g. operation and maintenance of an entire platform in the tail-end phase, as is done in one example in the British sector of the North Sea);* delivery of services related to product support (field service, spare parts, training, diagnostics services, remote support, etc.); and* remote support requiring specialist services not normally available at the plant site.Purpose and goal\nDiscussion and conclusions: The survey reveals that the service relationships between companies are regulated and customized in the form of contracts based on involved parties' needs, wants and preferences. However, they do not use a systematic framework for developing a service strategy to be implemented in the contracts. Most of the contracts are developed based on traditional approaches, and the service content based on basic needs. Furthermore, service performance is increasingly becoming a core focus for involved parties and thus important to compete in the market. In the survey, some of the participants stated that they focused their service strategies on the delivery of total integrated packages including the physical product and supplementary services (or \"total service offerings\"). This is a trend that is also developing in other sectors as well (see, for example, Vandermerwe and Rada, 1988; Stremersch et al., 2001; Bovik, 2004; Kumar and Kumar, 2004b; Nordin, 2005). Therefore, there is a need for a framework for development of performance-based service strategies.As discussed above, the attributes need to be assessed and customized based on the individual needs, wants, and preferences of the involved parties, the technical installation (production facility), etc. To avoid conflicts and hindrances, knowledge and competences from of a variety of disciplines are usually required to evaluate the importance of the various influencing factors. Moreover, the service strategy and influencing factor attributes should be reassessed at regular intervals in the implementation and execution phase and adjusted according to changing needs. In the case study it was observed that most of the suggested influencing factor attributes are considered to be important and therefore need to be considered when developing a performance-based service strategy for the O&G industry in the North Sea. Figure 5 depicts the attributes grouped for each influencing factor and listed in accordance to significant influence (SI).The results from the analysis show that some of the performance factors (success factors, cost drivers and performance killers) are similar or identical to attributes in functionality. This reinforces the observations in the survey and indicates that the development of performance factors should be based on an analysis of influencing factor attributes. The performance factors need to be integrated in the initial phase of the development process. However, when some experience is gained from executing the service strategy, one must make sure to update the existing strategy and the performance measurement systems in accordance with changes in customers' needs, wants, and preferences.The Norwegian O&G industry is, in general, excellent at both developing and using new technology, services and organizational management. However, companies need to become more critical when buying services and when improving the service delivery process with respect to cost-effectiveness and other performance measures. The implementation of performance-based service strategies will create a win-win situation for all parties and lead to a better return on investments, improved service quality and enhanced customer satisfaction, as well as customer retention and loyalty.\nManagerial implications: As industrial services become increasingly important for production facility performance in an increasingly globalized and competitive world, companies need to become precise in selecting the right services and the right service providers. Therefore, effective and efficient service strategies, seen from an operational performance perspective, need to be developed.The proposed framework provides a foundation for managers to develop a performance-based service strategy. The framework takes into account strategy influencing factors, their attributes and performance factors. Furthermore, it takes into account reduction of potential gaps between required services and delivered services as well as continuous monitoring of the strategy execution performance.Periodical reassessments of influencing factors and their attributes are included in the framework to update and improve the service strategy, based on revised information, knowledge and requirements. Managers can use the framework and suggested attributes to analyze their needs and enable the development of a performance-based service strategy to become more efficient and cost-effective. Furthermore, the framework provides a foundation for managers to negotiate a performance-based service strategy. The framework is developed based on a case study in the O&G industry on the NCS, but can easily be adapted to other industries as well.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The main purpose of the paper is to present a framework for the development of performance-based service strategies for the oil and gas industry in Norway. The framework considers various influencing factors and their attributes, as well as performance factors categorized as critical success factors, performance killers and cost drivers.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - A case study has been conducted to map current practices, to validate the influencing factor attributes, and to suggest performance factors. Data have been collected through an e-mail questionnaire, face-to-face interviews, available documents from the industry and a literature survey.\nFindings: - Operators of complex oil and gas production facilities are becoming increasingly dependent on service providers to support their efforts to perform according to demands. When developing a performance-based service strategy one needs to consider influencing factors and attributes. Furthermore, one needs to measure the service delivery process performance and the gaps between required and delivered services, and to periodically reassess the service strategy influencing factors.\nResearch limitations/implications: - The research is based on a case study in the Norwegian oil and gas industry, but the results can be adapted for other industries as well.\nOriginality/value: - The proposed framework can support practitioners in the oil and gas industry to develop performance-based service strategies and can assist practitioners in reducing costs and improving performance.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
An empirical study into the limitations and emerging trends of Six Sigma in manufacturing and service organisations	[ "Six Sigma", "Survey", "Empirical study", "Limitations", "Emerging trends" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Since its origins in the mid-1980s, the Six Sigma business strategy for business process improvement has become widely adopted by a number of manufacturing and service organisations internationally. A number of high profile companies such as Allied Signal (also known as HoneyWell), General Electric, Caterpillar, Cummins, ABB, Johnson and Johnson, American Express and Bank of America helped to popularise and legitimise this problem solving methodology, resulting in millions of dollars of bottom line savings (Swink and Jacobs, 2012; Antony et al., 2017).\n2. Literature review: limitations, trends and gaps in Six Sigma research: A systematic literature review of the key limitations of Six Sigma in addition to emerging trends and research gaps identified 15 limitations/research gaps/emerging (Sony et al., 2018). In authors' view, this is possibly the most comprehensive study carried out explicitly covering the major limitations, research gaps and the emerging trends of Six Sigma. Moreover, the paper was based on a thorough review of existing literature looking into the limitations, critique and cons of Six Sigma.\n3. Research methodology: The main objective of this study is to critically evaluate the limitations and emerging themes or research gaps of Six Sigma from leading practitioners such as MBB, BB and GB in a number of manufacturing and service companies. The motivation for the investigation of this research stems from a number of discussions and workshops conducted by one of the authors. It was found that although a number of limitations of Six Sigma were addressed by a few authors (Antony, 2004a; Mitra, 2004; Montgomery, 2008), there was no research conducted to empirically test these limitations in the eyes of practitioners and leading consultants working in industry. Moreover, the same principle can be applied to the emerging trends as well. Our purpose is to capture the views of Six Sigma professionals in industry for validating the limitations associated with applications of Six Sigma as well understanding some of the emerging trends or themes on the topic for further research. The above has led us to arrive at the following research questions:\n4. Results: The top 6 limitations and emerging trends/research gaps of Six Sigma in Manufacturing and Service companies are shown in Tables II and III, respectively. It was very interesting to observe that there was very little critical differences in the top 6 limitations and emerging trends/research gaps between the manufacturing and service clusters. However, it was quite surprising to realise that the non-standardisation of Six Sigma curriculum for training has not appeared in the top 6 limitations for the participants. Moreover, high start-up costs associated with the implementation of Six Sigma did not appear to be a limitation although this was considered to be one of the most important limitations according to many practitioners in the past (Snee, 2010; Pande et al., 2000; Pyzdek and Keller, 2014).\n5. Discussion, limitation and implications: Our findings suggest that the top 3 limitations/emerging trends/research gaps of Six Sigma in both manufacturing and service organisations according to leading practitioners such as Six Sigma MBB, BB and GB are:\n6. Conclusion and directions for further research: Although Six Sigma has been around for over 30 years, only a few papers have addressed the limitations and the emerging trends/research gaps associated with this powerful business process improvement methodology. The authors argue that this is the first empirical study to address the identification of the limitations and the fundamental research gaps of Six Sigma for its further growth and sustainability in organisations. The top 3 limitations and research gaps identified from this global study were:\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to carry out an empirical study of the limitations and emerging trends of Six Sigma in manufacturing and service companies.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The authors developed an online survey instrument based on the existing literature addressing the current limitations and emerging trends of Six Sigma in manufacturing and service companies. In this study, 75 Six Sigma Master Black Belts, 39 Black Belts and 12 Green Belts from large manufacturing and service companies participated; each of whom is familiar with the Six Sigma topics.\nFindings: This study reports the top 5 limitations and emerging trends of Six Sigma from the viewpoints of subject matter experts from large manufacturing and service companies from over 20 countries. The main finding is that the top 4 limitations were identical for both manufacturing and service companies. These limitations include: the integration of Six Sigma with Big Data, the use of Six Sigma in small medium and micro-enterprises, an over emphasis of Six Sigma on variability reduction and the poor implementation of Six Sigma and its resultant negative impact on employee satisfaction.\nPractical implications: In order to sustain Six Sigma initiatives in organisations, the authors argue that the limitations and emerging trends of this powerful business strategy should be understood and appropriate remedial strategies developed to address said limitations.\nOriginality/value: To the best of the authors' knowledge, this is the first empirical study to examine the limitations and emerging trends of Six Sigma in both manufacturing and service organisations. Moreover, the findings of the study can be very beneficial to many organisations.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Fourth graders' perceptions about medicines and medicine use	[ "Education", "Internet", "Children", "Young people", "Medicine" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Using medicines is a common activity for almost everybody, including children (Chambers et al., 1997; Dengler and Roberts, 2003; Hansen et al., 2003; Stoelben et al., 2000). Numerous studies have shown that many children as young as ten years of age (Chambers et al., 1997; Dengler and Roberts, 2003; Sloand and Vessey 2001; Hameen-Anttila et al., 2010) start self-medication using, e.g. analgesics, and many do so without their parents' knowledge (Chambers et al., 1997). Adolescents may have experience of more than one non-prescription medicine, painkillers in particular, ibuprofen being far the most common (Westerlund et al., 2008). In most homes, medicines are distributed all over the house, and children have ready access to them (Sanz et al., 1997).\nMethod: This study aimed to clarify fourth graders' perceptions about medicines and their use. Healthy children's perceptions have been studied in numerous ways using drawings, focus group discussions, semi-structured and structured interviews as well as questionnaires (see Hameen-Anttila 2006; Hameen-Anttila and Bush, 2008). It has been argued that differences in the results from researches may partly be due to the methods used (Hameen-Anttila and Bush, 2008). To ensure validity in the results, in an authentic school context this study combined three different methods of collecting data. Because our aim was not to compare but to describe and understand pupils' perceptions about medicines and medicine use, a control group was not used. Instead the research followed a case study design (Gomm et al., 2000): it focused on understanding the dynamics present at a single setting (Stake, 2000). This case study involved multiple cases; three classes, numerous levels of analysis and typically for the case studies, combined data collection methods (Stake, 2000).\nResults: Table I presents the indications and names of the medicines mentioned by the pupils in the questionnaire. The indications and names were calculated as many times as they were mentioned: one pupil may have described the same issues several times.\nDiscussion: As has been found earlier in Finland in different age groups (Hameen-Anttila, 2006), the fourth graders in this study also knew about common illnesses and their symptoms. They also knew the names of a great many medicines, showing that medicines are familiar to them (cf. Chambers et al., 1997; Dengler and Roberts, 2003; Hansen et al., 2003; Stoelben et al., 2000; Hameen-Anttila et al., 2006). They were particularly well aware of different painkillers in terms of their brand name and dosage (cf. Sanz, 2003; Almarsdottir and Zimmer, 1998; Hameen-Anttila, 2006). In this study, pupils' perceptions differed regarding the age they considered suitable for an individual to use medicines independently, the age most often chosen being about their own age.\nMethodological strengths and limitations: There has been some discussion about the relevance of drawings as a valid data collection method for gaining knowledge about pupils' perceptions and understanding of phenomena. The fact that some medicines may be difficult to draw, may be why they have been left out of the drawings. For example, in their questionnaire, pupils wrote about the purpose for which medicines are taken, but there were few drawings describing the purpose. This suggests that there may have been some details that the pupils were not able to draw but could describe literally. Conversely, some things such as bottles may be easier to draw, hence these perceptions may be expressed more easily by drawing than by writing (see also Dove et al., 1999).\nConclusions: This study gives an overview of fourth graders' perceptions about medicines and medicine use. These Finnish pupils had multifaceted knowledge about medicines but their different perceptions did not necessarily indicate the right knowledge in relation to rational medicine use; the right medicine taken in the right way at the right time and for the right problem. Their knowledge and perceptions were quite fragmented and pupils did not necessarily understand the whole idea of using medicines. The concept of \"medicine\" was also not fully understood, food and medicines were not sufficiently differentiated.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the development of medicine education by examining pupils' perceptions of medicines and medicine use.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Fourth graders' (n=51, aged 10-11) perceptions about medicines and their use were collected in one school through mixed-methods using a questionnaire, a drawing and discussions.\nFindings: Listing several over-the-counter medicines, pupils most frequently perceived that medicines are meant for treating headaches, wounds or temporarily when they are sick or have some pain, and that medicines help to ease symptoms and speed recovery. Pupils mentioned getting information about medicines from the pharmacist, the internet, the physician, as well as from medical packages.\nResearch limitations/implications: This study was carried out in one school context and is therefore not necessarily generalizable, it does, however, bring an awareness of concrete pedagogical needs to the debate on health education and was conducted using methods that, to some extent, can be transferred to any school setting.\nPractical implications: These results show that medicine education should already be started in primary school, along with critical thinking skills related to use of the internet.\nSocial implications: The development of medicine education may help improve the wellbeing of pupils.\nOriginality/value: The triangulation of data used in the paper are in the authors' awareness unique in the context of medicine education. The results particularly highlight the role of the internet in medicine education, thus suggesting the importance of critical thinking.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Drivers of personnel satisfaction towards performance information usage : Findings from Finnish municipalities	[ "Performance management", "Local administration", "Performance information", "Performance measurement maturity", "Personnel satisfaction" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Performance measurement systems (PMS) are potentially powerful managerial tools offering quantitative and compact information supporting decision making and development of operations. Even though there are promising examples demonstrating the benefits of performance measurement (Wisniewski and Olafsson, 2004), there appear to be many problems in practice (Rantanen et al., 2007). Much effort is expended to maintain PMS but, at the same time, managers do not seriously look at the data. Measurement is not properly integrated within management systems (Ammons and Rivenbark, 2008).\n2. Literature review: 2.1 Framework for maturity analysis of PM\n3. Empirical context and research methods: Survey data were collected from Finnish municipalities. Finnish public sector is similar to that in Scandinavian countries and characterized by democratic decision making and a welfare state. Public sector is substantially large and there are a large variety of different services which also increases organizational sizes and complicates the practice of PM. Social and health services account for most of the expenditure.\n4. Results: satisfaction towards PI use: 4.1 Factor analysis\n5. Conclusions: This paper took a slightly different approach towards the issue of PI usage in the public sector context by applying private sector originating PM maturity discussion. Even though the utilized survey was not tailored to the public sector context, no wide criticism towards it was presented in \"open comments\" of the survey. This suggests at least reasonable applicability of the existing discussion and models in a new context.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to identify the drivers of personnel satisfaction towards performance information (PI) usage in the local public administration context.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The study utilizes both quantitative and qualitative research approach. Data are gathered with a survey receiving 194 responses from the departments of six different municipalities that all belong to the group of largest municipalities in Finland. Regression and variance analysis, as well as analysis of open-ended comments are utilized.\nFindings: A key observation is that high maturity level of performance measurement or information systems do not guarantee personnel satisfaction. Three main perspectives are found to positively affect satisfaction: use of PI in strategic planning, inter-administrative management with PI and communication of measurement information.\nResearch limitations/implications: Common limitations of survey studies apply. The quantitative data set could have been wider and it should be complemented with more qualitative data. Also the survey itself has limitations due to its generic nature.\nPractical implications: The results indicate that managerial purpose of measurement needs to be better clarified. Greatest need for development is found in utilizing PI in resource sharing and in the analysis of current situation supportive to strategic planning.\nOriginality/value: The efficient use of performance measurement is a commonly acknowledged challenge. Even though PI usage has been increasingly studied, the focus has often been in separate managerial tasks. Wider approach towards performance measurement and management practices has gained less attention. This study is one of the first attempts to apply private sector originating performance measurement maturity discussion in the public sector context.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Sustaining higher education using Wal-Mart's best supply chain management practices	[ "Higher education", "Sustainable development", "Best practice" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nHigher education: Higher education is experiencing new pressures. More minorities, children of recent immigrants, and middle-aged and older Americans are seeking access to colleges and universities. At the same time, states in the USA are cutting funding to public institutions, while other countries are improving their education systems to compete in the global economy. As public schools increase tuition fees to compensate for the loss of funding, they have to act like private schools in the marketplace (i.e. better financial aid packages, better facilities, more personalized instruction, better perceived quality, more amenities). Many are forced to layoff faculty and staff, and delay or cancel needed improvements. To make matters worse, top tier private schools in good financial shape can capitalize on financially weaker lower tier schools by attracting faculty and students whom the weak schools can no longer afford to retain (Goral, 2002; Johnstone, 1991).Historically, the main purpose of higher education has been to teach and to do research, and for centuries this paradigm has held true. However, the manner in which higher education operates has recently changed. The college experience has expanded from a simple educational institution to a full enterprise, akin to a country club resort complete with all the amenities (Cotton, 2003). In addition to an education, students search for other marks of quality, such as safe and up-to-date residence halls, state of the art facilities, and high technology. The costs of offering, operating, and maintaining these services for students, in addition to an education, are astronomical. School tuition fees rise each year to defray the costs, and as a result, students and their families demand more return from their investments.There are no commonly agreed upon metrics and assessment measures for institutional efficiency, and especially lacking are standardized metrics for student learning and teaching effectiveness. Currently, cost-per-student is the most generally accepted measure of efficiency because it can be easily measured, not because it measures the true output of the university (Johnstone, 1997). Until the higher education sector establishes a way of measuring institutional contributions to student learning, it will be difficult to properly assess the effect on quality of any particular effort. Particularly in the USA, one of the main accrediting bodies for schools of business, the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business has been recently focusing on assessment outcomes for learning at their accredited schools. Information technology (IT) does offer viable methodologies to address the mandates for outcome assessment. The question here is no longer if IT has a role to play in the campus conversations and public discussions about assessment and outcomes, but when will college and university IT leaders assume an active role in bringing data, information, and insight to the critical planning and policy discussions about institutional assessment and outcomes that affect all sectors of US higher education (Green, 2007).While rising education costs are always of concern to consumers (the students and parents) (Immerwahr and Johnson, 2007), they are also the concern of the supplier (higher education). Comm and Mathaisel (2005) found that initiatives have taken place to reduce or contain costs (such as outsourcing and leveraging the use of technology), and for the most part, these initiatives have been successful. But, in terms of cost containment, higher education might also consider benchmarking a company known for its \"Always Low Prices.\" Wal-Mart, the world's largest retailer, has best practices in supply chain management (SCM) that are in part responsible for its success in keeping prices low and offering efficient distribution of its products through its advanced technologies. Institutions are now referring to their students as customers, just as Wal-Mart does. Whether one agrees with this concept or not, higher education can learn lessons from the corporate sector. First, what is an institution's strategic marketing plan (product/service, price, promotion, place and target market)? Next, how will that plan be implemented, and then how will the results of the plan be assessed?\nWal-Mart's best practices in supply chain management: The authors reviewed relevant secondary data about Wal-Mart and discovered that their best practices in SCM can be categorized into four segments: strategic concepts, logistics and distribution, IT, and supplier collaboration. In terms of the first category, strategic concepts, Wal-Mart recognized the importance of controlling and containing costs as much as possible in order to maintain prices low enough to maximize sales and revenue. Minimizing costs is imperative in providing discount prices. These concepts are embodied in the first two of the five cultural imperatives developed in 1995 by Wal-Mart to help management best focus their efforts: stock it, price it right, show the value, take the money, and teach them (Slater, 2003). This strategy is in line with the goal of SCM, as succinctly stated in The Goal, which is to \"increase throughput while simultaneously reducing both inventory and operating expense\" (Goldratt, 1984).Logistics and distribution, the second category, are at the very heart of Wal-Mart's expertise in SCM. The very foundation of the growth strategy of the company is based around the system of distribution centers. When deciding to enter a new area, it is first determined if the location will be able to contain enough stores to support a distribution center. Once the distribution center is built, stores are planned and opened around it to gradually saturate the area. Each center serves approximately 150 stores (Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., 1982). Through the practice of re-optimization, the distribution network is realigned to maximize efficiencies every time another center is added to the system (Troy, 2003).The success of the SCM of Wal-Mart is largely because of its expertise in information systems and supporting technology, the third category of best practices. As early as 1974, Wal-Mart began using computers for inventory control. By the 1980s, Wal-Mart had installed checkout scanners in all stores and started sending all point-of-sale information to a centralized IT department at headquarters in Bentonville to aggregate sales and inventory data. Technology provides a way to track information throughout the supply chain and share the information with suppliers and stores. Data mining is also used for insight into customer behavior to assist in product decisions and forecasting.Lastly, Wal-Mart's practices regarding suppliers have been important to their SCM strategy from the very beginning. The company has a reputation for being a tough negotiator when it comes to pricing and delivery, and it often uses reverse auctions and bidding when negotiating with competing suppliers. Suppliers are subject to pricing agreements and the costs of their products are expected to decrease on an annual basis. If these terms are not met, Wal-Mart most likely will not do business with a supplier. In fact, Wal-Mart recently closed 85 stores in Germany because many German suppliers could not meet their expectations.In exchange for meeting Wal-Mart's expectations, suppliers can expect some benefits in return, such as large order quantities, long-term contracts, access to a large market and the fast payment of invoices (Fishman, 2003). For example, Wal-Mart normally pays suppliers within 29 days while Kmart averages 45 days to pay an invoice (Moore, 1993). Thus, Wal-Mart makes the companies it deals with more efficient and faster by implementing its own practices.\nOutsourcing, technology and collaboration in higher education: How does Wal-Mart relate to higher education? A RAND Study (1998) and the Foundation for Independent Higher Education focused on college cost containment efforts in 630 member institutions. The study identified outsourcing, technology initiatives, and collaboration as the three key methods that public and private institutions of higher education should and can use to contain costs and improve efficiency in their value streams (Kaganoff, 1998). These three methods directly relate to the Wal-Mart principles.Outsourcing\nCommunity colleges: a case in point: According to the National Education Association (2007), community colleges exhibit overall characteristics which indicate they are becoming well suited for sustainability and the changes occurring in higher education. Many have outreach centers in the community, employ a lot of part-time and temporary faculty, and have growing distance education programs. Further, in terms of distribution, some community colleges even lease space in local malls to offer their courses. They also always offer lower prices than traditional four year colleges, their services are available at various sites, they promote their services with the public university system, and they have a distinctly defined target market.\nConclusions: adding value to higher education: Even though higher education relies heavily on services and not products, it is an industry that could certainly benefit from applying some of the lessons learned from Wal-Mart's expertise in SCM. This particular industry involves many players, such as faculty, students, staff, administration, product and equipment suppliers, the government, insurance companies, and various intermediaries. Many of the parties in higher education's supply chain are acting in their own best interests without considering the overall efficiency of the total supply chain, and this is contributing to the high costs of higher education in the USA. With this type of supply chain structure, it is hard to achieve the economies of scale necessary in order to reduce costs and add long run value.Wal-Mart can attribute its success in SCM to its innovative and early applications of technology, its lower prices, and its deep partnerships with suppliers. These best SCM practices can be applied to higher education, particularly in the areas of outsourcing, technology, and collaboration, to help colleges and universities control their costs. If they can learn from Wal-Mart how to achieve these benchmarks, institutions of higher education can become more competitive and provide more value for their students, stakeholders, and society.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The costs in higher education are increasing and need to be controlled. This paper aims to demonstrate what lessons higher education could learn from Wal-Mart's reasons for its financial success with its focus on efficient and effective supply chain management (SCM) best practices.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Wal-Mart's best practices in SCM were investigated through a secondary data literature review.\nFindings: - Wal-Mart's best practices in SCM can be categorized into four segments: strategic concepts, logistics and distribution, information technology, and supplier collaboration. The company's technology, outsourcing, and collaboration practices are particularly useful in higher education.\nResearch limitations/implications: - The adoption of Wal-Mart's best practices was investigated for only one service industry (higher education). Future research could apply these practices to other service industries, such as hotels and transportation.\nPractical implications: - Higher education is looking for best practices to help control costs and can learn from Wal-Mart's best practices.\nOriginality/value: - Past research has focused on applying the best practices of other colleges and universities to higher education. Benchmarking Wal-Mart's best practices can add further value to the sustainability of higher education.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
The variable nature of country-to-brand association and its impact on the strength of the country-of-origin effect	[ "Brand equity", "Country-of-origin", "Brands", "Country image", "Product categories", "Association strength" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: 1.1 Country-of-association\n2. Methodology: 2.1 Measures and experimental stimuli\n3. Data analysis and findings: 3.1 Structural equation model (SEM) analysis\n4. Discussion: The results demonstrate the presence of a significant moderating influence on the evaluative pertinence of the COO effect; specifically, the perceived strength of association to a particular country. These findings shed light on how the COO effect is conceptualized. First, the findings support Thakor and Lavack (2003), Pharr (2005), Josiassen and Harzing (2008) and Magnusson et al. (2011), in their assertion that origin is contingent on association rather than on the geographical configuration of value chains or on any other readily available means of objectively assigning origin, such as the location of the corporate headquarters or where the brand was founded. The results also extend this principle by demonstrating that association is variable by degree and that this variation has a palpable moderating impact on brand evaluation as illustrated in Figures 2 and 3. This reinforces the notion that country-of-association, as subjectively perceived by the consumer, is the relevant conditional antecedent that determines where a brand is \"from\" in terms of the COO effect. The findings thus address many, if not, most situations in which COO would occur.\n5. Conclusions: The study showed that all the various facets of CI exert some degree of influence on consumers' evaluations of BE. The novel finding of this study is that the COO effect is moderated by AS; the perceived linkage between country and brand is thus contingent upon AS, rather than on a dichotomy of origin/non-origin. This may explain why some brands that are perceived to have a certain origin may still not enjoy the expected influence on their CBBE. Audi, Mercedes-Benz, Opel and Volkswagen are all typically perceived as German, but some consumers may not consider all of these automobile manufacturers \"German enough\" for this association to alter their judgment of these brands. Failing to account for this variability in AS could potentially result in a significant epistemological gap in research on the COO effect. This enhanced grounding of the COO effect enables both scholars and brand management practitioners not only to better understand how association to a country may affect a brand but to also avoid the mistakes of placing undue emphasis on a weak brand-country association and underestimating the effect of a very strong association.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Recent research has shown that the country-of-origin (COO) effect - the influence on consumers' attitudes and purchase behavior derived from a brand's perceived association with a country - is inextricably linked to consumer perception. The purpose of this paper is to examine this shift by considering origin as a characteristic derived from perceived association and also by proposing that this association varies by degree, rather than simply acting as a binary attribute in its effect on consumer attitudes.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Data from a test series in which respondents (n=100) rated 38 brand-country pairs were put to split-half multi-group analysis tests to capture the moderating influence of association strength (AS) on several facets of country image (CI) simultaneously.\nFindings: AS is a variable that exerts a moderating influence on how different dimensions of CI influence consumers' evaluation of brands.\nResearch limitations/implications: The findings indicate that origin, as a characteristic, should be considered an association that is variable by degree and not as dichotomous. The implications of such a shift are broad, not only for the theoretical understanding of the COO effect but also for marketing and brand management practice. Accounting for AS allows for more accurate prediction of how consumers will react to COO.\nOriginality/value: The paper explicitly demonstrates that the strength of country-brand association moderates COO's influence on brand equity. Such a relationship had previously only been theoretically implied but had not been empirically tested across multiple categories of products on multiple levels of CI.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Service-driven manufacturing: Provision, evolution and financial impact of services in industrial firms	[ "Manufacturing industries", "Competitive advantage", "Service climate", "Service strategies", "Service evolution", "Financial impact", "Research work" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Competing through service is no longer limited to service companies. Manufacturing companies are also beginning to realize the strategic importance of service in gaining a competitive advantage. Some authors envisioned early on the important role of service in manufacturing strategy and management (Vandermerwe and Rada, 1988; Canton, 1988; Chase and Garvin, 1989; Quinn et al., 1988, 1990; Bowen et al., 1991). Manufacturing organizations have increasingly begun to adopt service strategies as part of their competitive advantage. Recently, many multinational manufacturing companies, such as Xerox, General Motors, Apple, Volkswagen, Caterpillar, and Johnson and Johnson, have shown how service strategies are becoming crucial to their businesses.In turn, these service strategy initiatives ignited the interest of management researchers who, starting in the late 1990s (Wise and Baumgartner, 1999), presented initial contributions to the service research community at international conferences such as Frontiers in Service and QUIS. Their studies included exploring and understanding how companies are managing the transition from products to services (Brown and Neu, 1998; Reynoso and Garcia-Calderon, 2000; Reynoso and Sanchez, 2000; Oliva and Kallenberg, 2002; Beckenbauer et al., 2004) and examining how manufacturers are not only developing innovative customer support systems (Gebauer et al., 2004) but are also becoming versatile service providers (Brax, 2004), creating new and successful business models for manufacturing organizations in business-to-business environments (Hildebrand et al., 2004). Later researchers have continued developing multi-phase projects that have helped to increase awareness on the topic and to advance the existing limited knowledge on this phenomenon (Reynoso et al., 2008, 2009b; Gebauer, 2008).This article aims to provide a review of key research contributions on the topic of service strategies in manufacturing by focusing on three areas in this emerging research field: descriptions of the phenomenon, theoretical explanations of its evolution, and the financial impact of services. A summary analysis of the extant literature is provided, identifying valuable findings and discussing fundamental methodological issues in this field. Additionally, the challenges, limitations and directions for future research are highlighted. The purpose of this article is to provide a relevant source of ideas and guidance for all those interested in doing research in this area. In an attempt to integrate these three related areas of research, the concept of service-driven manufacturing is put forth towards the end of the article.\nProvision of services in manufacturing: exploring the phenomenon: The past decade has seen more and more manufacturing companies developing their service businesses, as epitomized for example, by IBM ((The) Economist, 1998, 2002), General Electric (Slywotzky and Morrison, 1998; Slater, 1999) and Rolls-Royce (IfM, 2004). However, there are also reports (Fang et al., 2008; Neely, 2007) indicating that manufacturers have encountered challenges in managing the development of services. Such mixed results call for a better understanding of ways in which manufacturing companies can develop successful service strategies and even better businesses.Research on services in manufacturing can be traced back to the 1960s. The concept of \"service\" has evolved from just \"an element in the marketing mix\" to \"a management philosophy\" and \"a business in its own right.\" Despite this long tradition, however, the literature has examined the phenomenon through the lens of a product-service dichotomy. This dichotomy overemphasizes the distinction between product and service and, in doing so, fails to recognize the diversity of manufacturing companies and the variety of services they offer. As a result, our understanding of services that manufacturers actually develop, sell, deliver, and manage is still limited.To address this knowledge gap, one of the co-authors (Ren, 2009) carried out his doctoral research to identify different types of service offerings in capital equipment industries, to describe each service offering's characteristics and to explain their respective implications. It was found that the development of service strategies is driven by the changing business landscape faced by manufacturers, notably constant pressure on product competition, growing demand for customer value, and the continuing need for profit growth.These factors have motivated capital equipment manufacturers to create service offerings that meet customer needs at the equipment, asset, and process levels. Accordingly, services can be classified into product lifecycle services, on-site maintenance services, managed services, and consulting services/consultancy-led solutions, each of which can be further categorized. Significant distinctions were observed between the service categories. Developing each service offering not only involves direct changes to the capabilities of service sales and delivery, but also has far-reaching consequences for existing functions, such as research and development (R&D), product design and production, finance, and human resource management. Furthermore, to enable capability development and cross-functional collaboration, manufacturing companies have to transform their organizational arrangements. The findings of the current research can be integrated into the conceptual framework as shown in Figure 1. The development of service strategies in manufacturing is concerned about four dimensions (business drivers, service offerings, capabilities, and organization).Central to the framework is the expansion of the value chain. Typically, manufacturing companies have traditionally focused on core functions such as R&D, design, production and supplier management for the purpose of creating, making and selling products. While sales support, delivery and maintenance (shown in the middle part of the value chain) always exist as required by the nature of capital goods, manufacturing companies gradually turn to new service offerings to satisfy increasing customer demand, maintain a competitive advantage and achieve financial growth (see the business driver level in Figure 1).The great potential of service business development is materialized through the initial shift of product support services from a cost to a profit center and then from break-and-fix services to value-added service contracts (e.g. preventive maintenance, cost inclusive, performance guarantees). As manufacturing companies identify customer's other needs, the venture of service development is further expanded to managed services (e.g. maintenance, assets, and operations), consulting services and consultancy-led solutions (see both ends at the offering level).To reap the benefits from services, manufacturing companies find themselves in a challenging process of capability and organizational transformation. They have to develop new capabilities so that they can better market, sell, deliver, and profit from the services, and meanwhile they must recognize the new requirements on existing functions such as R&D, design and production (see the capability level). Moreover, to institutionalize the alignment within and between business groups, new organizational arrangements have to be set up (see the organization level).As demonstrated above, the classification approach to studying services in manufacturing offers great insights into the inner working of individual service offerings. It reveals the wide, yet profound impact of service development on the manufacturer's capabilities and organization, underlining the importance of a \"whole business\" approach. Many manufacturing companies in this research had relied on their instinct to develop the service component. In future decisions, the service classification can and should serve as guidance for capital goods manufacturers to identify business opportunities. Additionally, the anatomy of individual service offerings can inform managers of more details about service business development, along with recommendations to avoid or overcome the potential capability and organizational challenges.Research directions on services in manufacturing\nEvolution of service strategies in manufacturing: searching for theoretical explanations: Since Oliva and Kallenberg (2003) and Davies (2004) carried out their seminal work on the transition from products to services, the topic of services in manufacturing companies has become the forefront of many research agendas (Reynoso et al., 2009a; Reynoso, 2010b). Contributions made by one of the co-authors of this article have attempted to improve theory-building and to offer managerial guidance for extending the service business in manufacturing companies. As illustrated in Table I, in the first phase, narratives on the extension of the service business in manufacturing companies are described and compared. The comparison of such narratives improved the transferability of qualitative findings. Later, these qualitative findings laid the foundation of developing hypotheses and testing them empirically (Phase 2).Qualitative studies in Phase 1 revealed the so-called service paradox (Gebauer et al., 2005), where manufacturing companies invested in the extension of the service business, but were not able to earn the corresponding returns. Determinants such as:* Managerial motivation.* Market-oriented and clearly defined service development processes.* Service offers focused on customers' value propositions.* Relationship marketing.* Clear service strategies.* The establishment of a separate service organization.* A service culture overcome the service paradox and improve revenues and profits.These determinants were subjected to more detailed qualitative investigations around service development processes, behavioral and cultural implications, as well as, organizational structures. For example, companies seem to acknowledge that there is no generally applicable service development process or organizational structure and that each type of services and/or service strategies requires specific considerations (Gebauer et al., 2008).In Phase 2, the development and testing of the hypotheses revealed specific patterns of service strategy changes; namely, from after-sales service strategy to customer-support service strategy and from customer-support service strategy to development partner or outsourcing partner strategy (Gebauer et al., 2010c). These service strategies need to be aligned with organizational design elements (Venkatraman, 1989) such as service orientation in corporate culture (values and behavior), human resources (recruitment, development, and compensation), and organizational structures (distinction between products and services, and proximity to the customers). An after-sales service strategy focuses only on service orientation in corporate values. On the contrary, a customer-support service strategy should be conscientious about the service orientation of personal recruitment, training, and assessment, and should drive a considerable organizational distinction of products and service business in terms of a separate business unit for services. An outsourcing partner drives the organizational distinction even further towards two separate companies for products and services; whereas a development partner moves back towards a higher integration of product and service competencies (Gebauer et al., 2010b).At the cultural level, a positive association between the service orientation of corporate culture and business performance was corroborated empirically. However, service orientation was not assumed to be single construct. Rather, service orientation was conceptualized and operationalized through service value and behavior at the managerial and employee levels (Gebauer et al., 2010a). At the strategic level, the positive role of service differentiation in achieving a competitive advantage was corroborated. In addition, service differentiation was embedded in existing concepts such as innovativeness and customer centricity. Service differentiation strengthens the positive impact of innovativeness and customer centricity on business performance (Gebauer et al., 2011).All these contributions enhance theory-building on operational capabilities, which overcome the service paradox and ensure service revenues and profits. Supplementary to the insights into operational capabilities, dynamic capabilities (e.g. sensing service opportunities, seizing the sensed opportunities, and reconfiguring operational capabilities) play a key role in whether service business extension follows the exploitation or exploration approach. Exploitation uses services to enhance incrementally the existing value constellations. Exploration uses services for defining new value constellations, which allows companies to radically jump towards a new strategic stage (Fischer et al., 2010).All necessary qualitative and quantitative data were obtained in a variety of manufacturing industries, but the contributions were limited in three different ways. First, the manufacturing companies were from a few Western European countries such as Germany, Sweden, and Switzerland, which have a strong bias due to their high-labor costs and strong technical experience. Second, the manufacturing companies were mostly positioned as original equipment manufacturers with direct access to their customers. Third, the companies offered mostly capital goods, which require high-customer investments, and are positioned in the business-to-business context.Further research on the evolution from products to services\nImpact of services on manufacturing: assessing financial consequences: One obviously important aspect of research on service strategies in manufacturing is understanding the impact of such strategies on firm performance. However, until recently most authors in the field have implicitly assumed that this transition to services is always beneficial for manufacturing firm performance. Yet, only a limited number of empirical studies have actually considered the relationship between service provision and firm performance (Fang et al., 2008; Gebauer, 2008; Gebauer et al., 2010c; Neely, 2008). Furthermore, there is evidence for both a positive (Davies, 2004; Gerstner, 2004) and a negative (Neu and Brown, 2005) impact of transition to service provisions. This suggests that our understanding of the performance impact of service strategies in manufacturing is still limited. This part of the article reviews extant evidence on the impact of services on firm performance and points out potential directions for future research.Research progress on the impact of services on firm performance\nConclusions: Together, with globalization and sustainability, service-driven manufacturing will continue to be among the most significant developments in modern industrial business management. While the idea has been around for quite a long time, our understanding of the phenomenon is still relatively limited. The purpose of this paper was to review the current state of research on service strategies in manufacturing by concentrating on three significant areas in the research field: descriptions of the phenomenon, explanation building, and financial consequences. Table III summarizes the findings of this review in terms of current knowledge on service strategies, significant knowledge gaps and potential avenues for future research in the area.This review indicates that while we already have a relatively good understanding of service strategies in manufacturing, there are still significant gaps in our knowledge. In particular, future research should try to be more contextual, i.e. to address specific industrial and geographical contexts to help us understand what are the contingencies in achieving success with service strategies. More research is also needed on the theoretical explanations of the phenomenon, as well as the financial consequences of services in manufacturing. In addition to these, we have also listed a number of research directions at different levels of analysis, expecting more in-depth investigation into the field and, ultimately, more useful guidance for managerial practice in the future.As a result of the analysis and discussion of the contributions presented throughout the article, the concept of service-driven manufacturing is integrated throughout the provision, evolution, and impact of services in industrial settings. The evolutionary process whereby manufacturing companies respond to customers, competition and growth pressures by developing a variety of relevant and pertinent service offerings at the equipment, asset and process levels requires a wide-range of organizational transformation - capabilities to create a positive impact on firm performance.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to provide a review of key research contributions on the topic of service strategies in manufacturing by focusing on descriptions of the phenomenon and theoretical explanations of its evolution and financial consequences.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - A summary analysis of the extant literature is provided. Valuable contributions and fundamental methodological issues are identified and discussed. Challenges, limitations and directions for future research avenues are also highlighted.\nFindings: - As a result of the analysis and discussion presented, the concept of service-driven manufacturing is integrated through the provision, evolution and impact of services in industrial settings.\nPractical implications: - The paper contains guidelines for manufacturing managers interested in the evolution from products to services in different industries.\nOriginality/value: - The paper is expected to be used as a relevant source of ideas and guidance for all those interested in doing research in services strategies in manufacturing.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Motivation of female entrepreneurs: a cross-national study	[ "Norway", "Russia", "Ukraine" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Females are a source of entrepreneurial talent (OECD, 2003) and an instrument of development (Ahl, 2006). Female entrepreneurship is viewed as an emancipatory act of change creation (Rindova et al., 2009; Jennings et al., 2016). Practitioners want more women with good ideas to consider entrepreneurship as a career option (HM Treasury and Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform, 2008), and they want to expand women's business ownership (OECD, 2003). However, the dominant popular entrepreneur image relates to a western heroic white male figure exhibiting aggression and assertiveness (Collins and Moore, 1964). Women are generally less visible in the popular media (De Bruin et al., 2006). Due to a dearth of high-profile successful female entrepreneur role models (i.e. \"invisibility\" of women's involvement in and contribution to entrepreneurship (Marlow et al., 2008)), there is a potential assumption that entrepreneurs are male (Ahl, 2006). Entrepreneurship is not a gender-neutral phenomenon, and gender bias relating to gender-stereotypic beliefs about entrepreneurship is prevalent (Jennings and Brush, 2013). Gender stereotypes are often used to explain the tendency of women to evaluate business opportunities less favourably, and to report a lower intention of becoming entrepreneurs (Gupta et al., 2008, 2014). Across several countries, there is support for the underrepresented hypothesis about female entrepreneurship relating to women being less likely than men to become entrepreneurs (Kelley et al., 2013).\n2. Country context description: 2.1 Norway\n3. Theoretical background: 3.1 Motivation of female entrepreneurs\n4. Method: This cross-country case study implies the usage of qualitative methods to access context embeddedness and to develop concepts and propositions subject to later tests in quantitative studies. A case study approach is appropriate to examine the relationship-based phenomena (Jack, 2010), particularly for the studies focusing on \"how\", \"why\" and \"so what\" questions (Yin, 1994) relating to a contemporary phenomenon within a real-life context. In our study, we aimed to explore how and why the events in the entrepreneur's past and present life influenced their choice of entrepreneurial decision-making logic. In this situation, the case study as \"a history of a past and current phenomenon, drawn from multiple sources of evidence\" (Leonard-Barton, 1990, p. 249) would provide us with rich understanding of the processes. A comparative case study approach provides a broad detailed portrayal (Jick, 1979), and facilitates an inductive and rich description (Halinen and Tornroos, 2005). Conversely, a cross-sectional quantitative approach would only have focused on a narrow array of issues relating to a single point in time. Furthermore, a comparative case study enables deep probing and analysis of a phenomenon in its natural setting and has been widely used to investigate entrepreneurial behaviour.\n5. Findings: 5.1 Russian and Ukrainian female entrepreneurs\n6. Discussion: The aim of the present paper was to explore and compare the types of motivation of female entrepreneurs in emerging and developed economy contexts. Furthermore, this paper aimed to explore the importance of context embeddedness as a moderator for motivational drivers. The following discussion reports and analyses relate to these two issues - the first motivational drivers detected in the study are discussed and compared to existing research. Furthermore, context embeddedness as a source of diversity is discussed.\n7. Conclusions: Women frequently have specific human capitals related to health, education or service industries obtained through education and previous job experience (Alsos et al., 2010). The inclination to education and employment related to social services and industries might be justified by traditional female roles related to providing care and primary knowledge to children and elderly people, or home-related functions (cooking, cleaning, decorating, etc.). Such professional choices let females to interact with people and hone skills related to social services, as well as identify gaps and business opportunities in humanitarian sectors. Male-dominated professions are often related to heavy physical labour and technical industries.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: This paper focuses on the motivation of females to start businesses in developed and emerging economies. Although the issues related to the motivation of entrepreneurs have been widely studied, there are a few studies focusing on the differences in women's entrepreneurial motivation in countries with different levels of market economy development. Furthermore, existing studies on female founders mainly adapt the concepts that have often been developed in male-dominated paradigm. The purpose of this paper is to explore in depth motivations of female entrepreneurs in different contexts and discover the dissimilarities in women's entrepreneurial motivations in countries with different levels of economic development.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The qualitative research approach is applied in this study to explore the social-driven and profit-driven motives of female entrepreneurs. The authors have employed purposeful sampling to select cases. The authors investigated the motivations of 45 female entrepreneurs in Norway (12), Russia (21) and Ukraine (12). Semi-structured interviews were used to collect primary data. The authors have also triangulated the data collected from interviews with the data available on the internet, company reports and newspaper publications.\nFindings: The findings indicate that women often pursuit business opportunities to satisfy social needs, rather than focusing on traditional business outcomes such as growth or profit. However, different contexts - the emerging economies context of Russia and Ukraine and the developed one of Norway - seem to influence the motivation to establish new ventures differently. The study found a stronger desire to contribute to a society's needs among female founders in Norway compared to their counterparts in Russia and Ukraine. This indicates that cultural and social context in developed countries, such as in Norway, probably provides more possibilities for female entrepreneurs for self-realisation elsewhere leaving more room for focusing on societal issues in business in comparison with emerging countries contexts.\nOriginality/value: A novel conceptual contribution is the exploration of links between the social-driven and profit-driven motives of female entrepreneurs in emerging and developed economises. The study also adds to debates relating to context embeddedness of smaller firms.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Teamwork benefits in tertiary education: Student perceptions that lead to best practice assessment design	[ "Australia", "Teamwork", "Qualitative", "Student perception", "Accounting education", "Assessment design" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Higher education practitioners (Kotey, 2007; Olson-Buchanan et al., 2007; Tempone and Martin, 1999), and accounting and finance practitioners (Cappelletto, 2010), along with the accounting and finance disciplines' governing bodies (CPA, 2012; Jackling and De Lange, 2009), have heeded the call to incorporate team learning activities into the curricula taught at the university undergraduate level. The tertiary education system and practitioners have grappled with the question of what skills should be provided to students to create effective lifelong learners and to enable them to compete effectively in the workforce (Crebert et al., 2004; Jackling and De Lange, 2009; McLarty, 2000). As evidenced by various studies, this issue has become a priority for universities with the disparity between the skills and competencies of graduates and the requirements of prospective employers growing more divergent (CPA, 2012; Crebert et al., 2004; Deckinger et al., 1990; Evans et al., 2002; Jackling and De Lange, 2009; McLarty, 2000).\nLearning through teamwork: The concept of teamwork may easily be misinterpreted as referring to a simplistic notion of \"group work\" within an educational setting. To better understand employers' vision of teamwork, the definition provided by Ellis and Bell (2005) posits that teamwork is the process \"where two or more employees interact interdependently toward a common and valued goal or objective, and who have each been assigned specific roles or functions to perform\" (p. 641). Conceptually, a team is supposed to create synergy and progress towards a common goal. At issue here is whether a team formed within the confines of a university undergraduate programme can achieve the same purpose and motivation that is claimed to be experienced in the workplace. As presented next, the authors clearly explain that the answer is \"yes\".\nStudent learning and study approaches: Adoption of a deep learning approach is characterised by a personal commitment to learning where the student approaches the learning task to seek the meaning behind the task and search for relationships in the material which they interpret based on their previous knowledge and experiences (Beattie et al., 1997; Booth et al., 1999; Hall et al., 2004; Trigwell and Prosser, 1991). This deep approach to learning is said to result in better learning outcomes for the students in that they are more able to retain and transfer that knowledge, leading to a greater understanding of the subject matter and an improvement in their critical thinking skills (Booth et al., 1999; Hall et al., 2004). Rather than merely acquiring sufficient knowledge to only complete or pass the task as is evident in the utility of a surface learning approach (Hall et al., 2004), a student adopting a deep learning approach attempts to effectively and efficiently organise their time, effort and work space in order to be as successful as possible (Beattie et al., 1997; Hassall and Joyce, 2001).\nMethod: Through an analysis of students' reflections on a teamwork task, the current study explores the question of what learning approach students perceive they utilise in an accounting task when working in a team and what, if any, aspects of the teamwork they perceive will contribute to their ability to work professionally in the future. Further, students' perceptions of the teamwork task are used to inform suggested design elements for teamwork assessment that will contribute to positive student learning experiences. It does this through a qualitative analysis of 190 student responses to an individual, written reflection piece completed upon submission of a team-based assessment task in a third-year, capstone, accounting unit at a major Australian, metropolitan university. This assessment required students to complete a written report in a team of five, with each team member then being required to complete an additional, individual, written piece reflecting on their experiences within the team. It was these individual, reflection pieces from which the qualitative research data were collected.\nResults and discussion: To explore whether students perceive teamwork to be beneficial to them as part of their studies and for their future professional careers, three key questions were posed: What, if anything, were the positive aspects of working within a team?; How did teamwork and this task assist your understanding and application of accounting theories?; and, How has this teamwork-based task contributed to your ability to work as an accounting professional? The findings, supported by exemplar quotes from the respondents, and discussion of their implications follow. Key themes identified from the students' responses to these three questions were then used to answer the fourth research question: How can students' perceptions of teamwork inform the future design of teamwork assessment?\nContributions and conclusion: This paper contributes to and extends accounting education knowledge by investigating what style of learning students perceive they use in order to complete teamwork-based assessment and what, if any, aspects of the teamwork will contribute to their ability to work professionally in the future. Further, this study suggests factors to consider when designing teamwork assessments in order to maximise the students' benefits from the learning experience. That it did so from the perspective of the student, affords this study a unique perspective. The results of this study reveal that: first, students perceive that they use a deep learning approach through a collaborative approach when completing a teamwork-based assessment item; second, tudents perceive that the team-based, analytical report, required the adoption of a deep approach to study in order for them to understand and apply accounting theories effectively and, third, Students perceive that teamwork at the undergraduate level clearly contributes to their future abilities in the profession by addressing their skills in the areas of collaboration, team unity and cultural diversity, identifying both national and international relevance for this study. The results of this study also identify six factors that impact positively on the teamwork assessment experience: a challenging task context; collaborative research; cross-functional teams; shared team goals; cultural diversity; and, adaptable work skills. It is these factors that form the basis of best practice in teamwork assessment design.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the understanding of the development of students' skills in the context of team-based learning. Academics have heeded the call to incorporate team learning activities into the curricula, yet little is known of student perception of teamwork and whether they view it as beneficial to them and their future professional career. Further, this study presents an instructional framework to guide best practice in higher education practitioners with regard to the design of teamwork assessment.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The paper adopts a qualitative approach utilising 190 students' reflections to examine their perception of the benefits of teamwork and whether it will contribute to their future professional work.\nFindings: Results indicate students perceive team-based assessment tasks require them to adopt a deep approach to learning together with a deep approach to study, as well as improving their skills in the areas of collaboration, team unity and cultural diversity. Further, the study identified a best practice approach that higher education practitioners should adopt in teamwork assessment design giving this study both national and international significance and aids fellow educators in their practices.\nResearch limitations/implications: Because of the chosen research approach, the results may lack generalisability. Therefore, researchers are encouraged to test the proposed propositions further.\nPractical implications: The paper presents important implications for those involved in the development of assessment items where objectives include the development of team skills and quality learning outcomes. The findings are vital for unit and course planning and design generally, and assessment planning, design and processes, specifically, both nationally and internationally.\nOriginality/value: This paper fulfils an identified need to study students' perceptions of teamwork, whether they view it as beneficial to them and their future professional career, and presents a best practice approach for teamwork assessment design.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Understanding the emergence of a social enterprise by highly skilled migrants: The case of Honduras Global Europa	[ "Immigrants", "Developing countries", "Networks", "Social enterprise" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: There is a growing interest to understand how migrant experiences inform the emergence of new forms of social enterprises. In that regard, there is limited understanding of social enterprises created by highly skilled members of a diaspora from a developing country. While \"Diasporas,\" which refers broadly to disperse migrant networks connected through sentimental links with a homeland (Safran, 1991), are attracting attention in the entrepreneurship literature (Brzozowski et al., 2017; Elo et al., 2018) they remain under-researched in terms of social enterprise emergence (Brinkerhoff, 2012), and thus merit further attention.\nLiterature analysis: Diaspora: transnationalism and networks\nSocial enterprises and DKNs: Social enterprises represent an interesting organizational context to examine the engagement of highly skilled members of a diaspora. Social enterprise is a concept framed along a continuum of options around organizations (e.g. from not-for-profits, charities, philanthropic societies to private associations, cooperatives and mutual societies) addressing societal issues such as poverty, inequality and education among others (Galera and Borzaga, 2009), aiming to deliver positive social outcomes for a particular community or group (Ridley-Duff and Bull, 2015). In this study, social enterprise emergence is engaged when a group, sharing a specific and well-defined social goal (e.g. providing food, education, and medical services to members of a society in need) succeeds in translating their collective effort into an institutional formal arrangement and manage it an entrepreneurial way (Galera and Borzaga, 2009). To achieve objectives some social enterprises may rely on a not-for-profit model through voluntary action and funding by grants, donations or contracts with public or private organizations (Ridley-Duff and Bull, 2015). This study focuses on the emergence of a social enterprise composed by highly skilled migrants called DKN.\nMethodology: Addressing the \"how and why\" question in this study demanded understanding the world from the perspective of those studied (Pratt, 2009, p. 856), aiming to provide a more valid explanation of what is going on (Howorth et al., 2005). To do this, the authors engage in autoethnography to describe and systematically analyze (graphy) personal experience (auto) in order to understand cultural experience (ethno) (Ellis et al., 2011, p. 273). Autoethnography allows the generation of \"theoretically relevant descriptions of a group to which one belongs based on a structured analysis of one's experiences and the experiences of others from one's group\" (Karra and Phillips, 2008, p. 7). To generate rich data for analysis, a DKN that would be representative of the topic of study was deliberately chosen (Miles et al., 2013) where the authors can reflect on experiences as \"insiders.\" Insider research is a category of autoethnographic practice where practitioners are academic researchers who study a group they are part of, and use their insider position as a methodological and interpretive tool (Butz and Besio, 2009). By being \"insiders\" authors had access, knowledge, and freedom of movement which allows to develop particular insight not easily visible to \"outsiders\" conducting qualitative research in specific contexts (Karra and Phillips, 2008). Studying the emergence of a DKN through autoethnography provides a methodological frame for researchers, who are part of a diaspora, to manage research and theorize.\nContextual setting: Honduras and Honduras global: Honduras, a developing country in Central America with an estimated population of 8.7m inhabitants, has several qualities that make it interesting for a study of the impact of a diaspora. First, diaspora research in Central America is the least covered, with the bulk of DKN research mainly focused on larger Latin American countries, such as Colombia and Mexico (Meyer, 2007). Second, due to the lack of employment opportunities, increasing social unrest, natural disasters and high personal security risks faced by the population at large (McSweeney, 2005; Ruhl, 2010) many Honduran citizens have migrated to other countries to improve personal and family living conditions (OECD, 2012). Finally, the Honduran Central Bank's balance of payments shows that while in the year 2000, financial remittances represented only 6 percent of GDP ($0.44bn), in 2015 they represented 16 percent of GDP ($3.65bn). Such contextual setting is important because recent studies highlight that while migration may reduce affective ties to the country-of-origin, migrants seek to regularly engage in social action across borders (Waldinger, 2008). This may occur as Honduras, as a place, may signify a spatial entity experienced and perceived as meaningful (Gustafson, 2001) based on symbolic long-term experiences (Hernandez et al., 2007) which may shape motivations to engage in further support. Thus, whilst financial remittances are important, there is limited understanding on how and why migrants from the Honduran diaspora may engage in the creation of a formal social enterprise to support their country-of-origin.\nHonduras Global Europa: Honduras Global, founded in 2010, is a DKN created by highly skilled members of the Honduran diaspora, international agencies and governmental agencies (see Seddig and Cerrato, 2014 for details). Its emergence is associated to Sir Salvador Moncada, the most cited British scientist and one of the most cited scientist in the world (The Royal Society, 2018). Nowadays, with more than 70 members, Honduras Global is perceived as a select group of highly skilled Hondurans. As members as dispersed around the world, both in situ meetings and web technologies (e.g. www.hondurasglobal.org) are used by members to meet, discuss and decide on new projects geared for knowledge transfer. In addition to thematic seminars, a flagship event, labeled \"Academic Week,\" started in 2011 as a yearly forum where members share their ideas, experiences and knowledge around selected topics to students from different universities and professionals from diverse sectors in Honduras. These events represent key mechanisms to transmit collective social remittances to wider audiences in Honduras.\nFindings: Reflections and data analysis brought to light that HGE members expressed a sense of consciously engaging in the emergence of a group that spanned several settings and that engaged in the transmission of social remittances motivated by shared feelings and unique reasons. Members engaged in the emergence of HGE attesting to this based on the strength of ties.\nDiscussion: In terms of how highly skilled migrants engage in the emergence of a DKN, findings suggest that both strong and weak ties can be more effective in disseminating information in diverse networks about the organization to gain information and support. The experience and patterns observed around the emergence of HGE reveal the value of links to others within several networks (Jack, 2005). Findings illustrate that the way highly skilled members of a diaspora activated links within the network was important. In line with Jack (2005), strong ties act as a mechanism to activate a latent network, procuring information and resources for organizational emergence. Highly skilled diaspora members can activate ties in diverse transnational networks (e.g. artists, professionals, and business owners), often spanning more than one country, and act as replicators in networks across countries (Cohen, 2008). Strong and weak ties provide access to a wider transnational social context and serve as a mechanism to activate other weak ties (e.g. \"friends of friends\") in diverse networks. The activation of strong and weak ties, prominent in the entrepreneurial literature (Jack, 2005), helps explain how highly skilled migrants engage in the emergence of a DKN. A contribution of this study is that the transnational features of network activation provides an interesting extension to Jack (2005) work about the role of ties in the emergence of a transnational social enterprise.\nConclusion: This study reveals that a DKN can emerge through the activation of a highly skilled diaspora network structure. The theoretical contributions of this study lie in the transnational features of strong and weak ties for organizational emergence (Jack, 2005). A core diaspora member may activate a latent network of highly skilled migrants that desire to fulfill intrinsic motivations. While previous literature suggests that a diaspora may be a loosely connected and fragmented network, our study suggest that highly skilled migrants represent a transnational community that desires to stay connected to their country-of-origin and can support the emergence of a transnational network structure for development. The empirical contributions of this study lie in understanding how and why highly skilled migrants from a developing country engage in the emergence of a DKN. Whilst DKNs emergence was previously promoted as an outcome of government-led action, this study contrasts such view by uncovering microfoundations of DKN emergence by migrants. Findings support the view that the transmission of collective social remittances can flow transnationally (Levitt, 1998), making highly skilled migrants effective agents of knowledge circulation (Kleist, 2008) and DKN appropriate vehicles for such endevours (Meyer, 2007).\n8. Limitations and further research: This study has a few caveats, and so, findings must be interpreted with caution. First, the advantages and limitations of relying on a single, albeit in-depth and longitudinal, case study (Flyvbjerg, 2006; Stake, 2008) as well as issues related to autoethnographic approaches, such as talking to the right individuals and/or attending relevant meetings or events are acknowledged (Karra and Phillips, 2008). The utility of autoethnography was enhanced by theoretical sensitivity, which prevented being overwhelmed by data volume and highlighted the experience of the authors. Second, the study was conducted around a DKN focusing on one developing country, Honduras, and therefore it may be difficult to infer similar results of DKNs in other developing countries. Yet our findings around the nature of social enterprises created by highly skilled members of a diaspora may have wider applicability in developing and developed countries. A study on Latin American diaspora in the USA suggests that the most educated or skilled migrants are most prone to retain ties with their country-of-origin and be interested in contributing back to alleviate societal concerns (Guarnizo et al., 2003). Thus, further ethnographic studies of organizations created by highly skilled migrants from other Latin American countries are worth pursuing because of their positive role in socio-economical transformations (OECD, 2015; Stephan et al., 2016). Further studies on how highly skilled migrants adapt specific ideas developed in institutions (e.g. universities, art galleries, corporations, international institutions) and include them as social remittances is needed.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the emergence of a social enterprise by highly skilled members of a diaspora. While most literature has focused on government intervention for diaspora engagement and monetary remittance flows from migrants, less attention has been paid to the transfer of social remittances and social enterprises created by diasporas. Based on the concept of social remittances, social network theory and motivation perspectives, this study unpacks the emergence of a social enterprise by highly skilled migrants of a developing country.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This study examines social enterprise emergence through an autoethnographic approach to describe and systematically analyze personal experience. This approach allows to understand cultural experience around the emergence of a social enterprise created by diverse members of a diaspora.\nFindings: Findings reveal that diaspora knowledge networks (DKNs) can emerge through the activation of a highly skilled diaspora network structure. Core diaspora members can activate a latent network of highly skilled migrants that wish to fulfill intrinsic motivations. Findings support the extend current understandings of social remittances by highly skilled migrants, who emerge as a transnational community that desires to stay connected to their country-of-origin and can support the emergence of a transnational network structure for development. The findings reveal that place attachment, sense of duty and well-being are key factors for highly skilled migrants to engage in DKNs.\nOriginality/value: The paper contributes to literature on networks and migrant-based organizational emergence by examining how and why highly skilled migrants from a developing country engage in the emergence of a DKN. Findings challenge previous views of government intervention and provides evidence on how the transmission of collective social remittances can flow trans-nationally, making highly skilled migrants effective agents of knowledge circulation and DKNs a vehicle for transmission. More specifically, the study provides evidence of the relevance of transnational features in the context of diaspora networks that lead to organizational emergence. It underscores the influence of interrelated motivations in diaspora engagement studies.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Work values as predictors of entrepreneurial career intentions	[ "Entrepreneurialism", "Gender", "Career choice", "Work values", "Entrepreneurial intentions", "Germany", "Students" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Work values, the relative importance individuals place on various aspects of work including desirable work settings and work-related outcomes (Ros et al., 1999), represent an important personal characteristic to explain individual differences in career choices (Brown and Crace, 1996). In this paper, we specifically focus on a career choice expressed in entrepreneurial intentions (EI), describing the conscious state of mind that directs personal attention, experience, and behavior toward planned entrepreneurial behavior (Bird, 1988). EI are pivotal in the early phases of venture creation (Baron, 2007) and it is essential to understand what types of personal characteristics motivate people to pursue an entrepreneurial career (Rauch and Frese, 2007).Research established that basic personality traits distinguish entrepreneurs from managers (Zhao and Seibert, 2006) and that specific motives and career justifications, such as recognition or independence, are related to nascent entrepreneurship and EI (Carter et al., 2003; Douglas and Shepherd, 2002; Franco et al., 2010; Schwarz et al., 2009; van Gelderen et al., 2008). However, existing research also found considerable heterogeneity in the relation between personal characteristics and entrepreneurial outcomes and sometimes reported contradictory results. For example, attitudes towards independence and financial issues (high income, financial security) were found to be important factors in some studies (Schwarz et al., 2009; van Gelderen et al., 2008), but not in others (Carter et al., 2003; Douglas and Shepherd, 2002). This implies that moderators might be at work and highlights the need for a better understanding when and for whom specific personal characteristics are related to entrepreneurship (Zhao and Seibert, 2006). Moreover, existing research on motives and career justifications relied on cross-sectional research designs which are useful for investigating the relationship between attitudes and EI, but do not allow inferences on how attitudes are related to change of EI over time. Because EI are not fixed traits but malleable intentions it is important to take changes of EI over time into count and to investigate what factors promote an increase or decrease of EI over time - yet this is not readily addressed in extant research.Within the present study, we specifically focus on the change of EI over the course of 12 months among German university students. University students are an important group to investigate because they are well situated to become future entrepreneurs and universities are increasingly focusing on entrepreneurship research and education (Schmude et al., 2008). Moreover, emerging adulthood is a time when changes in career intentions and life plans are particularity prevalent (Arnett, 2000) and we can thus expect that EI change even within relatively short periods of time for this group. As students are becoming engaged in the important tasks of career planning and exploration during the university years (Saks and Ashforth, 2002), some might discover their interest to become an entrepreneur while others might discover that founding a business is not an attractive career option for them after all. However, such changes can only be observed when assessing EI at multiple time points, as done in the present study. Hence, extending extant research that relied on cross-sectional data, our study makes a contribution by not only investigating concurrent relations of EI and personal characteristics but by also focusing on predictors of interindividual differences in intraindividual change in EI over time. Specifically, the present study contributes to the extant literature and investigates whether the effects of work values on change in entrepreneurial career intentions are moderated by gender. Gender differences seem especially important to consider in this context because previous research established gender differences in work values (Konrad et al., 2000) and entrepreneurial activity (Wilson et al., 2007).To summarize, this study's results will enhance our understanding of the direct effects of work values on level and change of EI, gender differences in work values regarding level and change in EI, and most importantly how gender moderates the relation of work values with level and change in EI. As such, our study makes three main contributions:1. We focus on work values as a well-established framework in contrast to the rather dispersed motives and career reasons examined in extant research.2. We investigate the reported heterogeneity in existing research regarding the relation of personal characteristics and EI by investigating moderating gender effects.3. We investigate not only concurrent relations but also focus on change in EI over time.\n2. Theory and hypotheses: 2.1 Work values and entrepreneurial intentions\n3. Method: 3.1 Participants and procedure\n4. Results: 4.1 Latent growth modeling (LGM)\n5. Discussion: Within the present study, we examined gender differences in work values and EI and how work values and gender were related to the level of EI within time and to changes in EI across time among a diverse German university student sample. Most importantly, we address the issue of heterogeneity in relations between personal characteristics and entrepreneurial outcomes found in other research and extend previous research on work values and career choices by focusing on how the relation of work values and EI might be moderated by gender.We found that independent of gender, work values in terms of self-enhancement, conservation, and openness to change significantly predicted level of EI. This result supports the usefulness of work values as predictors of career intentions. More specifically, the results indicate a positive association between of openness to change work values with EI, and a negative association of conservation values with EI. These results are in line with previous research which suggested that entrepreneurs are characterized by higher change orientation, low uncertainty avoidance, an acceptance of financial insecurity, and positive attitudes toward risk (e.g., Douglas and Shepherd, 2002; Rauch and Frese, 2007). Likewise, researchers have argued that entrepreneurship might serve as a route to achieving high pay and prestige and entrepreneurial interests are positively related to the values of achievement and power (Sagiv, 2002). Our results are consistent with those findings and show that a motivational orientation toward self-enhancement is meaningfully related to higher EI among students. However, we did not find that work values predict change in EI over time. Possibly because EI showed only minor variance in their change trajectory over time within our sample, the predictive effect of work values might only be observed over longer periods. It is also possible that the fundamental relation between work values and EI is established in earlier life stages, such as adolescence (Obschonka et al., 2010) and does not show dramatic shifts thereafter. We encourage future studies to investigate such possibilities. Regarding gender differences, our results also reflect previous research indicating that women are, on average, less inclined to follow an entrepreneurial career path than men (e.g., Zhao et al., 2005).While our study contributes to the literature by supporting previous findings regarding predictive utility of career preferences and gender on level of EI with an established framework of work values and among a new and different sample, its most important contribution lies in its focus on the change of EI over time and the moderation effects of gender. First, our study contributes to existing research on gender differences in entrepreneurship by showing that they might be partially explained by the fact that women hold, on average, different work values than men. Post-hoc analyses not reported here showed that, in our sample, men valued pay higher but altruism and variety lower than women, which is consistent with other research on gender differences in work values (Konrad et al., 2000; Rottinghaus and Zytowski, 2006). As we show, the work values usually expressed by men are, in turn, more typically associated with higher EI, thus contributing to gender differences in entrepreneurship.Second, our study makes a contribution to the controversy that the motives of men and women entrepreneurs were found remarkably similar in some studies (e.g., Carsrud and Brannback, 2011) while others reported gender differences, for example work values differed in relation to entrepreneurial career interests for boys and girls (Rottinghaus and Zytowski, 2006). Our results imply that at a given point in time, the reasons students are interested in entrepreneurship do not differ across gender in terms of work values and that gender does not generally moderate the relation between work values and level of EI. The exception was self-transcendence values that were more positively related to EI for women as compared to men. Possibly, this reflects a tendency of women to regard entrepreneurship not only as a means for self-enhancement but also as a possibility to contribute to the greater social good, as implied in models of social entrepreneurship (Austin et al., 2006). On a general level, our results support type-based theories of career choice which suggest that people (regardless of gender) choose certain careers based on the correspondence between their needs and personal type, and, alternatively, on the characteristics and reinforcers of the vocation (Dawis, 2005; Holland, 1997).Third, by investigating changes in EI over time, our study significantly extends existing cross-sectional research and contributes to our understanding of the heterogeneity found in previous studies regarding the relation between personal characteristics and entrepreneurial outcomes. While we did not find consistent moderating gender effects within time, our study established that gender moderates the effect of work values on change of EI across time. Our study was based on the assumption that EI are not fixed but can show meaningful change over time. Our results support this assertion by showing significant change of EI even for the relatively brief time-span of one year. In fact, our study shows that on average EI decrease over time. This has important implications for entrepreneurial education in universities because it means that students are likely to lose interest in entrepreneurship over time if no specific measures are taken. Previous research criticized that education systems may stress theoretical and conceptual thinking over practical and intuitive problem solving and thereby discourage active pursuit of entrepreneurial intentions (Gibb, 1996; Henderson and Robertson, 2000). As we could show, for women as compared to men, self-enhancement values are related to less decrease in EI. Likewise, women with stronger conservation values show more decrease in EI as compared to men with similar values. We speculate that those findings might be explained by the argument that entrepreneurship is a less typical and less socially facilitated career path for women compared to men. Consequently, women would need to hold stronger prototypical work values for entrepreneurship (i.e. self-enhancement values) and not hold strong untypical values (i.e. conservation values) to become and remain interested in pursuing an entrepreneurial career. This last finding implies that it seems important to distinguish between the expression of a particular career intention at a given point in time (i.e. level of EI) and the change of such intentions across time (i.e. rate of change in EI). While our study does not suggest large gender differences regarding work values for the former, gender might well affect the effects of work values on the latter. On a general level, our results imply that prototypical work values for a particular career are especially important in developing and retaining interest for the gender that is on average less represented in that career domain.5.1 Limitations\n6. Implications for practice and conclusions: Our study offers some suggestions on how to increase entrepreneurial activity. Despite the fact that entrepreneurship is generally regarded as a way to modernize the economic systems of nations, enhance the technological knowledge of societies, and reduce inefficiencies in the economic system (e.g., Kirzner, 1997; Shane, 2005; Shane and Venkataraman, 2000), currently, entrepreneurship seems to be a potential career path only for a small proportion of individuals. For example, the percentage of adults with entrepreneurial intentions among those not currently involved in entrepreneurial activity is only 6.4 percent in Germany and 7.7 percent in the USA (Kelley et al., 2010). As our results show, this might be partially explained by the nature of entrepreneurship being associated to a rather narrow set of work values. If one attempts to broaden the appeal of entrepreneurship, putting, for example, social entrepreneurship into focus, it may increase entrepreneurial venture formation because it might appeal to individuals that are not traditionally drawn to an entrepreneurial career (i.e. those holding self-transcendence values). This seems especially important to increase the participation of women in entrepreneurship. As our results show, women hold, on average, work values that are less typically associated with EI and need to possess especially strong typical entrepreneurial work values in order to increase or retain their intent to becoming entrepreneurs during university. In the long run, promoting entrepreneurship that does not only correspond to the values of self-enhancement may not only stimulate more entrepreneurial activity in the social sector among people generally, and women specifically, but also create new opportunities for competitive entrepreneurship (e.g., Botsman and Rogers, 2010). For example, one of the largest recent initial public offerings in the US was the company \"ZIPCAR\", which essentially translates the old idea of car sharing into a new venture (Schumpeter Blog, 2010).In sum, our study supports the usefulness of work values as predictors of specific career intentions by showing that particular work values are an important component to explain why some people are inclined to become entrepreneurs. Moreover, we show that work values are useful in explaining gender differences in career intentions, such as entrepreneurship, in terms of explaining both existing differences, as well as changes in EI. Finally, we showed that while the reasons for choosing a specific career path might not differ between men and women, the change of such intentions might well be affected differently by work values depending on the gender of the person. As our results suggest, the prototypical work values of a career domain seem important in retaining the career intent for the gender that is underrepresented in that domain.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - Work values are an important characteristic to understand gender differences in career intentions, but how gender affects the relationship between values and career intentions is not well established. The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether gender moderates the effects of work values on level and change of entrepreneurial intentions (EI).\nDesign/methodology/approach: - In total, 218 German university students were sampled regarding work values and with EI assessed three times over the course of 12 months. Data were analysed with latent growth modelling.\nFindings: - Self-enhancement and openness to change values predicted higher levels and conservation values lower levels of EI. Gender moderated the effects of enhancement and conservation values on change in EI.\nResearch limitations/implications: - The authors relied on self-reported measures and the sample was restricted to university students. Future research needs to verify to what extent these results generalize to other samples and different career fields, such as science or nursing.\nPractical implications: - The results imply that men and women are interested in an entrepreneurial career based on the same work values but that values have different effects for men and women regarding individual changes in EI. The results suggest that the prototypical work values of a career domain seem important regarding increasing the career intent for the gender that is underrepresented in that domain.\nOriginality/value: - The results enhance understanding of how gender affects the relation of work values and a specific career intention, such as entrepreneurship.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Impact of globalization: The ability of less developed countries' (LDCs') firms to cope with opportunities and challenges	[ "Globalization", "Competitive strategy", "Small to medium‐sized enterprises", "Developing countries" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The notion that the world has become a global village is shared by almost every person on earth. Events, discoveries, technologies, and crises that make headlines in one part of the world are swiftly brought to the notice of many people all over the world. Globalization can be defined in several ways (Czinkota and Ronkainen, 2007; Peters and Pierre, 2006; Curry, 2000). In this paper, we adopt Curry's (2000) definition of globalization. For Curry (2000), globalization refers to the worldwide phenomenon of technological, economic, political, and cultural exchanges among nations, organizations, and private individuals (with some emphasis from authors). These exchanges have led to interdependencies at all levels (national, firm, and private individual levels).Interdependencies at all levels, an inherent feature of globalization, provide several actors (governments, organizations, and private individuals) numerous opportunities such as large markets, access to modern technology worldwide, access to modern and superior goods/services, and fewer barriers to trade and capital flows. It is up to every actor to develop its capabilities so as to be able to exploit the opportunities emerging from globalization. As maintained by Lee (2005), our tastes, needs, wants and demands are converging, a trend termed as \"global consumers\". It is not uncommon to witness that modern technologies are making it not only easy for isolated places and impoverished people to be exposed to modern goods and services, they are eager for modernity's allurements (Cox and Enis, 1988). However, the potential benefits which globalization provides cannot be realized by many people or countries of the poorest parts of our globalize markets (Spiegel, 2007; Peters and Pierre, 2006; Human Development Report, 2004).Globalization also comes with enormous challenges such as liberalization of markets, intense competition, decline of domestic job opportunities and revenues, economic volatility of the integrated markets, cyclical crises, and non-tariff barriers to trade, spread of pandemics, and new security issues. Many actors, especially in the least developed countries (LDCs) may not have the capabilities to handle challenges (Spiegel, 2007; Human Development Report, 2002) which globalization brings with it. And above all, one major challenge will be the ability of poorer countries and the firms in them, for example, to deal with the fact that there is no leveled playing field (Speigel, 2007; Beamish and Lu, 2004; Human Development Report, 2004, 2002) for exchanges between economic actors. Subsidies and trade restrictions of various kinds are still common rather than the exception in many developed countries, even emerging markets, and some LDCs (Peng et al., 2008; Spiegel, 2007; Beamish and Lu, 2004).Thus, according to Audretsch (2003), globalization has brought two important developments. The first is related to the re-emergence of the importance of regions and proximity as units of economic activity, which have contributed to enhance more investigation about clusters and innovation. On the other hand, the innovativeness of firms is increasingly associated with high-tech innovative regional clusters. The result of this association between innovation and regional proximity is related to a strong linkage between the competitiveness of firms and regions, which induce the policy makers to adopt more intensively a strategic management of regions as a response to the risks of changes in the production location:At the heart of the strategic management of placement has been the development and enhancement of factors of production that cannot be transferred across geographic space at low cost - principally, although not exclusively, knowledge and ideas (Audretsch, 2003, p. 16).In view of the above discussions, the purpose of this paper is to contribute to the debate on the impact of globalization and, for that matter, trade liberalization on competitiveness of firms in LDCs. We, therefore, seek to find answers to the following questions:RQ1. How does globalization affect the competitiveness of small and medium-sized companies (SMEs) in LDCs?RQ2. How can SMEs in LDCs handle opportunities and challenges emerging from globalization and trade liberalization?The rest of the paper is structured as follows. In the next section, the existing literature on the impact of globalization is reviewed, followed by a brief discussion of the methodology used. Thereafter, the theoretical framework of this study is presented, followed by some propositions to address some ways to handle opportunities and challenges, which globalization may pose for SMEs in LDCs. Finally, the conclusion, the implications of the study, and suggestions for future study are discussed.\nLiterature review: Globalization\nMethodology: Since the subject area, \"the impact of globalization on LDCs\" firms' ability to cope with opportunities and challenges' is new and/or under-researched, an exploratory research based solely on insights drawn from existing literature is employed. An exploratory research (Malhotra, 2001) serves as a means to help acquire useful information or knowledge about the subject area. By drawing on the existing literature, we endeavour to not only theorize on the impact of globalization, but also formulate and discuss some propositions that will help illuminate and discuss some ways for SMEs in LDCs to understand the opportunities and challenges inherent in the forces of globalization and trade liberalization, emphasizing on ways to exploit opportunities and deal with challenges. As posited by Gummesson (2002, p. 283), one burdensome task with all research is not to collect or rather generate more data, but to interpret and combine what is already there and make some sense out of it. We submit to this assertion and try to make the most out of the insights we can get from the existing literature to address the phenomenon under study.\nTheoretical framework: Impact of globalization\nConclusion: The purpose of this study has been to contribute to the debate on the impact of globalization on competitiveness of firms, particularly SMEs, in LDCs. The study highlights that firms that are capable of innovating and learning in interaction with other actors are able to exploit opportunities and handle challenges emerging from globalization. Also argued in this paper is that firms that are capable of innovating and learning in interaction with other actors are able to internationalize their activities as one of the responses to the opportunities and challenges.Institutional setup, co-operation among firms, government socio-economic polices and active support to firms will enhance the SMEs' capabilities with regards to innovation, learning and internationalization, which should increase their competitiveness. The relationships between a firm's capabilities (i.e. innovation, learning, and internationalization) and the mediating factor, institutional setup, will produce the effect that an SME's competitiveness will improve in the face of globalization. However, this improved competitiveness of SMEs will also be a function of how well they handle their networks of exchange relationships with some significant actors in the economy.\nSome implications: As argued elsewhere (Pettinger, 2007) and in this paper, an important priority in the drive for globalization should be the ability to develop markets and sell products and services. SMEs from LDCs will be required to develop their domestic as well as making inroads into foreign competitors' markets to pre-empt them. The ability to develop markets and sell products and services will require the capability to innovate in new products or update existing products to meet customer needs and also find new ways to interact with customers. However, innovation solutions that are perceived by customers to be new and superior to alternative ones in the marketplace will be preferred by customers (Doye and Stern, 2006). Most SMEs from LDCs are not able to compete with foreign goods and services from MNCs from the developed countries because customers perceive goods/services from the MNCs to be innovative and superior. But, innovative solutions, which are preferred in our globalized markets, can, for the most part, be beyond the provision of a single SME from an LDC. Hence, an SME may have to establish networks of exchange relationships with other organizations, where they complement each other through resource and activity sharing and joint learning to boost their innovative skills.There will be the need to expand SMEs' networking so that interaction between governments, businesses and the general public will create a forum where ideas, expertise, knowledge, and experiences can be shared. Experiences elsewhere show that institutional support, especially support from the government (Shamsuddoha, 2008; Todd and Jivalgi, 2007), do play a major role in SMEs' competitiveness development within the domestic market and when they attempt to internationalize their business activities as well. For instance, Todd and Jivalgi (2007) show how India's SMEs' internationalization efforts gained the Indian Government's support; the SMEs are/were supported by governmental measures, which helped boost their entrepreneurship, innovation and finances, all facilitating their global presence.Government in LDCs should encourage and support collaboration between universities, other areas of higher learning and industries. This presupposes that SMEs will learn how to compete and co-operate with each other, even co-operating sometimes with competitors can be a good thing. The forces of globalization and trade liberalization demand such a change in attitude or business orientation; it is all about networking to avail oneself with complementary resources and activities which one lacks.\nSuggestion for future research: The present study is mainly a conceptual one. In future, it will be fruitful to conduct empirical study, building on the insights shared in the study, to increase our understanding of the extent to which SMEs in LDCs are coping with the opportunities and challenges inherent in the forces of globalization. In view of that, the propositions provided in this study (see pp. 9-10) can be tested empirically too.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this study is to contribute to the debate on the impact of globalization on the competitiveness of firms in least developed countries (LDCs). Two main research questions will be addressed. How does globalization affect the competitiveness of small to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in LDCs? How can SMEs handle opportunities and challenges emerging from globalization?\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The methodology for this study is a conceptual attempt to review the existing literature and make some propositions about how SMEs can handle the opportunities and challenges emerging from globalization.\nFindings: - Building on a developed operational framework affecting the competitiveness of firms, some of the expected results are that firms' capabilities with regards to innovation, learning, and internationalization, which increase their competitiveness, are enhanced by institutional setups. Second, establishing relationships with governmental and non-governmental institutions is crucial in terms of accessing resources, innovating, and entering into foreign markets.\nOriginality/value: - The paper represents a contribution to the debate on the impact of globalization on the competitiveness of firms, particularly SMEs, in LDCs. Although globalization has brought considerable benefits to many actors worldwide, its impact on competitiveness of (SMEs) are controversial. We suggest that globalization's effects depend on the capability of firms to learning, to innovate, and also on the institutional setup in LDCs.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Building resilience: how to have a positive impact at the organizational and individual employee level	[ "Resilience", "Organization development", "Strategic learning", "Development strategies" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: At some time during its life, every organization will face some form of disruptive crisis. Be it a natural disaster, a reputational crisis, problems within the supply chain, or an issue affecting its people, organizational crises happen more often than we think.\nOrganizational resilience: Research has identified a suite of 13 leading indicators that can help reveal how resilient an organization is likely to be in the face of future crises (Lee et al., 2013). The resilience of an organization depends on the quality of three pillars: its leadership and culture, the networks, and relationships the organization has fostered on which it can draw and how the organization is strategically positioned to be change-ready (Figure 1 below).\nEmployee resilience: As individuals we take cues from others around us as to how we should respond or behave. This can be either explicitly, through policies and practices that define \"the way we do things around here,\" through to implicit indicators of what types of behaviors and attitudes are and are not acceptable within a particular workplace. This means that depending on the culture your organization has, it can enhance or erode the resilience of all employees.\nIn summary: When an organization is put under pressure, it is their people and how they come together that can make or break the organization. As identified earlier in this article, the most challenging aspects of successfully leading a team through a crisis, are the people aspects. Below are ten practical ways you can do that (Seville, 2016):\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: At some time during its life, every organization will face some form of disruptive crisis. Be it a natural disaster, a reputational crisis, problems within the supply chain, or an issue affecting its people, organizational crises happen more often than we think. In today's world of change and uncertainty, an organization needs core resilience capabilities to survive. This paper aims to set out three pillars for organizational resilience, identify the questions that leaders need to ask themselves about employee readiness, and offer ten practical ways in which leaders can help their teams to respond effectively in times of disruptive change.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This paper draws from a variety of sources of research, including the author's own that tracked businesses' rates, speed, and quality of recovery following the 2010/2011 earthquakes in Christchurch, New Zealand.\nFindings: When an organization is put under pressure, it is their people and how they come together that can make or break the organization. The prevailing culture and the behavior and capabilities of leaders can enhance or erode the resilience of all employees.\nOriginality/value: Resilience is an aspect of organizational life that is becoming ever more critical but research is still scarce. The advice contained in this paper is based on research and offers grounded advice on how leaders can support and enable their teams to survive and thrive in the VUCA world in which organizations now operate.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Online apparel retailing: roles of e-shopping quality and experiential e-shopping motives	[ "E‐shopping quality", "Experiential e‐shopping motives", "Online apparel shopping", "Electronic commerce", "Customer services quality", "Garment industry", "United States of America" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: As the online shopping channel begins to mature and growth slows (Ross, 2010), the intensity of competition for online retailers will continue to increase. Such a competitive environment, coupled with the increase in numbers and diversity of e-consumers, has made the issue of understanding key factors that drive consumers to shop online increasingly important. Despite the growing interest among researchers and retail marketers, still, there is a general lack of research on, and a need to extend knowledge about the drivers of consumer e-shopping behavior.Effectively managing online stores that induce customer satisfaction is a critical factor underlying sustained growth, not only for pure e-tailers but also for multi-channel retailers because of the reciprocal effects across channels (Venkatesan et al., 2007). A satisfactory experience with an online store is desirable since it can lead to positive outcomes such as customer trust (Fassnacht and Kose, 2007), customer retention and referral, online conversion, and e-shopping stickiness (Bansal et al., 2004) and online loyalty (Anderson and Srinivasan, 2003; Chiou et al., 2009; Fassnacht and Kose, 2007; Rodgers et al., 2005). Noting the importance of cross-channel effects, van Birgelen et al. (2006) reveal that customer online satisfaction and offline satisfaction (e.g. employee performance and offline area performance) interact to influence customer behavioral intentions. Similarly, customers who have a bad online experience appear to be reluctant to shop through the retailer's other channels (Finn, 2008), raising a question regarding what matters for online shopping satisfaction.In particular, industry observers call for better understanding of the effects of online shopping quality features on customer satisfaction and subsequent behaviors while taking consumer characteristics into account (Ross, 2010). Gaining full understanding of online shopping quality also enables e-tailers to monitor and improve their store operations to maximize performance. In response, a number of studies have developed scales for measuring online service quality in a variety of industry and product settings (Francis, 2009; Loiacono et al., 2007; Parasuraman et al., 2005; Wolfinbarger and Gilly, 2003; Yoo and Donthu, 2001; Zeithaml et al., 2000). Accordingly, it seems timely to re-examine current e-shopping quality scales in an online retail operation setting.The current study employs Oliver's (1997) quality-satisfaction-behavioral intention link model as a framework to examine potential drivers and outcomes of customer satisfaction in an apparel online shopping environment. In addition, as discussed in recent consumer behavior research, investigation of moderating factors (e.g. e-shopping motives) that are unique to an online shopper enriches our understanding of online consumer behavior (Nysveen et al., 2005; Parasuraman et al., 2005; Rodgers et al., 2005). For example, Parasuraman et al. (2005) point out the need to examine whether or not shopping motives (e.g. experiential, goal-directed) moderate the relationships between e-shopping quality and customers' evaluation of e-stores, as part of their call for an investigation into e-shopping quality relating to experiential shopping aspects. Yet, there is a lack of empirical evidence on consumer online behavior that takes into account such moderator. To fill this gap in the existing literature, this study aims to empirically:* delineate e-shopping quality dimensions;* investigate the e-shopping quality - satisfaction - behavioral intentions link; and* examine the moderating effects of consumer experiential e-shopping motives in the e-shopping quality - satisfaction - behavioral intentions link within the context of online apparel retailing.\nLiterature review: E-shopping quality\nMethod: This study uses a survey design to examine the proposed hypotheses in the context of young consumers' online shopping for apparel/fashion accessory products. In the USA, the apparel, accessories and footwear category surpassing computers hit the top of the online sales rankings in 2007 (National Retail Federation, 2007), providing evidence of strong e-commerce sales in the category. Such popularity of apparel/fashion product categories in e-tail industry is worldwide: more than half of UK online shoppers (52 percent) buy clothes/fashion items online, followed by films and music (47 percent) and groceries and food (24 percent) (Office for National Statistics, 2010).The sample was chosen from a representative group of online shoppers: college students as young adults in tech-savvy Generation Y (age 18-32). According to Pew Internet & American Life Style Project (2009), young adults between the ages of 18 and 32 comprise the biggest group to shop online, accounting for 30 percent of internet-using population, followed by the 33-44 years-old age group (23 percent) and the 45-54 years-old age group (22 percent) in the USA. As with e-shopping product categories, clothing is the most popular product category for this young adults group compared to other products (Case and King, 2003; Seock and Norton, 2008). At the same time, concentrating on this e-shopping leading group helps this study examine the proposed moderating effects of experiential e-shopping motives by controlling potential biases in association with ages. Therefore, the selection of college students of young adults is reasonable.Pre-test\nResults: Measurement model\nDiscussion and implications: Results of the study suggest that apparel online shopping quality consists of four dimensions:1. web site content/functionality;2. customer service;3. privacy/security; and4. experiential/atmospheric qualities.Similar constructs are discussed in research examining apparel e-shopping (Kim and Kim, 2004; Kim and Stoel, 2004). The explained variance of the first factor, web site content/functionality (51.51 percent), was greater than the other three factors. This indicates that web site content/functionality service makes the most significant contribution, accounting for the greatest proportion of variation in overall perceptions of apparel e-shopping quality.Research suggests that the dimensionality of web site quality may differ by online retail category (e.g. product type and/or delivery method) (Francis, 2009; Francis and White, 2004; Peterson et al., 1997). Online apparel retailing, as an offline-product category, comprises four e-shopping quality dimensions: privacy/security, web site content/functionality, customer service, and atmospheric/experiential qualities. There are some overlaps and differences between e-shopping quality dimensions identified in this study and those in other studies (Francis, 2009; Parasuraman et al., 2005; Wolfinbarger and Gilly, 2003). First, privacy/security and web site content/functionality are commonly found in studies of various product retail settings (e.g. eTailQ scale, E-S-QUAL scale, RECIPE scale), implying that online store features relating to these two dimensions are fundamental qualities contributing to the customer perceptions' of e-shopping quality, perhaps, for all types of online retailers. Moreover, stable roles that individual e-shopping quality factors play on shopping outcomes are observed. For example, consistent with the findings in past research, this study shows that: privacy influences loyalty intention (Parasuraman et al., 2005); customer service directly influences loyalty intention; and web site content/functionality directly influences e-shopping satisfaction (Wolfinbarger and Gilly, 2003).On the other hand, unlike other scales, this study revealed that the atmospheric/experiential dimension is a critical e-shopping quality factor in developing customers' evaluations of online stores, at least, for apparel/fashion online retailers. This finding supports our anticipation that, while shopping online for apparel items, customers seek and value atmospheric/experiential features such as those generating feelings of fun, excitement, or pleasure and consider these features as distinct benefits which influence their overall assessment of e-stores. It is also noteworthy that, differing from past research (Francis, 2009; Parasuraman et al., 2005; Wolfinbarger and Gilly, 2003) items representing fulfillment aspects were dropped from the exploratory factor analysis, thus failing to appear in the final four-factor service quality model. A possible reason for the neglected fulfillment factor could be that, whether or not an order will be completed without errors may be no longer be a concern for online shoppers. That is, consumers take the fulfillment aspect (accurate order fulfillment and prompt delivery) for granted since the continuance of the retail business depends on the ability to fulfill orders, thus fulfillment seems hardly to contribute to customers' perception of e-shopping quality. However, the inconsistency in e-shopping quality dimensions warrants further exploration.The results of this study support Oliver's (1997) quality - satisfaction - behavioral intention link model in an e-shopping context for apparel/fashion product shopping. That is, among four dimensions of e-shopping quality, e-shoppers' perceptions of web site content/functionality and atmospheric/experiential quality influence their shopping satisfaction which, in turn contributes to e-shopping intention. The findings also contribute to Bagozzi's (1992) appraisal - emotional response - coping framework by confirming the notion in an online shopping environment. The finding that e-shopping quality (web site content/functionality and atmospheric/experiential) affects e-shopping intention through e-shopping satisfaction also supports the mediating role that emotional response plays on the appraisal - coping association. Additional results reveal that e-shopping quality (privacy/security and customer service) has a direct impact on e-shopping intention, consistent with prior research (McDougall and Levesque, 2000).Prior research suggests that consumer responses to technology-mediated environments are susceptible to individual characteristics such as shopping motives but the dynamics were not examined with respect to the roles that they may play in evaluation of e-shopping quality aspects. Focusing on e-shopping motives directed at hedonic, intrinsically motivated, autotelic activities in a virtual store (i.e. experiential e-shopping motives), this study tests experiential e-shopping motive's moderating effects on consumer e-shopping behavior. Results provide some evidence to support the proposition that high experiential e-shopping motives would strengthen the role that experiential and hedonic e-shopping quality plays on e-shopping satisfaction. Specifically, web site content/functionality increases e-shopping satisfaction as experiential e-shopping motives increase. The observation that high experiential e-shopping motives increase the experiential/atmospheric - e-shopping satisfaction link directionally but not statistically also adds support to the proposition. Contrary to prediction, however, experiential e-shopping motives do not moderate the effects of experiential and hedonic e-shopping quality on e-shopping intention. Indeed, it is shown that task-related e-shopping quality (customer service) increases e-shopping intention as experiential e-shopping motives increase. Additionally, the influence of e-shopping satisfaction on e-shopping intention becomes stronger when experiential e-shopping motives are high compared to low experiential e-shopping motives. The findings suggest that the moderation of consumers' experiential e-shopping motives in e-shopping contexts may occur along the nature of outcomes rather than predictors. Accordingly, experiential e-shopping motives enhance behavioral response (e-shopping intention) derived from goal/task-related e-shopping quality (privacy/security) and emotional response (e-shopping satisfaction) in association with experiential/hedonic e-shopping quality (web site content/functionality). Further investigation of experiential e-shopping motive moderation in different e-shopping settings will be worthwhile.The findings provide useful information for e-tail marketers to better understand the online consumer response process and determine effective e-store management strategies that reflect the differing customer evaluation processes by the experiential shopping motives. First, online retailers selling apparel goods can promote customer satisfaction with and intent to shop at their e-stores by managing their service quality execution in terms of privacy/security, web site content/functionality, customer service, and atmospheric/experiential quality. This is also important for multi-channel retailers in that the web site is a major path leading shoppers to make purchases at stores. Second, retailers targeting hedonic or experience-driven shoppers and/or hedonic-dominant retail categories particularly need to make special efforts to create high-quality web site content/functionality and customer service features, since a high level of consumer e-shopping satisfaction exerts a stronger impact on e-shopping intention. For instance, technical supports such as try-it-on, digital TV station, and live chat features can elicit hedonic shoppers to visualize products and involve social interaction pleasantly which will eventually enhance their virtual shopping experiences.\nLimitations and suggestions for future research: The findings from this study should be interpreted with caution for several reasons. First, the results have been accomplished using a single segment of the retail industry (i.e. online apparel retailing). Hence, caution should be noted in applying the results to other areas of retailing, such as service and/or product categories which are less likely to entail look and feel attributes. Related to this, the conceptualization of e-shopping quality dimensions and their effects on consumer e-shopping behavior might benefit from additional investigation into other industry domains. For example, a typology of internet retailing suggested by Francis (2007, 2009) can serve as a cornerstone for delineating e-shopping quality dimensions corresponding to each e-tail category. Next, the satisfaction scale used in this study was chosen to focus on emotional/affective state in response to an online apparel store rather than cognitive-affective combined state. Different approaches to and measures of satisfaction may observe different findings regarding quality perceptions - satisfaction - behavioral intention associations, given that various measurements exist for satisfaction. Last, a limitation of common method bias in relation to the use of self-reported measure invites a unique approach to test the proposed model utilizing other measures such as industry statistics.The results of this study invite further research attention. The model under investigation explains relatively low variances in e-shopping satisfaction (21.3 percent). The lack of explanatory power by the proposed model warrants a need for investigating additional antecedents to e-shopping satisfaction. In addition, future research in need is to examine the influence of additional online shopping motive dimensions (e.g. social shopping motive) on online shopping behavior. For example, Dholakia et al. (2004) identify social motive factors (e.g. social enhancement) as reasons for participating in a virtual community. Also, utilizing social cues such as an Avatar, live chat service, voice, and interactive humanlike features is an effective strategy for online retailers to satisfy customers with humanlike interactive/collaborative experiences and emotional connections in a virtual world (Wang et al., 2007). Social shopping motives may incorporate interactive and symbolic aspects of attitude, differing from utilitarian motives as well as experiential shopping motives, possibly. Finally, an in-depth examination of underlying e-shopping motives through a qualitative approach (e.g in-depth interviews, narrative analyses) will lend insights into a better understanding of how customers derive a satisfying online shopping experience.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The objectives of this paper are to: examine e-shopping quality dimensions; explore how e-shopping quality factors influence consumer shopping outcomes (e-shopping satisfaction and e-shopping intention); and test the moderating effects of consumer experiential e-shopping motives on the e-shopping quality - e-shopping outcomes links within the context of online apparel retailing.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Data were gathered from 298 college students in the USA using a self-administered online survey.\nFindings: - Among four e-shopping quality factors identified (privacy/security, web site content/functionality, customer service, and experiential/atmospheric), web site content/functionality and atmospheric/experiential quality have significant impact on e-shopping satisfaction contributing to e-shopping intention, while privacy/security and customer service have significant impact on e-shopping intention but not on e-shopping satisfaction. Furthermore, this study provides some support for the moderating roles that experiential e-shopping motives plays in the e-shopping quality - e-shopping outcomes links.\nResearch limitation/implications: - This paper shows that experiential e-shopping motives as an individual characteristic play a role in controlling the dynamics among e-shopping quality, e-shopping satisfaction, and e-shopping intention. However, the data consisting of self-reported measures from a single segment of online retail industry warrants caution in generalization in relation to common method bias.\nPractical implications: - This paper entails useful implications for internet- and multichannel retail marketers delivering apparel/fashion goods to better understand the online consumer response process and determine effective e-store management strategies that reflect the differing customer evaluation processes.\nOriginality/value: - This study extends and complements the e-tail service literature by examining whether and how experiential e-shopping motives moderate the relationships among e-shopping quality dimensions, e-shopping satisfaction, and e-shopping intention.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Acceptance sampling plans based on failure-censored step-stress accelerated tests for Weibull distributions	[ "Acceptance sampling", "Product design", "Product life cycle", "Customer satisfaction", "Reliability management" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: It is essential from the consumer's point-of-view that a product perform the required function without failure for the desired period of time. The lifetime of a product is therefore one of the most important quality characteristics. Life-test sampling plans are commonly used to determine the acceptability of a product with respect to lifetime. Much work has been done for the design of the life-test sampling plans. Fertig and Mann (1980) discussed sampling plans for the Weibull distribution using best linear invariant estimators. Kocherlakota and Balakrishnan (1986) considered one- and two-sided sampling plans for the exponential distribution. Schneider (1989) discussed failure-censored sampling plans for the lognormal and Weibull distributions using maximum likelihood estimators (MLEs). Balasooriya (1995) considered failure-censored sampling plans for the exponential distribution under the circumstances where items are to be tested in sets of fixed size. Balasooriya and Saw (1998), Balasooriya and Balakrishnan (2000), and Balasooriya et al. (2000) considered sampling plans for the exponential, lognormal, and Weibull distributions based progressively failure-censored data, respectively. Tse and Yang (2003) considered sampling plans for the Weibull distribution under progressive censoring with random removals, where the number of items removed at each failure follows a binomial distribution. Balasooriya and Low (2004) discussed progressively time-censored sampling plans for the Weibull distribution under competing causes of failure.Many modern high-reliability products are designed to operate without failure for a very long time. Life testing for these products under use conditions takes a lot of time to obtain reasonable failure information. In this situation sampling plans based on such life tests are impractical. Introducing accelerated life tests (ALTs) in life-test sampling plans can be a good way to overcome such difficulty. Wallace (1985) stressed the need for introducing ALTs to the future plans of MIL-STD-781. ALTs are used in many contexts to obtain information quickly on the lifetime distribution of products. Test items are subjected to higher than usual levels of stress to induce early failures. The test data obtained at accelerated conditions are extrapolated by means of an appropriate model to the use conditions to obtain an estimate of the lifetime distribution under the use conditions. In ALTs, the stress can be applied to test items in various ways. In a constant stress ALT the stress applied to the items is constant during the test duration, and in a step-stress ALT the stress changes either at a fixed time or on the occurrence of a fixed number of failures. Nelson (1990, chap. 6) and Meeker and Escobar (1998, chap. 20) provide references and planning methods for constant stress ALTs. Some work on planning step-stress ALTs can be found in Miller and Nelson (1983), Bai et al. (1989), Bai and Kim (1993), Chung and Bai (1998), and Alhadeed and Yang (2002).Sampling plans based on ALTs have been explored in previous work. Yum and Kim (1990) developed failure-censored constant stress ALT sampling plans for the exponential distribution. Hsieh (1994) extended the work of Yum and Kim (1990) and obtained sampling plans that minimize the total censoring number. Bai et al. (1993) considered the design of failure-censored constant stress ALT sampling plans for the lognormal and Weibull distributions. Under the constraint that the tests at high and low stress levels have equal expected test times, Bai et al. (1995) considered failure-censored constant stress ALT sampling plans for the Weibull distribution. Chung et al. (2000) considered the design of failure-censored step-stress ALT sampling plans for the lognormal distribution with known scale parameter.This paper considers the design of the acceptance sampling plans based on failure-censored step-stress ALTs for items having Weibull lives. The sample size and the acceptability constant are obtained which satisfy the producer's and consumer's risks. The accelerated life test is optimized to have a minimum sample size by minimizing the asymptotic variance of the test statistic. The proposed sampling plans are compared with the sampling plans based on constant stress ALTs.\n2. The model: 2.1 Assumptions\n3. Acceptance sampling plans: 3.1 Lot acceptance procedure\n4. Optimum sampling plans: 4.1 Optimum design of sampling plans\n5. Comparison with constant stress ALT sampling plans: We compare the proposed sampling plans with the constant stress ALT sampling plans considered by Bai et al. (1993) in terms of sample size and expected test time. Let p* be the sample proportion allocated to xL which minimizes the asymptotic variance of the test statistic, and let cL and cH be the failure proportion at xL and xH, respectively, in constant stress ALT. We first obtain p* and minimum sample size n' of constant stress ALT sampling plans for selected values of cL, cH and xL. Next, for the value of qc calculated by the equation qc=pcL+(1-p)cH, we obtain n* of step-stress ALT sampling plans.Table VII gives n', n, ratio n/n' for the selected values of cL, cH, and xL. We can make the following observations from this table:* n/n' decreases as s increases. n/n' for LH mode varies from 0.408 to 3.456. When s=1.25 or 2.0 and xL> 0.5, in many cases, n of LH mode is smaller than n'.* n* of HL mode is greater than n' for all cases.Let n1 be the number of failures observed at x1 and nc be the total number of failures observed before the test is terminated in a step-stress ALT. And let Ync:n denote the ncth order statistic of a random sample of size n from a Weibull distribution. In section 3.2, the elements of the Fisher information matrix were obtained by using the approximated expectations of z1 and z2. Using the approximated expectations with q1(n1/n and qc(nc/n, the expected test time of a step-stress ALT sampling plan can be computed by: Equation 33 Let nL and nH be the number of items allocated to xL and xH, respectively, and let rL and rH be the number of failures observed before censoring at xL and xH, respectively, in a constant stress ALT. Then the total sample size for a constant stress ALT sampling plan is n=nL+nH. Let Yri:ni denote the rith order statistic of a sample of size ni from a Weibull distribution, i=L, H. Then the expected test time at xi of a constant stress ALT sampling plan can be computed by: Equation 34 which is also employed in Bai et al. (1995). Note that the expected test time of a constant stress ALT sampling plan is the maximum of the two expected test times evaluated at xL and xH.To compare the expected test time of an optimum step-stress ALT sampling plan with that of an optimum constant stress ALT sampling plan, we consider the example of Yang (1994) for temperature-accelerated life test of a miniature electromagnetic sealed relay. The operating and allowable highest test temperatures of relays are 303degK (30 degC) and 398degK (125 degC), respectively. The relays have a load-impedance of 24 VDC, 0.5A. The operating rate is ten cycles/minute. Yang assumed that the lifetimes follow a Weibull distribution whose shape parameter is 1.2 from experience and scale parameter is a log linear function of the inverse of the absolute temperature, and obtained mD=7.6 from a reliability prediction handbook and mH=1.3 from a preliminary test. Therefore, the pre-estimates of model parameters are g0=7.6, g1=6.3, and s=1/1.2 [?] 0.8. Table VIII presents not only a comparison of the step-stress ALT sampling plans with the constant stress ALT sampling plans but also a comparison of the two modes of the step-stress ALT sampling plan in terms of the computed expected test time using these g0, g1, and s for the values of n, n1, nc, n'L, rL, n'H, and rH resulted from Table VII.From this table, we can first see following: The expected test time of LH mode is shorter than that of the constant ALT sampling plan for most cases.* The expected test time of HL mode is shorter than that of the constant ALT sampling plan for all cases.* The ratio of the expected test time of LH mode (or HL mode) to that of the constant stress ALT sampling plan increases as xL increases. This means that using the step-stress ALT sampling plan can reduce the test duration significantly when the low stress level is low.Comparing the two modes of the step-stress ALT sampling plan gives the following:* For given specification of (pa,1-a)=(0.00041, 0.95) and (pb,b)=(0.01840, 0.1), when xL> 0.5, the expected test time of HL mode in most cases is shorter than that of LH mode.* For given specification of (pa,1-a)=(0.03190, 0.95) and (pb,b)=(0.09420, 0.10), the expected test time of HL mode is shorter than that of LH mode for all cases.* The difference between the expected test times in the two modes tends to decrease as xL increases.\n6. Conclusions: The design of the acceptance sampling plans based on failure-censored step-stress ALTs was considered for the Weibull lifetime distribution. Asymptotic variance is a dominating factor in determining the sample size required for a sampling plan to determine the acceptability of a lot. The proposed sampling plans provide the minimum sample size by optimally designing a step-stress ALT so that the asymptotic variance is minimized. The two modes of the step-stress ALT sampling plans were considered and these were compared with respect to the sample size and the total test time. The properties of the proposed sampling plans were also investigated.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The paper aims to present acceptance sampling plans based on failure-censored step-stress accelerated life tests for items having Weibull lives.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The model parameters are estimated by the method of maximum likelihood. Based on asymptotic distribution theory, the sample size and the acceptability constant are determined satisfying the producer's and consumer's risks. The step-stress accelerated life test is optimized to have a minimum sample size by minimizing the asymptotic variance of test statistic. Two modes of step-stress accelerated life test are considered, and a comparison between them is made. The proposed sampling plans are compared with the sampling plans based on constant stress accelerated life tests.\nFindings: - Asymptotic variance is a dominating factor in determining the sample size required for a sampling plan to determine the acceptability of a lot. The sample size is minimized by optimally designing a step-stress accelerated life test so that the asymptotic variance is minimized.\nOriginality/value: - The sampling plans presented in this paper are particularly useful when items to be tested are so reliable and are useful to reliability engineers and life test planners.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Managing between the agendas: implementing health care reform policy in an acute care hospital	[ "Organizational culture", "Clinical governance", "Health services", "Hospital managers", "Managerialism" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Health systems worldwide are under pressure to perform. Performance in this instance is defined as efficiency, service quality and patient safety (Sorensen and Iedema, 2008). However, quality failures and costs continue to mount, and government focus turns increasingly on the performance of health services themselves as the problem. As it does, political agendas pervade ever more deeply in to the operational realms of clinical workplaces, traditionally the preserve of the health professions. Health service delivery thus becomes a contested arena as powerbrokers vie for control. As instruments of government policy, health administrators seek to limit cost increases to keep spending on health care within sustainable limits. Clinicians, on the other hand, accustomed to more permissive practice environments, resist such constraints, aiming instead to maximise their professional autonomy and minimise organisational accountability. The impact of these different stances on health service performance can be profound.\nBackground: Implementing health reform\nMethod: This paper reports on one part of a multidimensional study to present evidence of administrative and clinical managers' stances on health system reform and our interpretation of their effects. A qualitative methodology was employed for this part of the study. Our evidence is drawn from a survey of 23 administrative and clinical managers (included here are administrative and general managers both with and without clinical qualifications and medical, nursing and allied health managers all with clinical qualifications) in a major public metropolitan referral hospital in Sydney Australia undertaken in 2007. This number represents the total population of clinical managers of six wards in which our study was undertaken (respiratory, oncology, cardiology, renal, aged and neurology) and of the senior administrative managers in the health service (general manager, director of nursing, director of medical services, chief financial officer, clinical governance and casemix director, nursing and medical education managers). Managers in our study were defined as \"administrative\" if they spent 100 per cent of their time on administrative duties; clinical managers were defined as spending 50 per cent of their time on administrative duties.\nResults: Organisational purpose\nDiscussion: In this paper, we sought to identify and understand the different stances of administrative and clinical managers about key dimensions of health care reform. Our reasons for doing so were to assess opportunities to lessen the distance between these key stakeholders to enhance organisational performance as health reform policy intends. We found the culture divide that Degeling et al. (2004), and Davies (2003) describe, both between administrative and clinical domains as well as within them. Our study adds value in illuminating the organisational pathologies that impede building the trust relationships through which problems can be identified, articulated and solved, and conditional to performance improvement. Our study adds further value in articulating the managerial competencies that underpin health reform implementation, not only for clinical managers, but also for administrative managers. Our findings are limited by their location within a single health service. Nonetheless, they will be useful to others attempting to interpret professional attitudes and practices as an element in implementing reform policy, particularly given the pervasiveness of the administrative/clinical divide that our literature review has revealed.\nConclusion: Health service managers do not have the autonomy or leadership skills necessary to assess and respond to the organisational priorities that contemporary health care delivery presents. Rather, priorities set externally at more senior level of the hierarchy and that concern higher order political agendas are far removed from the conditions that clinicians face on the ground. Thus, administrative and clinical managers are responding to different goals, and without alignment of health service and patient care objectives, an innovative hybrid culture of the type conceptualised by Pope et al. (2010) to coherently link strategies for improvement is not likely to arise in the near future. Even though power retained at the administrative apex disenfranchises those who do clinical work and who are most likely to change it, clinical autonomy remains a strong cultural value. Each stakeholder group appear doomed to continue to manage between the agendas in their struggle for ascendency and control. Yet each needs the other to fulfil their own professional as well as organisational objectives, and potentially their own personal expectations, if morale and job satisfaction are regarded as desirable work outcomes. Further work is needed to gauge whether a more autonomous operating environment will encourage the emergence of an innovative culture capable of leading change by recognising and responding to essential patient care needs.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: This paper aims to assess administrative and clinical manager stances on health system reform. Understanding these stances will help to identify cultural differences and competing agendas between these two key health service stakeholders and contribute to developing strategies to improve organisational performance.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A qualitative methodology was used comprising in-depth open-ended interviews conducted in 2007 with 26 administrative and clinical managers who managed clinical units.\nFindings: This paper provides empirical insights into the ways that administrative and clinical mangers conceive of their managerial roles in relation to health care reform and performance improvement in health services. The findings suggest that developing a hybrid clinical manager culture as a means to bridge the gap between administrative and clinical manager stances on reform objectives, while possible, is not yet being realised.\nResearch limitations/implications: The research has relevance for health services that are experiencing organisational transformation. However, its location in one health service limits the generalisability of findings to other sites. Further research is needed to assess the opportunities for a hybrid culture to emerge as well as its effect.\nPractical implications: While attention is predominantly directed to clinician groups as a key stakeholder in implementing health reform policies, this paper has implications for how administrative managers also structure their roles and responsibilities to create an organisational climate conducive to change. This will include strategies to support clinical managers to make the transition from a predominantly clinical, to a clinical managerial, orientation.\nOriginality/value: This paper addresses a significant problem in health service governance, namely the divide between the value stances of dual hierarchies. This problem is only now gaining prominence as a significant barrier to health reform.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Survival probability in patients with liver trauma	[ "Logit model", "Liver trauma injury", "Survival probability", "Treatment mode" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: This study was motivated by three drivers: trauma's steady occurrence; few studies where survival among patients with liver trauma has been predicted; and understanding injured patients' survival probability, which may help to audit hospital performance, resource allocation and improve communication between staff, patients and relatives. Predicting treatment outcome is paramount for: accuracy and success when communicating with patients and relatives about patient recovery (Signorini et al., 1999); as a tool for deciding whether to pursue a traditional or interventionist treatment; and for audit purposes (Signorini et al., 1999; Hunter et al., 2000). Patients (young and old) come to emergency rooms (ERs) with diverse injuries (ranging from single to multiple organs). Each patient's injury requires a unique examination and care plan. Consequently, managers and physicians need to plan resource allocation and predict outcome.\nData and their description: Data were collected in the University Hospital of Trauma between January 2009 through December 2012 (Table I). Patients were grouped into seven age categories. The variables were patients' conditions; for example:\nMethod: The logit model was used to analyze various factors' effects on survival probability and the intervention or conservative treatment's success probability. Many studies predicting injury outcome have used the logit model (Montague and Brooks, 1989; Moon et al., 2013; Signorini et al., 1999; Wong and Leung, 2008). All equations are from Gujarati and Porter (2009):\nModels: Four different models are used to estimate injury patent's survival probability. Age, gender, Lhospit, Cinjur, grade, Interv, Resec, ISS and RTS are explanatory variables. The models under investigation draw upon numerous studies (Chawda et al., 2004; Montague and Brooks, 1989; Moon et al., 2013) on trauma survival. There is consensus that all trauma cases have common features but trauma involving liver injury has been studied less thoroughly. Every ER patient with an injury is checked using the same standard procedure, whether the liver is injured or not. Therefore, common factors should explain the patient's condition, treatment and progress (whether conservative treatment or intervention). The following general model is the quest to find factors determining the progress toward full recovery and the best treatment. Success probability depends upon or is determined by patient's age, gender, hospital stay, injury combined with liver and other organs, injury grade, intervention, resection and trauma severity. The equation can be written, using the notation for variables considered in this study, as:\nResults and analysis: For each model described, we estimate four logistic models (1-4). Each estimation's output is summarized in Table III. Coefficients, standard errors, slopes (at the mean value), McFadden R2 and odds ratios are shown for each model.\nConclusions: In this study, logistic models are used to estimate survival probability among patients with liver injury, using data from patient records. Models 1-2 can be used for audit purposes and to communicate to patients or their relatives. Models 3-4 can be used to communicate with patients and relatives about interventions, and about resource allocation. We found that patient survival probability after liver trauma is driven by injury severity (both anatomical and physiological), treatment, age and organs injured other than the liver. Our conclusions and recommendations can be used to improve information flow from physicians to patients or their relatives and to better allocate hospital resources. However, our study has limitations; we have not been able to externally validate our results; i.e., we have not tested the multinomial logit model on a different patient sample to see if statistically significant results can be replicated.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to assess the survival probability among patients with liver trauma injury using the anatomical and psychological scores of conditions, characteristics and treatment modes.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A logistic model is used to estimate 173 patients' survival probability. Data are taken from patient records. Only emergency room patients admitted to University Hospital of Trauma (former Military Hospital) in Tirana are included. Data are recorded anonymously, preserving the patients' privacy.\nFindings: When correctly predicted, the logistic models show that survival probability varies from 70.5 percent up to 95.4 percent. The degree of trauma injury, trauma with liver and other organs, total days the patient was hospitalized, and treatment method (conservative vs intervention) are statistically important in explaining survival probability.\nPractical implications: The study gives patients, their relatives and physicians ample and sound information they can use to predict survival chances, the best treatment and resource management.\nOriginality/value: This study, which has not been done previously, explores survival probability, success probability for conservative and non-conservative treatment, and success probability for single vs multiple injuries from liver trauma.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Strategies and challenges of internationalisation in HE: An exploratory study of UK universities	[ "Globalization", "Organizational culture", "Higher education", "Universities", "United Kingdom" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Although it has been argued that internationalisation has become a key strategic element of universities across the world (Ayoubi and Massoud, 2007), there is little empirical evidence suggesting the nature and extent of integration of internationalisation into the strategic mission of individual institutions. We also do not know much about the challenges faced by institutions in their quest to integrate internationalisation into their broad strategic choices. An understanding of these issues is however necessary for the effective development and management of internationalisation.An exploratory study was conducted in six universities in the UK selected from the Russell pre-1992 group, the post-1994 group and former colleges of higher education (HE). The study had three distinct but interrelated aims directed at discovering how the idea was conceptualised in the study institutions; finding out available evidence for its structural integration into the university services and understanding the perceived challenges institutions face in the quest to integrate the idea as a broad strategic element of those institutions.Findings of this exploratory study indicate that although internationalisation is identified as a key strategic goal by all universities in this study, there exist a range of distinct barriers that seem to work against the full integration of the concept into the institutional cultures. Key barriers include: conceptual and structural deficiencies in the organisation of institutional internationalisation; an over emphasis on human exchange initiatives over cultural integration efforts and increasing undercurrents of feelings among staff and students of local neglect at the expense of global attention.The paper summarises key theoretical issues, rationales and strategies associated with internationalisation in universities from existing literature in order to create a baseline of understanding about the subject and to set a platform and justification for launching this specific study. It then discusses the purposes, methods and findings from the exploratory study and highlights key implications for strategic and operational decisions at both institutional and sector levels.\nConceptual analysis: Globalisation\nMethodological approaches: Arising from the above discussion are three distinct but interrelated questions for which we do not have adequate evidence yet in the UK university sector. These are:1. How is internationalisation conceptualised in different university institutions in the UK and what are the significant drivers, including perceived benefits of internationalisation in the different universities?2. What organisational and management models of internationalisation exist in the different universities and what activities dominate the internationalisation dimension of UK universities?3. What are the significant risks and challenges universities face in the process of internationalisation and what might be done to reduce and manage those risks and challenges?The above questions clearly require a mixed methodological approach which help to bring a more holistic picture in exploratory and case studies. Brewerton and Millward (2001, p. 55) note:In exploratory and case study research, the notion of combining qualitative and quantitative data offers the promise of getting closer to the \"whole\" of a case in a way that a single method study could not achieve.A combination of questionnaire surveys, focus groups, face-to-face interviews and document analysis was used to obtain data for the above questions.In each university, a senior member of staff with direct responsibility for internationalisation at a strategic level was interviewed. Small groups of four members of staff including administrative, teaching and research staff in each university were interviewed in focus groups. These staff also answered a survey questionnaire survey as well. Relevant institutional documentation about internationalisation in each university was gathered to help provide a basis for corroborating and triangulating evidence from other data-gathering strategies (Silverman, 1993; Hammersley and Atkinson, 1983). Given the exploratory nature of this research, the limitations imposed by small sample sizes need to be acknowledged, yet the scope this data provides for developing a future research agenda around this subject is limitless.All in all, six interviews were achieved, 32 questionnaires were returned (12 per cent) and several institutional documents were scrutinised.Table I summarises the key questions asked in the different data-gathering approaches employed in this research. The table also indicates the reason the questions were asked based on the issues raised in the literature review.\nSummary of key findings: The findings are presented in sections which relate to the main questions that have driven this study.Institutional perspectives on internationalisation\nChallenges and risks: Unfair competition\nConclusion and implications: Internationalisation is now a substantial albeit inchoate aspect of UK HE. Different institutions reflect substantially different levels of conceptualisation of the idea ranging from an instrumental understanding to one deeply rooted in beliefs about being substantial players in the global world of ideas, economics and socio-cultural development. This difference in understanding has resulted in an uneven terrain of the practical implementation of internationalisation across the institutions. The strategic status of internationalisation, though widely acknowledged is yet inadequately documented.The study, limited as it is by its scope and size, has begun a process of mapping the idea of internationalisation in UK HE. Findings from this study can constitute sound hypothesis for developing more broad-based studies with larger samples from the HE sector both locally and possibly internationally too.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - Although internationalisation has become a key strategic element of universities across the world, there is little empirical evidence suggesting the nature and extent of integration of internationalisation into the strategic mission of individual institutions. Little is also known about challenges faced by institutions in their quest to integrate internationalisation into their broad strategic choices. This paper aims to address these issues.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - An exploratory study is conducted in six universities in the UK selected from the Russell pre-1992 group, the post-1994 group and former colleges of higher education (HE). The study has three distinct but interrelated aims: how internationalisation is conceptualised in the study institutions; the available evidence for its structural integration into the university services and understanding the perceived challenges institutions face in the quest to integrate the idea as a broad strategic element of those institutions.\nFindings: - There exist a range of distinct barriers working against the full integration of the concept into the institutional cultures. These include: conceptual and structural deficiencies in the organisation of institutional internationalisation; over emphasis on human exchange initiatives over cultural integration efforts and increasing undercurrents of feelings among staff and students of local neglect at the expense of global attention.\nOriginality/value: - The paper creates a sound basis for a more broad-based study across the HE sector. Specifically, the paper suggests that the increasing cultural diversity in UK HE brought about in part by internationalisation and also by general human migration occasions new thinking and practices in organisational and management terms to address the needs of the \"mosaic or cultural melting pot\" phenomena characterising the increasingly multicultural HE learning environments.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Knowledge transfer in international educational collaboration programme: The China perspective	[ "Higher education", "International cooperation", "Knowledge transfer", "China", "United Kingdom" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: In the 21st century, knowledge is widely recognised as the single most important factor in creating and sustaining superior organisational performance. The effective creation of knowledge depends upon knowledge transfer, knowledge sharing and organisational learning. University as the knowledge institution has been widely acknowledged. University knowledge transfer activities are an increasing important and integral part of the work of high education sector as they are essential drivers for the government's economic and modernisation agendas, including enhancing competitiveness and improving quality of life. Knowledge transfer provides a route to innovation and development at all levels. Higher education is the great, largely unknown and certainly under-exploited resource contributing the creation of wealth and economic competitiveness. Many outside higher education still do not recognize the capacity of that resource or how to get it, and many of those inside higher education do not know how best to connect with the outside world. Despite of a number of studies on the role of university in knowledge economy (Etzkowitz and Leydesdorff, 1997; Goddard, 1994, 1997, 1999), how to explore the knowledge potential of higher education and link higher educational institutions (HEIs) with other institutional actors for innovation and economic growth has not been properly understood.Globalisation is seen as offering more opportunity for both developed area and developing nations. The developed countries can obtain huge marketplace for their surplus producing power by selling goods, transferring technology by setting up joint venture, etc. while the developing countries can acquire advanced technology and knowledge by offering new market opportunities and providing human resources and raw material. Therefore, the involvement of technology and knowledge transfer as a whole in developing the international collaboration programme seems an open secrete. Furthermore, knowledge transfer/knowledge sharing has been widely recognised to be strategically significant for international collaboration and capacity building of an organization.The term globalisation is used to describe the way in which a number of processes in economic, social, cultural and technological areas have begun to permeate all geographical regions in the world. The speed and nature of impact of these processes is uneven between different localities, depending upon the interaction between globalising tendencies and the particular configuration of local factors, such as the state of development of domestic economy in each country or its telecoms infrastructure (Dickson, 2002). Globalisation has intention to focus more on assimilation and integration while internationalisation focuses more on the differences of various nationalities. This position is no different for high education. The internationalisation of high education is undoubtedly the most pressing challenge to the education sectors of both developed and developing countries. However, the process of higher education internationalization is different from the globalisation of the economy because the high education system were originally created by national government, most countries still operate regulatory or legal constraints on various issues, which make it more challengeable. Globalisation could be referred as integration with differences with a traditional Chinese expression. The essence of the internationalisation of high education aims to respect the common laws of education while maintaining individual national cultures, because education is never simply to teach knowledge and develop skills, but to inherit culture and to forge personality as well (Wu, 2002).Need for study\nBackground of the current research project: The 21st century has seen an unprecedented demand for and a great diversification in high education, as well as an increased awareness of its vital importance for socio-cultural and economic development. As defined as by the General Conference of UNESCO at its 27th session (November 1993) in the recommendation on the Recognition of Studies and Qualifications:High Education include all types of studies, training or training for research at the post-secondary level, provided by universities or other educational establishments that are approved as institutions of high education by the competent State authorities.High education everywhere, including China, is facing with great challenges and difficulties related to financing, equity of conditions at access into and during the course of studies, improved staff development, skills-based training, enhancement and preservation of quality in teaching, research and services, relevance of programmes, employability of graduates, establishment of efficient co-operation agreements and equitable access to the benefits of international co-operation. Addressing these challenges, Zhou (2001), Deputy Minister of Ministry of Education, People's Republic of China, points out that China needs to strengthen its academic collaboration and exchange in high education and study the experience and lessons in high education from the West, furthermore, to develop collaboration and exchange in teaching and scientific research, in particular, the exchange of teaching staff and students, to share and use international high quality resources so as to enhance China's high education.As indicated by the relevant statistics and analyses (Liu, 2003), there is a big gap between the Chinese famous universities and the world class research led university in Europe and America, in terms of original research and publication, quality of teaching staff, natural and scientific theses, ratio of PhD candidates and their supervisors, ratio of local students and international students, funding of scientific research and vision of internationalization, in particular, the number of Noble Price winners. The key question is how to narrow the gap of high education between China and the West? With the ever increasing of state economic power and the implementation of the strategy of developing the country by the enhancement of science and education, China has strong commitment to make direct investment and other indirect investment into its high education. It is anticipated that the funding invested into the famous universities will reach the level of that of the world class universities in Europe and America in ten years time. It is clear that the gaps between the two not only lie on the hard side of high education, such as campus, library, IT facility, but also on the soft side, such as, quality of the teaching staff, natural and scientific theses, educational management expertise, vision of internationalization, international dimension. It should be noted that improving facilities and physical environment does not necessary lead to the improvement of the quality of education and management. Professor Sir Watson[1] highlights five elements, including research; media's view; employment of graduates; infrastructure; and international postgraduate recruitment, when he addresses the concept of \"world-class\" high education and what should the world-class university pursue in the age of globalisation. It is believed that the first important thing to response to the vision of world-class university is to have comprehensive study of the operational mechanisms of university and high education. It has been identified in the current research project that the university needs \"four wheels\" in order to be in a good operation[2]. The theory of four wheels refers to teaching, research, training and consultancy as well as international collaboration. These four wheels are organic combination, supporting each other, promoting each other. For the brevity of the paper, therefore, only one \"wheel\" of \"the international collaboration\" which involves significantly knowledge transfer and knowledge sharing, will be addressed because it has been seen as an instrument for capacity building, for finding effective ways to manage high education, and for testing new or established practices in many aspects of teaching and research. To put it differently, this paper will focus on the process and appropriateness and effectiveness of knowledge transfer in Sino-UK educational projects when the UK academic staff and the Chinese staff work together.Academic collaboration between UK and China\nDefinition and concepts of knowledge transfer: Knowledge transfer is an increasingly popular term in the literature across various disciplines as researchers attempt to highlight the human aspect of knowledge management. There is often a distinction made between knowledge transfer that occurs naturally or informally, and that which takes place in more formalised routines. Knowledge transfer is about connection not collection, and that connection ultimately depends on choice made by individuals (Dougherty, 1999). It is worth noting that this form of transfer in particular may well be a \"two-way process\" between the transferor and the transferee.Mechanisms and practicalities in knowledge transfer\nMethodological design and philosophical notion of the study: The literature review provides a wide and extensive understanding of international high education. However, with a few exceptions that touch knowledge transfer in high education, little has been done in the research area of knowledge transfer, in particular, knowledge transfer/knowledge sharing cross border and continents in high education. However, it has been clear that the subsequent review of literature entitled as \"Internationalisation of High Education: Trends and Development since 1998\" the background paper prepared by The International Association of Universities (2003), and \"World declaration on higher education for the twenty-first century: vision and action\" adopted by the World Declaration on High Education for the Twenty-first Century: Vision and Action (1998), in terms of internationalisation of high education and knowledge transfer and knowledge sharing has made the research aims more focused. Hence, the research problems addressed in this study are:* Is knowledge transfer in high education appropriately and effectively channelled?* How could knowledge transfer contribute to the capacity building in high education?* What is the motivation of international education collaboration between China and the West?Key assumptions\nInterpretation and discussions of the interview data: This section discusses the strategic issues of why having international academic collaboration before dwelling upon the appropriateness and effectiveness of knowledge transfer in international collaboration projects. It summarizes the interviews and discussions with Deputy Vice Chancellors of three Western universities, including University of Northumbria, University of Buckingham and International University of Monaco and Deputy Presidents of five Chinese universities, including, Tongji University, Wuhan University, Zhengzhou University, Ocean University of China and International University of Business and Economics.Perspectives of international collaboration\nConclusion and policy implication: The UNESCO and other international organisations' encouragement and the high education's tradition of promoting exchange of programme and staff across borders has resulted in advancement and contribution to society, culture and economy. In the age of globalisation, the significant expansion of international academic collaboration initiatives is characterised by two major trends. Though high education from developed and developing countries may differ in some issues, however, there is congruence in viewing the two trends. The first trend is that high education institutions are becoming more and more internationalised. To put it differently, it is a growing imperative to integrate an international/intercultural dimension into teaching, research and students services in order to enhance academic excellence and the relevance of contribution to society. To some extend, high education institutions in the developing countries are more concerned with this international dimension. The second trend, more concerned with the high education institutions in the developed countries, is the growth of market driven activities, fuelled by increased demand of high education worldwide, including declining public funding in many national contexts, the diversification of high education providers, and the new method of delivery. The ever increasing of the two trends has inspired the argument and philosophy of the current study.In these days one of the interesting debates is that international business and co-operation of multinational enterprises in various sectors rather than high education between developed and developing countries has been widely researched by academics, however, international academic collaboration and knowledge transfer in high education was not appropriately attended. This interesting phenomenon could be described as \"you cannot see the real face of Mountain Lushan as you are in the mountain\" by a Chinese proverb (a famous poem by Dufu). The discussion in the paper concerning the Perspectives of International Collaboration Influencing and Factors in Determining International Collaboration Strategy has to some extend been thought provoking and fuelled the debate about sharing knowledge and know-how across borders and continents.This study is a comprehensive examination and analysis of the process of knowledge transfer/knowledge sharing in a Sino-British educational collaboration project, incorporating both the cultural and organisational factors that play a role in the whole process. The distinctiveness of this study lies in providing strategic insights to both partners in high education when they try to establish international academic collaboration programme. However, the findings and conclusion of the paper are based only on the examinations of interviews with the eight presidents, which sets out a strategic framework for a major study of international development strategy of high education and the analyses of the structured survey will be presented in a separate work.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to review the literature of international development strategy of high education and examine what is happening currently in terms of education collaboration between the UK and China and attempt to address various challenges in capacity building through knowledge transfer.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Theoretical analysis supported by observation and interviews.\nFindings: - The study has identified that there are a certain number of elements, which are crucial to the success of international educational collaboration, of which, the appropriateness and effectiveness of knowledge transfer/knowledge sharing is vital to the capacity building of higher educational institutions. The study examines on-going Sino-British education collaboration programme and fuelled the debate concerning knowledge transfer/knowledge sharing in high education between the developed and developing countries.\nOriginality/value: - Based on a comprehensive examination and analysis of the process of knowledge transfer/knowledge sharing in a Sino-British educational collaboration programme, this study emphasizes the significance of incorporating both cultural and organisational factors that play a role in the whole process. This paper describes the process of knowledge transfer between foreign and Chinese faculties when they work together on academic collaboration project in China. Furthermore, the paper addresses the appropriateness and effectiveness of knowledge transfer/knowledge sharing during the implementation of the international academic collaboration programme.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Self-leadership and team members' work role performance	[ "Self‐leadership", "Team member performance", "Proficiency", "Adaptivity", "Proactivity", "Collectivism", "Self development", "Team performance", "Teamworking" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Over the past two decades, self-leadership has been advocated as an effective means to positively influence employee performance (Manz, 1986; Neck and Houghton, 2006). Self-leadership refers to a process of self-influence concerned with \"leading oneself toward performance of naturally motivating tasks as well as managing oneself to do work that must be done but is not naturally motivating\" (Manz, 1986, p. 599). Previous research has demonstrated positive relationships between self-leadership and employee motivation and task performance (see Neck and Houghton, 2006, for a review). Moreover, self-leadership training has been shown to increase self-efficacy perceptions (Neck, 1996; Neck and Manz, 1996) and self-leadership was also positively related to students' course performance and individual performance of team members (Konradt et al., 2009; Prussia et al., 1998). The latter studies also found evidence for the mediating role of self-efficacy and instrumentality, indicating the motivating function of self-leadership. Self-leadership therefore appears to be technique, which is positively related to employees' job performance.\nTheoretical background and hypotheses: Self-leadership\nMethod: Participants and procedure\nResults: Measurement model\nDiscussion: The purpose of this study was to increase our understanding of the relationship between team members' self-leadership and individual task and team member role performance. Results indicate that self-leadership is positively related to individual task proficiency and team member proficiency. Additionally, our results indicate positive relationships between self-leadership and adaptivity and proactivity directed both at the individual task as well as the team. Our results thus clearly confirm theoretical postulations of self-leadership's positive relations to performance (Manz, 1986; Neck and Houghton, 2006). Moreover, the results of this study are consistent with previous research and illustrate a positive relation between self-leadership and aspects of individual work role performance (e.g. Carmeli et al., 2006; Konradt et al., 2009; Prussia et al., 1998). Our results extend previous research by providing a comprehensive investigation of self-leadership's relationship with a differentiated set of work role performance outcomes including team member work role performance aspects, providing new insights for self-leadership and team research. Whereas previous studies did not allow conclusions about which behaviors self-leading team members actually display that may have led to enhanced team performance (e.g. Uhl-Bien and Graen, 1998), the present study suggests that self-leadership of team members may also have positive relationships to team-oriented behaviors (i.e. team member proficiency, team member adaptivity, and team member proactivity).Additionally, we examined collectivism as a moderator of the self-leadership-team member work role performance relationships. However, our results provide mixed evidence indicating that collectivism moderated the self-leadership-team member proficiency relation whereas the relationships between self-leadership and adaptivity as well as proactivity did not change. One plausible explanation for this result may be found in the fact that team member proficiency is perceived as the most central aspect of team member performance. Less collectivistic team members may direct their effort towards the most central behaviors (proficiency) as a result of self-leadership rather than behaviors seen as less important for the attainment of team goals (adaptivity and proactivity).Limitations and directions for future research\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this present study is to extend previous research on self-leadership by investigating the relationship between self-leadership and work role performance of team members, including individual task and team member proficiency, adaptivity, and proactivity. Moreover, it aims to examine the moderating role of collectivism.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Organizational team members' self-ratings of self-leadership and six work role performance dimensions (i.e. individual task and team member proficiency, adaptivity, and proactivity, respectively) were collected in a cross-sectional study and were analyzed using partial least squares modeling.\nFindings: - Results indicate positive relationships between self-leadership and proficiency, adaptivity and proactivity directed both at the individual task and the team. Results also suggest that collectivism moderated the relation between self-leadership and team member proficiency.\nPractical implications: - Managerial implications for personnel selection, leadership, training, and organizational development efforts are provided.\nOriginality/value: - Previous research is extended by providing first evidence of self-leadership's relationship with a differentiated set of individual task and team member work roles including adaptive and proactive performance aspects.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
A new model for managing change: the holistic view	[ "Organizational change", "Strategic management" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Harold Wilson noted that \"he who rejects change is the architect of decay. The only human institution which rejects progress is the cemetery\". Come forward four decades from the swinging '60s and Wilson is still right; organizations, the most human of human institutions, must change with the times or fail. The only differences are that now change is happening faster, it is more dramatic and dynamic than ever before and it is driven by forces more complex than could ever have been imagined in the 1960s. Our argument in this paper is that dealing with change has become the primary role of the strategist in organizations, something widely accepted in both the theory and practice of strategic management, but there are few models or theories that assist the strategist in making difficult change decisions. Thus we propose a new model that combines different forms and processes of analysis to provide a holistic view of change in organizations. The article is organized in a fairly straightforward way. We first explain the origins of and assumptions that underpin our argument before moving on to explain the key components of our model. Finally, we explain why we think this model has value.\nStrategy origins and assumptions: Strategy really matters for a number of different reasons. Within organizations, strategy allows for the co-ordination of activities, processes and functions and provides criteria to measure, assess and alter performance. Strategy forces managers to think about the future and so allows for long term decision making. But what exactly is strategy?Chaharbaghi and Willis (1998), for example, found 54 different yet widely used definitions of strategy and it may be reasonable to conclude that whilst we cannot accurately define it, we know it when we see it. In any case, the academic discussion of meaning is of less use to practicing managers than discussion of what strategy involves. For the purposes of this article, we will assume that the central activity common across all strategy is coping with complexity.The complexity of strategy manifests itself in many ways. The first element of complexity lies in the fundamental nature of strategy: dealing with the relationship between the whole of the organization and the environment in which it operates. Organizations are necessarily complex creatures. Like people, they have appearances and personalities and their true nature is defined by both. Organizations are collections of specifics like products, functions, processes and finances but they are also defined through intangibles such as culture, knowledge and learning. Similarly, environments are a complex collection of forces (for example, economic, social and technological), actors (customers, suppliers and regulators) and behaviors (consumer and competitor).If the arena where strategy takes place makes life difficult for the strategist, then the activity itself is also difficult because strategy has to marry elements of both rationality and irrationality. For our purposes, rationality is considered in the traditional sense of decision-making and interpretation based on reasoning where the emphasis is on hard facts, common sense and logic. By irrationality we do not mean something that is unreasonable or unsupportable but rather elements that are beyond reason such as the instinct and gut feeling of a manager that a certain course of action is the right thing to do. Similarly, the interpretation of strategic events may not always be based on rational considerations but rather on the individual experiences and prejudices of those doing the interpreting, be they senior managers, shop floor workers, customers or industry regulators.If we accept that strategy is a complex business, then we can also accept that there may be a use for models of strategy that allow managers to make sense of that complexity. In generic terms, the test of any good management model is, first, the extent to which it allows for more informed management decision-making and, second, the extent to which it can lead to improved organizational and business performance. In meeting this kind of broad purpose, management models can play a number of important roles. For example:* models can simplify complexity and clarify thinking about what has happened and what should happen next;* models, especially those of a strategic nature, should identify important issues rather than simply interesting ones;* models can help communicate key issues of strategy to both organizations and the outside world; and* models can provide explanations about strategy and the consequences of strategy to a variety of internal and external stakeholders.Most models, however, do not describe the real world but an approximation of the real world. In this context, one of the main problems with the use of models is that, in reducing the real world into a series of fundamental approximations, the outcome is often either too black or too white. The model that we propose is different because it combines these elements in a way that treats organizational and strategic transformation in a holistic manner.To understand the nature of this model, we need to think about two issues.Origins first\nThe model: Like all strategies, transformation is a process, a collection of individual activities arranged into a sequence that has an inner logic from beginning to end. This model suggests that to understand transformation there are four places where analytical interventions are necessary:1. The transformation event. Why the transformation happened and the intended result.2. The transformation program. How transformation occurs, the key management decisions and activities through which change occurs.3. The transformation outcome. The nature of the transformed organization that emerges from the first two stages.4. The transformation myth. Not what happened, but how the transformation is interpreted and understood by both outsiders and insiders.Diagrammatically, the model can be represented as shown in Figure 1.The model's three key points of event, program and outcome are driven by the principle of consistency. It is built around the notion that all the activities in any change process must be integrated with one another. It allows for post rational enquiry and understanding of what has been done and why it may have been problematic. It allows for ongoing assessment of an ongoing change process and allows for the planning and preparation of change process yet to begin. All of this is rational; the process is logical and represents common sense as much as excellent or innovative management.This form of rationality, however, can only take understanding so far and thus we have the fourth point of intervention, the transformation myth. This element deliberately stands away from the core process for two reasons. It is intended to reflect the view that any change process will be influenced by not just what is happening but also what is thought to be happening, how events are understood. Second, it reflects the point that, like strategy, the outcome of transformation is open to any number of different interpretations.\nThe transformation event: Organizations do not undergo transformation by accident. Unless managers make clear and deliberate decisions to transform, things will stay the same or the organization will wander aimlessly into the future. This is the starting point for the analysis and involves important questions such as: why did this happen? Why should this happen?Central to the success of any change program is an understanding of the likely repercussions of the transformational event. The event itself can result from a senior manager hearing of a new concept in the industry, an unexpected result for the bottom line, the failure of a new product, a loss in market share or the entrance of new competition. Analysis needs to go beyond the event itself and the transformation agent needs to think about the underlying causes. Thinking about why something must happen allows the process of deciding what should happen to begin, especially what the transformation should deliver, the outcomes the organization hopes to achieve.For many organizations, a change program is only likely to give desired results if it is planned and directed. For some this will be a top-down process and for others it may be more organic. Perhaps the central point is that change must involve many stakeholders within the organization be they instigators or drivers of change or simply those who are affected by the change. Whatever the case, change is more likely to fail when the reasoning is poorly communicated and hence understood.\nThe transformation program: The hardest part of any transformation process is knowing where to begin, Mao Tse Tung said that every journey begins with a single step but taking that first step into something new and different is often the hardest step of all. More questions. Is the way we are going to change consistent with our objectives? Does this program of change address the issues that triggered it in the first place? Is our program clear enough that everyone will know we are serious and flexible enough that we can adapt it along the way?The problem with programs is that there are no generic, off-the-shelf answers that have universal applications across all organizations and businesses. Every organization is different and so by definition each transformation process must be different. They may all have the same components, but there are always many nips and tucks needed. Planning, adaptation, first steps and so on may be common to many programs, but what are the key issues in developing and analyzing a transformation? How important is engagement and communication? Do all stakeholders have to buy in and, if so, how can this be achieved?\nThe transformation outcome: Knowing when to stop, or when you have reached the desired outcome, is often difficult to determine. Models may provide more questions than answers. Where has this journey taken us? Has our transformation made us better or just different? Have we transformed in the way we needed to? Have we met the objectives we set ourselves? Have we dealt with the threats that started this process? Which opportunities have we seized? Have we changed enough? Have we changed in the way we expected to? If not, why not? What lessons have we learned?\nThe transformation myth: What people believe has happened can be a major factor in success or failure. Different stakeholders will have different perceptions and create their own myths about what they see or experience as well as different relationship with and expectations of the transforming organizations. Their attitudes and behavior will be governed by this. Customers may look at a transformed organization and judge success on whether it delivers the price or quality they want whereas employees may create their judgments around perceptions of job satisfaction or security. What is seen as a rational, desired outcome for some may be seen as the biggest mistake the organization can make by others. Behavior is often governed by our perceptions of events rather than the mechanics of the events themselves.\nValue: With strategies aimed at transforming the nature of organizations, all that can be certain is that the future will be different to the past. Our argument is that in coping with uncertainty, models such as the one in this paper which provide holistic overviews through combining rational and irrational elements can offer value in several ways:* The model allows for systematic, post rational analysis of an experience of transformation undertaken. People in general, and managers in particular, learn best when they are active learners and reflect on their own experiences. This kind of management learning is best facilitated through a process that combines structure with rigor.* The model explains why transformations fail. Successful transformation is based on a series of activities combined into a coherent process; without coherence failure is inevitable and without a way of understanding such lack of coherence we will never know what went wrong.* The model allows for an appreciation of the possibilities of transformation. It helps determine what can and cannot be done and where the priorities for management intervention and focus must lie.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - In an age where organizational transformation is becoming more important to both the theory and practice of strategic management, the aim of this paper is to provide a model through which organizational transformation and strategic change can be understood in an holistic manner.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - In developing a model to explain organizational transformation, the paper draws on two different theoretical traditions. First, the paper draws on theories of political revolutions and, second, the paper draws on interpretative theories, in particular, speech act theory.\nFindings: - The paper argues that in order to provide a realistic understanding of how and why an organization has attempted a transformational strategy it is important to consider four issues: the event which triggered the transformation, the program and process through which transformation was attempted, the outcome of the transformational strategy, and the myths which have been built up around the transformation.\nOriginality/value: - The paper takes a novel approach by drawing on non-management theories to develop an understanding of management phenomena. In doing this the paper generates an original model useful for the post rational explanation of transformational strategies.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
The impact of cyberostracism on online complaint handling: Is "automatic reply" any better than "no reply"?	[ "Customer complaining behaviour", "Cyberostracism", "Service failures", "Failure severity", "Customer services quality", "Complaints" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Online shopping is here to stay (ACNielsen, 2005). According to Forrester's (Johnson and Tesch, 2005), in the US, online retail sales will grow from $172 billion in 2005 to $329 billion in 2010. Given the rapid acceptance of this evolving marketing channel, there is an urgent need to understand how consumers react to the online shopping environment (Lee and Lin, 2005; Park and Kim, 2003) and technology-based failures (Holloway and Beatty, 2008; Ballantine, 2005). In case of service failures, most consumers prefer to contact the online retailer by email due to the easiness and speed of this form of communication (Holloway and Beatty, 2003). Yet research on customer complaining behaviours and service recovery with technology-related failures is scant (for notable exceptions see Harris, Grewal, Mohr and Berhardt, 2006; Harris, Mohr and Bernhardt, 2006; Holloway and Beatty, 2003; Demangeot and Broderick, 2006). Previous work suggests that effective service recovery is hard, especially with technology-related failures (Meuter et al., 2000). The fact that 20 out of 25 customers are dissatisfied with the online firm's recovery effort (Holloway and Beatty, 2003) shows that these firms struggle to make effective service recovery. Technology-related failures often induce negative reactions from the customer (e.g. switching service providers, reverting to the interpersonal delivery mode or simply deciding not to use the online service). However, there is little guidance for online retailers as to how to effectively handle online complaints, resulting in high dissatisfaction caused by inappropriate recovery approaches such as generic or impersonal responses. Generic recoveries (e.g. automatic e-mail replies), lengthy delays, poor customer support, poor communication, and feelings of injustice are common problems with online complaint handling processes (Holloway and Beatty, 2003).\n2. Background literature: 2.1 Ostracism and cyberostracism\n3. Methodology: The authors first conducted a qualitative study to ensure that consumers feel ignored when companies fail to respond to their e-mails. This was followed by an experimental study that tested the research propositions. The participants for both studies were composed of a sample of undergraduate students at a large university in the Northeastern US. Given that the topic of this study was centred around online shopping behaviour, this population was chosen specifically, as 18-34 year olds are the heaviest users of the internet in the population and are commonly used for research concerning online behaviours (Li et al., 2007). Respondents were primed to think about a company that they frequently purchased items from and then imagine that they contacted the company via mail. This procedure was deemed necessary in order to tease out the effects of cyberostracism in a situation where consumers are highly familiar with the retailer.\n4. Results: 4.1 Negative emotions, satisfaction with problem handling, and attitude change\n5. Discussion: As the internet continues to grow in importance as a retail channel, an understanding of the way in which customers perceive and react to online failures grows ever more imperative (Holloway and Beatty, 2008; Harris, Mohr and Bernhardt, 2006). Service recovery, particularly with regard to technology-related failures, is difficult (Meuter et al., 2000), and yet such recoveries will only become more commonplace as the popularity of online shopping continues to spread. While consumer-service provider interaction over the internet in many ways mirrors a face-to-face transaction, understanding and responding to the specifics of online service failures will allow retailers to better serve their online customers. The authors rely on the social ostracism literature to provide a theoretical framework for these findings.\n6. Implications: A key finding of this study was that customers appear to perceive no significant difference between receiving no reply and receiving a generic auto-reply in response to an online complaint. This is valuable information for retailers who may currently believe that they are serving the customer's needs with auto-reply e-mails. Another important finding is that when customers feel ostracized online, the greater the impact on the negative emotions, attitude toward the brand, satisfaction, and intention to engage in negative behaviours. This finding should alert retailers to the fact that when an online failure occurs, proactive, personalised recovery efforts are necessary to maintain customer loyalty and mitigate negative outcomes.\n7. Limitations and future research: As with any study, this study has several limitations. First, the study used hypothetical scenarios as stimuli. Future research, using field studies or experimental manipulations, would be warranted to strengthen the findings of this study. Second, the sample was composed of college students. Although young consumers frequently use the internet to buy clothes, college students may not fully represent the population of online retail customers. The mean age of this sample was 20 years old, but future research is needed to examine the perceptions of cyberostracism on populations in various age groups or those who are less familiar with online communication and purchasing.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: This research aims to examine how consumers react to being ignored by a company once they have complained about an online service failure. The authors seek to propose that automatic reply e-mails to customer complaints are considered a form of cyberostracism, thus having equally harmful effects on customer perceptions as a mere no reply.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The authors first conducted a qualitative study to ensure that consumers feel ignored when companies fail to respond to their e-mails. This was followed by an experimental study that tested the research propositions. The experimental design was a 3 (ostracism) x 2 (severity of failure) factorial between-subjects design.\nFindings: The results indicated that consumers did not perceive any significant difference between an automatic reply e-mail and no reply at all and perceived both to be a form of cyberostracism. It was also found that cyberostracism led to higher levels of negative emotions, lower levels of satisfaction, and higher levels of negative behavioural outcomes. The prediction that these impacts would be moderated by failure severity was partially supported.\nPractical implications: These findings should alert retailers to the fact that when an online failure occurs, proactive and personalised recovery efforts are necessary to maintain customer loyalty and mitigate negative behavioural outcomes.\nOriginality/value: The authors extend the online failure literature by showing that automatic reply e-mail responses are perceived as cyberostracism and have an equally negative impact on consumer perceptions and post-failure behaviours as a mere no reply.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Service quality in multichannel fashion retailing: an exploratory study	[ "Fashion industry", "Service quality", "Thematic analysis", "Social constructivism", "Multichannel retailing", "Customer typology", "Social influence theory" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The evaluation and understanding of customer service quality perceptions has been a topic of major interest for academics and practitioners since the 1980s (Gronroos, 1984; Parasuraman et al., 1988; Shostack, 1982). Despite such intense research focus, a gap in the literature remains when it comes to understanding service quality in multichannel settings (Huan et al., 2019; Verhoef et al., 2015). This is surprising, since multichannel service systems have become increasingly important with the rise of E-commerce. Based on what is mentioned above, there remain critical questions in understanding how multichannel fashion retail settings influence service quality. This research fulfils these needs by examining the following research questions:\n2. Theoretical background: 2.1 Multichannel retailing\n3. Methodology: 3.1 Paradigm of inquiry\n4. Findings and discussions: The major themes that relate to the physical channel imply some physical stimulation from offline-mediated environments and, in particular, from store design, visual merchandising and haptics. A 29-year-old senior project manager of a marketing department stated:It's the whole sideshow: the colours and the lighting. That is what really matters.\n5. Key findings: 5.1 The catalyst model of multichannel service quality\n6. Theoretical implications: Extant studies about service quality mainly adopt a positivist epistemological paradigm (Martinez and Martinez, 2010; Patten, 2017; Radomir et al., 2012). Therefore, a focus has been put on measuring service quality dimensions in an objective manner. The outcomes were a number of generic service quality models that are generalisable to several service settings (Cronin and Taylor, 1992; Parasuraman et al., 1988; Wolfinbarger and Gilly, 2003). In particular, research conducted in traditional service quality settings has been based mainly on quantitative methods. Such limited paradigmatic variety initially directed the current study in similar surroundings. However, Schembri and Sandberg (2003) have questioned this limitation. They claimed to re-evaluate traditional research methods for service quality concepts. The current study considers Schembri and Sandberg's (2003) study as a point of departure to overcome the prevailing positivistic epistemology. For this study, Schembri and Sandberg's (2003) paradigmatic stance provides a more comprehensive approach to conceptualising multichannel service quality as a dynamic and interpretative phenomenon. Schembri and Sandberg (2003) contemplated social actors' heterogeneity (passive, monitoring and partnering types) and their different behavioural characteristics and service perceptions.\n7. Managerial implications: It is deemed necessary for multichannel retailers to adapt their strategy to the changing behaviour of their customers. Multichannel customers tend to constantly adjust their choices regarding retailer and retail channel during purchase. Therefore, it is important for multichannel retailers to set up coherent and integrated sales and communication strategies across channels. Retailers should cease working in silo organisations where one stream is in charge of online activities and another is in charge of offline activities. Different departments need to work in a cross-disciplinary manner, since multichannel customers expect a seamless shopping experience. The overall purchasing experience needs to be consistent for the customer at all moments of contact between the retailer and the customer in order to present a seamless service quality. Then, multichannel customers can take advantage of both online and offline channels and experience a congruent shopping experience across channels.\n8. Limitations and future research: Our findings should be considered in terms of the research design adopted, which also underlines several research opportunities for interpretations. The current work adopted a qualitative research paradigm utilising an abductive approach and an embedded case study research strategy. The social constructivist stance justified the researcher's case study approach (Annansingh and Howell, 2016). Our empirical study depends on the careful selection of information-rich interview participants and the application of triangulation ensure to rigour. Therefore, the paper can theoretically generalise multichannel service quality in fashion retailing. The qualitative research approach of this paper was helpful to conceptualise multichannel service quality and to develop a coherent model. Our study has some limitations. It has a single-country focus. Although, we have theoretically discussed the mechanism of service quality and multichannel fashion retailing from different perspectives, we do not empirically compare two or more countries to understand the dynamics of customer perceptions in the multichannel settings. Even though the literature suggests that customer perceptions are the predominant viewpoints for service quality, longitudinal ethnographic studies could offer further opportunities to provide rich descriptions of the four customer types. Another limitation is that we do not empirically examine how different genders perceive service quality and multichannel fashion retailing. It would be interesting to quantitatively study how genders perceive service quality and multichannel fashion retailing. Altogether, we believe that our study of the relationship between service quality perceptions and multichannel fashion retailing through social influence lens is a fruitful way to understand the complex engagement of interests in the emerging computer-mediated marketing environments, although future research could continue to examine how the four customer types apply to different countries.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Consumer purchasing behaviour has changed substantially in the light of recent developments in E-commerce. So-called \"multichannel customers\" tend to switch retail channels during the purchasing process. In order to address changing consumer behaviour, multichannel fashion retailing companies must continue to learn how to provide excellent service to such customers. The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the interpretation of multichannel service quality by explaining it from the perspective of the so-called \"multichannel customers\".\nDesign/methodology/approach: Drawing on social influence theory, this paper aims to investigate these issues from the perspective of multichannel customers. In contrast with dualist and objectivist studies, this paper uses a constructivist epistemology and ethnographic methodology. Such an approach is associated with an interpretivist ontological worldview, which postulates the existence of \"multiple realities\". The sample size for this research consisted of 34 in-depth interviews and 2 focus groups comprising 10 focus group participants.\nFindings: The data analysis fundamentally found that multichannel customers tended to continually adjust choices regarding retailer and retail ckhannel when making purchases. The perspective of this paper is different from mainstream positivist service quality research which sees service quality as static, objectively measurable and dualistic. As an alternative, this paper acknowledges service quality as a dynamic, subjective and pluralistic phenomenon.\nOriginality/value: This paper contributes to the interpretation of multichannel service quality with a new concept that explains the phenomenon from the perspective of customers and thus considers it necessary for multichannel retailers to adopt strategies relating to customers' changing behaviour.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Organizational adoption of e-HRM in Europe: An empirical exploration of major adoption factors	[ "Human resource management", "Communication technologies", "Europe" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The rapid development of the internet during the last decade has also entailed the advance of electronic human resource management (e-HRM). Customarily, it is agreed that e-HRM leads to considerable changes and therefore should be taken as an important development in the HR field (Lepak and Snell, 1998; Lengnick-Hall and Moritz, 2003; Gueutal and Stone, 2005). Given this view, a basic research topic refers to the organizational adoption of e-HRM (Strohmeier, 2007). Beyond the mere state of adoption, a special question relates to relevant factors of adoption, i.e. is e-HRM a universal activity that will be adopted by (virtually) all organizations by and by or are there factors that systematically separate adopting and non-adopting organizations? Given the manifest national differences in the adoption of various other HR activities (Brewster et al., 2004) a special aspect of this question refers to cross-national differences in e-HRM adoption due to nationally differing influence factors.In the interim, there is a certain body of empirical research that addresses organizational adoption (Ball, 2001; Beamish et al., 2002; Martin and Jennings, 2002; Comacchio and Scapolan, 2004; Hausdorf and Duncan, 2004; Hoi, 2006; Florkowski and Olivas-Lujan, 2006; Parry and Wilson, 2006; Olivas-Lujan et al., 2007; Panayotopoulou et al., 2007; Teo et al., 2007; Galanaki and Panayotopoulou, 2008; Keim and Weitzel, 2008; Lau and Hooper, 2008). Basically, these studies can be categorized by their regional and functional focus. Concerning the regional focus, most studies relate to a single country (Panayotopoulou et al., 2007), while cross-national studies (Florkowski and Olivas-Lujan, 2006) are rare and restricted to a few countries. Concerning the functional focus, one can distinguish studies that address the adoption of general e-HRM (Lau and Hooper, 2008) from studies that focus the adoption of specific functional subset of e-HRM, such as e-recruiting (Keim and Weitzel, 2008) or e-learning (Martin and Jennings, 2002). Customarily, most studies address the current state of adoption thereby accordingly yielding the result of a meanwhile wide-spread adoption. Quite contrary, factors of adoption are rather seldom tackled (Teo et al., 2007) and the few findings are rather scattered and inconsistent. So far, the only consistent result exposes organizational size as a determinant of adoption (Ball, 2001; Hausdorf and Duncan, 2004; Florkowski and Olivas-Lujan, 2006; Teo et al., 2007). Hence, at present there is only little knowledge concerning the factors of adoption, especially in a cross-national setting. Our study therefore aims at a first cross-national exploration of factors that influence organizational adoption of e-HRM in Europe.To do so, we first provide definitions, develop a general foundation and identify factors of adoption. Subsequently, we employ a cross-national large-scale survey to test our hypotheses on a sample of 2,336 organizations in 23 European countries and present our results. While finally discussing the results, we also attempt to derive some conclusions for future work.\nFactors of e-HRM adoption: Researching factors of organizational e-HRM adoption refers simultaneously to two recognized research streams. Since e-HRM mandatorily implies the application of information technology (IT) e-HRM adoption research refers to research on the adoption of IT (Jeyaraj et al., 2006). Additionally, since e-HRM can be seen as a HR activity e-HRM adoption research also refers to research on cross-national adoption of HR practices (Brewster, 2006). Jointly, these two research streams provide a valuable basis for the present study. In particular, these research streams are helpful in defining, founding, and deriving factors of e-HRM adoption.Definition\nMethod: The data employed in our study stem from the repeating Cranet Survey, which contains data on HRM issues of private and public organizations in over 30 countries. Data are ascertained by research partners in each of the countries. Information is gathered from the senior HR person in the organization via a postal survey using a comprehensive address list. The data are representative with respect to the industrial sector (using European Union's NACE categorization) in each country. In the 2004 survey, over 40,000 questionnaires were sent out worldwide. With a response rate of approximately 17 percent more than 7,000 organizations participated (Brewster et al., 2004). We used the data of the included 23 European nations, i.e. Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, The Netherlands, Norway, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkish Cypriot Community, and the UK. This results in a sample of 2,336 organizations.In order to measure the adoption of e-HRM (\"e-HRM\") respondents were asked whether their organizations have some e-HRM facilities. Organizations with e-HRM facilities were coded as 1, organizations without e-HRM facilities received a 0.The size of an organization was measured using the total number of employees. Owing to its distribution skewness (only few very large and many small- and medium-sized organizations) we choose the natural logarithm of size (\"ln size\") for the subsequent data analysis.So as to test sectoral influences we selected three sectoral groups with two sectors each and built corresponding dummy variables. The first group with mainly stationary and clerical tasks comprises the sectors banking and insurance (\"banking\") and public administration (\"public\"). The second group with mainly non-stationary and non-clerical tasks encompasses agriculture and forestry (\"agriculture\") and building construction (\"building\"). As a third hybrid group with mainly stationary but non-clerical tasks we chose manufacturing (\"manufacturing\") and retail (\"retail\"), while all other sectors were grouped to \"other sector.\"Age structure (\"age\") was measured by the percentage of employees older than 45 years. We choose this age level due to our assumption that IT education in schooling and vocational training generally started two decades ago, when the corresponding age group was 25 and hence mostly had finished their education phases. Gender structure (\"gender\") was measured by the percentage of female employees. Education structure (\"education\") was measured by the cumulated percentage of graduates and post-graduates within the organization.Organization of work (\"telecommuting\") and employment structure (\"employment\") were measured using four classes of percentages of telecommuting employees, while the classes were 0 percent (coded 0), 1-20 percent (coded 1), 21-50 percent (coded 2), and>50 percent (coded 3).The institutionalization of HRM (\"institutionalization\") was measured by asking respondents whether their organization has a formal HR department. The measurement of HRM comprehensiveness (\"comprehensiveness\") is based on the \"major four\" HR functions, i.e. staffing, training, and development, performance management, and compensation (Devanna et al., 1984). Given that organizations frequently have to perform some kind of compensation and at least infrequently some kind of staffing, we chose the additional implementation of appraisal and of internal training to measure the comprehension. Organizations without additional functions were coded 0, organizations with additional functions 1 or 2, respectively. The strategic orientation of HRM (\"strategy\") was measured based on the existence of an explicit HR strategy.We subsequently specified three different measures to capture different aspects of the economical development of national business systems. In a first model, we employed the gross domestic product (GDP) per capita. As the total market value of all final goods and services of a country produced within a year, GDP constitutes well-established measure of national economic development. In addition, GDP also constitutes a well-established predictor of individual IT adoption (Chinn and Fairlie, 2007). In a second model, we employed the geographical location and the corresponding historical developments to establish two groups of business systems (BS [1]) that reflect differences between \"old\" established nations (coded 1) and the \"new\" transforming post-communist nations (coded 0). In a final model, we combined the slightly refined geographical location (Northern, Eastern, Southern, or Western country) and GDP per capita to cluster supra-national geo-economic business systems (BS [2]). Using k-means clustering, we obtained three clusters, i.e. the Northwestern business systems (M GDP=24,750; S GDP=1,913/Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, The Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, and the UK), the Southern business systems (M GDP=14,233; S GDP=6,679/Cyprus, Greece, Italy, Spain, and Turkish Cypriot Community), and the Eastern business systems (M GDP=10,417; S GDP=2,336/Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Slovakia, and Slovenia).Besides, the usual descriptive and bivariate methods we used binary logistic regression to test our hypotheses. Since logistic regression is able to predict the probability of the occurrence of an event based on several numerical and/or categorical predictor variables (Hosmer and Lemeshow, 2000; Menard, 2002), it constitutes an adequate method of testing factors of e-HRM adoption.\nResults: The results of descriptive analysis are shown in Table I. (BS [2] is not included due to the categorical nature of the variable.)As the probably most interesting result, the adoption rate amounts to 65.8 percent, i.e. astonishing two thirds of all organizations have already adopted e-HRM. Hence, e-HRM definitely constitutes a common practice in European HRM.The bivariate results are presented in the correlation matrix of Table II. Most correlations found are weak to medium. Concerning e-HRM, in particular there are significant positive correlations of ln size, telecommuting, institutionalization, comprehensiveness, and strategy. Additionally there is a weak positive correlation to banking and a weak negative correlation to building. The rest of the hypothesized determinants as for instance GDP, however, did not show significant correlations. Obviously, there are multiple influences on e-HRM adoption and the multivariate analysis should add more insights.In this context, problems of multicollinearity (Menard, 2002) are not to be expected due to the weak correlations between the independent variables. (The high correlation between GDP and BS [1] is not relevant since both measures are used in different models).The results of multivariate analysis are shown in Table III. So as to cover different facets of H7 we used three different measures within three models. The measures for model evaluation generally are acceptable for all models, while especially Nagelkerkes R2 refers to a moderate degree of explanatory power (Menard, 2002).As expected, and in congruence with previous research organizational size (H1) constitutes a significant factor of adoption. Concerning different industries (H2) our results show the expected algebraic signs of the logit coefficients, i.e. positive signs for industries with mainly stationary and clerical tasks and negative signs for industries with mainly non-clerical and non-stationary tasks. In addition, also the \"hybrid\" industries retail and manufacturing shows negative signs. However, with building and banking only two industries reveal significant influences on adoption. Regarding organizational demography (H3) age, gender, and education accordingly do not influence adoption. Work organization (H4) and employment structures (H5) show contrary results, since the share of telecommuting employees demonstrates a significant positive effect while the share of temporary employees yields no effect. The configuration of HRM (H6) does generally influence e-HRM adoption, since institutionalization, comprehensiveness, and in particular strategy prove to be significant for adoption. Since institutionalization is slightly positive correlated with size, there may be some superimposition effects, however due to the only moderate correlation institutionalization effects cannot be reduced to effects of size. The economic development of the national business system (H7) yields some interesting results. In a first model, GDP unexpectedly does not reveal any effect on e-HRM adoption. Even more surprising, the second model that tests differences between established and transforming post-communist nations yields that the adoption in Western countries is less than in Eastern countries. Concretely, the odds ratio reveals that the chance of adopting e-HRM in a Western country is only 0.726 as compared to Eastern countries. Based on the described cluster approach of BS [2] a third model was specified. The results confirm the \"outlier\" position of Eastern business systems: using Northwestern business systems as comparative category, the chance of adopting e-HRM is higher in an Eastern business system (Exp(B)=1.395) and lower in Southern business systems (Exp(B)=0.591). Taken together, the findings of the three models uncover an unexpected national adoption pattern shown in Figure 1.Though of lower GDP, Eastern business systems accordingly show high adoption rates. Apart from Eastern business systems, however, there seems to be a rather good correspondence of the stage of national economic development and e-HRM adoption.\nDiscussion: Results\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to examine which factors influence the cross-national organizational adoption of electronic human resource management (e-HRM) in Europe.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Major general and contextual influence factors are derived and tested based on a large-scale survey with a sample of 2,336 organizations in 23 European countries using logistic regression.\nFindings: - The findings first reveal that e-HRM is a common practice throughout Europe since two-thirds of all organizations have already adopted e-HRM. Major general determinants of e-HRM adoption are size, work organization, and configuration of HRM. In addition, there are major cross-national differences in e-HRM adoption, unexpectedly revealing Eastern post-communist countries to lead e-HRM adoption.\nResearch limitations/implications: - Abundance of general and scarcity of contextual factors imply that there should be further important factors of adoption not considered in this paper. Owing to its cross-sectional character, the paper is not able to reveal findings of convergence or divergence of adoption over time.\nPractical implications: - HR professionals should be informed about the advanced state of e-HRM adoption, while some general insights are offered which kind of organizations should take an adoption of e-HRM into consideration.\nOriginality/value: - This paper is a large-scale sample-based evaluation of cross-national influence factors that drive organizational adoption of e-HRM in Europe.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Interactive theater: an effective tool to reduce gender bias in faculty searches	[ "Gender", "Recruitment", "Higher education" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: How can universities increase the representation of women in fields in which they have traditionally been underrepresented? This is one of the questions at the core of the University of New Hampshire (UNH) ADVANCE program. After receiving a National Science Foundation (NSF) ADVANCE Institutional Transformation award in 2012, UNH ADVANCE launched a series of initiatives to improve the representation of women faculty in STEM disciplines as part of its larger goal of institutional transformation. A centerpiece of the UNH ADVANCE program, the Gender Equity and Recruitment of Underrepresented People (GEAR UP) interactive theater workshop was designed to improve the search committee process by increasing transparency at all stages of the search process and reducing the prevalence of implicit bias. By increasing transparency and reducing implicit bias, GEAR UP strives to ensure that faculty searches are conducive to increasing the representation of underrepresented groups, particularly women faculty in STEM disciplines. In this paper, we briefly describe the 2012 baseline representation of women faculty at UNH and the systems view of organizations that has guided our work. We then discuss the development of GEAR UP and present quantitative and interview data that point to its effectiveness in enhancing the faculty search committee process, and consequently facilitating the recruitment of women faculty at UNH.\n2012 baseline representation of women faculty: Baseline institutional data collected in 2012 underscored the need to improve the representation of women faculty at UNH, particularly in STEM disciplines. In 2012, 37 percent of UNH faculty were women. Women represented the smallest share of STEM faculty at 21 percent, followed by Social and Behavioral Sciences (SBS) at 36 percent, and non-STEM disciplines at 48 percent. Across ranks, the category in which women were most underrepresented was STEM full professors, with only 24 percent of STEM women faculty at this rank. In contrast, 59 percent of men faculty in STEM were full professors. While the percentage of SBS women faculty at the full professor rank was higher at 31 percent, it also lagged the percentage of SBS men faculty (i.e. 40 percent were full professors). At lower ranks, the representation of women was much higher, although women still comprised only 32 percent of assistant professors in STEM.\nThe GEAR UP workshop: In order to achieve lasting change, UNH ADVANCE involves as many faculty as possible in designing and implementing its initiatives. In keeping with this strategy, we recruited faculty from both STEM and non-STEM disciplines to develop a program that would improve the representation of women and other underrepresented groups at UNH. The committee met weekly from May to August 2013 and evaluated university hiring practices and what other ADVANCE programs had done to increase the representation of women and other underrepresented groups. They reviewed a host of information relevant to faculty hiring, including what should be included in a hiring packet, suggestions on how to broaden the applicant pool, how to develop evaluation criteria, what people can and cannot say during a hiring interview, and how to write the job description and the job advertisement. In the end, the committee became convinced through their research that implicit bias in applicant screening was a significant impediment to hiring women in disciplines in which they have traditionally been underrepresented. Borrowing from the work of the University of Michigan's ADVANCE program, the committee decided to raise awareness about implicit bias through a faculty search committee workshop that used interactive theater to portray and deconstruct subtle and not-so-subtle instances of bias that sometimes stand in the way of hiring women for STEM faculty positions.\nGEAR UP's effectiveness: Faculty composition\nSummary and conclusions: Our analysis finds strong support for the effectiveness of the UNH ADVANCE GEAR UP workshop. Using interviews and survey results, we find evidence that attending GEAR UP changes faculty perceptions of the search process and faculty gender representation, especially in the STEM disciplines. A series of analyses from annual faculty climate data related to perceptions of search committee processes reveal three important trends. First, those who participated in GEAR UP have significantly more positive perceptions of faculty search committees compared to those who never attended the workshop. Second, one important dimension of the search committee process improved over time - faculty reported that they were increasingly aware of unintentional biases that might impact everyone's evaluation of the applicants. Third, changes in awareness of unintentional biases occurred only for those who participated in GEAR UP, and only after having attended the workshop (faculty who did not participate in GEAR UP did not experience such an increase between 2013 and 2016). Thus, the change over time of faculty's awareness of unintentional biases can be attributed to the GEAR UP workshop, as only faculty who participated experienced any change in this important dimension.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to describe the development, implementation and impact evaluation of an interactive theater-based workshop by the ADVANCE program at the University of New Hampshire (UNH). The workshop is part of a larger institutional transformation program funded by the National Science Foundation.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This institutional transformation program relied upon a systems approach to diagnose potential causes for the underrepresentation of women faculty in certain disciplines. This revealed that increasing awareness of, and reducing, implicit gender bias among members of faculty search committees could, in time, contribute to increasing the representation of women faculty at UNH. A committee charged with developing a faculty workshop to achieve this change identified interactive theater as an effective faculty training approach. The committee oversaw the development of customized scripts, and the hiring of professional actors and a facilitator to implement the workshop.\nFindings: The workshop's effectiveness in fulfilling its goals was assessed using faculty hiring and composition data, program evaluations, participant interviews and questions in an annual faculty climate survey. Findings indicate that the representation of women faculty increased significantly at UNH since the implementation of the interactive theater workshop. Analysis of the multiple sources of data provides corroborating evidence that a significant portion of the increase is directly attributable to the workshop.\nOriginality/value: This paper demonstrates the effectiveness of interactive theater-based workshops in an academic environment and of the systems approach in diagnosing and solving organizational problems.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Factors responsible for making young urban consumers brand loyal: A study on mobile network operators	[ "Satisfaction", "Brand loyalty" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: In recent years, according to various literature studies and management practitioners, it has become apparent that brand loyalty is regarded as an integral part of improving and maintaining brand equity (Aaker, 1991). It has been also observed from various research works that brand loyalty reduces marketing efforts, saving time and minimizing costs. Brand loyalty is a much cheaper technique compared to attracting and retaining customers in one particular brand (Rosenberg and Czepiel, 1984). Customers, who are loyal to a particular brand, will always spend less time considering whether to purchase a product or paying extra costs for that brand (Rundle-Thiele and Bennett, 2001; Reichheld, 1996). In comparison with other sectors, the service sector, more specifically the telecom sector, is one of the key industries experiencing a strong relationship with brand loyalty (Santouridis and Trivellas, 2010). The consumer retention model has been developed with the help of commitment, service quality, trust and satisfaction and it has been observed from previous research that these factors have a relationship with loyalty. Researchers from different fields have shown that there is a strong and positive relationship between service quality and customer loyalty (Clottey et al., 2008). The researchers show that consumer satisfaction is an integral part of any marketing strategy (Carroll and Ahuvia, 2006). It is also true that satisfaction always enhances the passion of purchase among prospective buyers (Bennett and Rundle-Thiele, 2002a). Two major factors, trust and commitment have a strong relationship with brand loyalty (Delgado-Ballester and Munuera-Aleman, 2001).\nExisting review of literature and development of hypotheses: Trust\nResearch methodology: A research design provides the framework to be used as a guide in collecting and analyzing data, identifying the data types and developing the methodology of sampling (Hair et al., 2007). For this study, the researcher has used descriptive research and the type of research design is cross-sectional. Cross-sectional design is a one-shot research study at a given point of time and consists of a sample (cross-section) of the population of interest. The literature review revealed that with the help of this the instrument named questionnaire has been used (Aydin et al., 2005; Bennett and Rundle-Thiele, 2002b; Lim et al., 2006). Primary data have been collected for this particular study through a pre-tested questionnaire, which is simple, easy to understand and consists of close-ended questions. The questionnaire has been distributed among urban young subscribers who are using mobile services of various telecommunication companies in Kolkata. The five-point Likert Scale has been used to collect the responses from the respondents, and the scale has been rated with 1=\"strongly disagree\" to 5=\"strongly agree\" because it is the most widely used method in the field of social science and marketing (Hair et al., 2006; Saunders et al., 2012). The researcher has developed a structured questionnaire which is reliable, prominent and it contains validated scales.\nData analysis and interpretation: The researcher has used structural equation modeling (SEM) with the help of AMOS 20 software packages. It is one of the most powerful techniques used to test any kind of conceptual model (Steenkamp and Baumgartner, 2000), and it explains the relationship between more than one variable. The SEM technique is also used to find out that the data collected are reliable and valid for the analysis.\nFindings: The study reveals that there are three variables, namely, trust, service quality and perceived value that have strong, positive and significant relationships with the satisfaction level of young urban consumers. Service quality is the most influential factor among all the independent variables when satisfaction is working as a dependent variable. It has been observed that the other two variables, namely, trust and perceived values are the second and third most influential factors on satisfaction. Though service quality is the most influential factor on satisfaction that is why the researcher has also tried to see the impact of service quality on brand loyalty. The result reveals that service quality has a positive and significant impact on brand loyalty. The relationship between these two has been created and it has been shown in the model. Satisfaction itself has a huge impact on brand loyalty and it is the strongest one among all the factors. It is positive and highly significant on 1 percent significance level. Brand image and switching cost do not have any impact on the satisfaction level of young urban consumers because it has been found that in both cases there is an insignificant relationship with satisfaction level. In a nutshell, the study reveals that service quality is the most important factor and it strongly influences the satisfaction level and from the model also it has been proved that the model is fit enough to provide the required answers. Service quality also has a strong impact on brand loyalty and it signifies that if the consumers are happy they will never leave the brand.\nManagerial implications: The study reveals that trust, service quality and perceived value have a strong, positive and significant impact on young urban consumers' satisfaction level. Service quality is the most important influence on the satisfaction level because the quality of services provided by the different mobile service providers is the main thing which can satisfy the young urban consumers of Kolkata. If the quality of service is poor then the customers will not be satisfied because the network coverage, connectivity, internet speed, call quality, etc., all are the important ingredients of services and if these are not working properly then automatically the quality of services will be affected badly and consumers will be dissatisfied. The companies need to understand the consumers are buying the SIM cards in order to receive the above facilities in a proper manner. If the consumers do not receive these facilities properly, then they will be automatically dissatisfied. It is also clear from the study that trust and perceived value have a significant impact on satisfaction. If the consumers are relying on their own service providers and if they trust them then automatically the consumers will be satisfied. In the same way, if the young urban consumers are happy with the charges providing by the service providers then also they will be happy. So it really understandable from the study that trust and value also has a significant effect on satisfaction.\nConclusion: This particular study explained that service quality has a significant impact on young urban consumers' satisfaction level. It also reveals that customer satisfaction has a strong positive impact on brand loyalty and service quality it also has a direct, positive and significant impact on brand loyalty. It is also exerted from the study that switching cost and brand image does not have any impact on satisfaction, whereas trust and perceived value have a strong, positive impact on satisfaction. In a nutshell, it has been understood that companies need to strengthen the service quality of mobile network operators to satisfy young urban consumers and if the customers are satisfied with the quality of services then automatically they will became brand loyal. This model has also shown that service quality has a direct impact on brand loyalty and it also proven through SEM. The new hypothesis has been created and it is shown that there is a significant relationship between service quality and brand loyalty. It also simplifies that if the service quality is really up to the mark then it will directly affect the brand loyalty. This particular model will help the company professionals and managers of various telecom companies to understand the need of urban young consumers and the same model can be used in different age groups or even in rural areas also.\nLimitations and future scope: The research work has few limitations like others have. The samples collected only from Kolkata and respondents are mainly young urban consumers. The results of the study may change if the samples were collected from other parts of India or in rural areas. The samples are collected only from young consumers whose age is less than 30 years, in the case of other age groups it may change. The sample size is also less and if the researcher can increase the sample size the results may change. There is lots of literature available on this and from that the researcher might get some new factors also.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to find out what are the factors responsible for making urban young consumers loyal to a particular brand.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The researcher used the convenience sampling method, and 206 respondents provided their responses from Kolkata. The study used exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis with the help of AMOS software to find out the result, and the responses were collected from young urban customers only.\nFindings: The study reveals that service quality is the most influencing factor, and it has a significant and positive effect on satisfaction. The result also reveals that satisfaction does have a direct impact on brand loyalty.\nOriginality/value: The study has been conducted in Kolkata, and the perception has been gathered from the young consumers only. In this domain, so far, no studies have been conducted in West Bengal or in India. This study provides a glimpse of the behavior of young urban consumers on brand loyalty.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Understanding the workforce: the key to success in a youth hostel in Scotland	[ "Motivation (psychology)", "Empowerment", "Skills", "Flexible labour", "Employees", "Scotland" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: It is not always clear how businesses, despite being successful, achieve their objectives. Neither is it usually very straightforward how much influence employees have on such endeavour. It is hard to deny, however, due to labour-intensive characteristics of the hospitality industry, that understanding the workforce is crucial if effective business performance is to be accomplished. Despite advancements in management practices in many hospitality organizations, some may still fall short on this essential premise. As an initial, cost-free strategic approach for improving overall business performance, the significance of understanding the workforce is highly encompassing and proved essential in the case hostel's daily activities. It helped increase customer satisfaction levels and improve the work environment, contributing, for instance, to a reduction in labour-turnover and minimized the effects of lack of motivators and excess of dissatisfiers in the workplace.Youth hostelling, similarly to any other area of human life, is evolving. The notion that hostels are small, rundown buildings with smelly dormitories crammed with bunk-beds and allocentric, adventure-seeking travellers is nowadays far from the norm. Hostels are some of the few places where large groups with limited budgets can be catered for. Similarly, the workforce of hostels is changing. Although the old hosteller, who was expected to do chores in return to the possibility of staying in remote locations, may still exist, modern, large hostels have the privilege of employing highly-skilled, qualified employees. Their qualifications, intellectual abilities and, as a consequence, their expectations are most of the time way beyond those of the youngster looking for apprenticeship or work experience in their first, seasonal or summer job. Such condition does not seem exclusive to hostels in Scotland, but one that is likely to be shared by other accommodation providers elsewhere; the reason why this paper may be of interest to practitioners in similar contexts within the industry. It is therefore hoped that this paper provides \"managers with useful information that can be applied immediately to solve their problems\" (Walsh, 2003, p. 67), thus making the link between theory and practice. It suggests ways of improving not only employees' performance in a simple, and yet effective way, but the working conditions for those without whom there would be no clean toilets and rooms, no breakfasts and dinners and no friendly welcome.\nThe hostel business: The core of this study is a four-star (under Visit Scotland Grading Scheme), bronze-rated (under The Green Tourism Business Scheme) city hostel in Scotland. With 148 beds spread among 28 rooms, it is part of a national chain and a member of Hostelling International. It provides accommodation in en-suite dormitories of two, four, six and eight beds, fully equipped self-catering facilities for individual travellers and a professional kitchen and dinning area for group catering. An estimate of current figures shows that around 40,000 bed nights are forecasted for the year. Customer satisfaction questionnaires and the maintenance of average occupancy rates of 75 per cent indicate that the customers are overall satisfied with the facilities and service. Business figures point towards the effective and profitable accomplishment of business objectives for the current year. The hostel may therefore bear resemblance to other accommodation providing businesses.\nThe research, its design and methodology: The research was conducted within a four-week-period and involved hostel assistants in answering written questionnaires consisting of 46 closed, multiple choice and open-ended questions. Observation of the workplace was also carried out and previously made assumptions were tested against a set of factors and supported by statements made by employees. Details of company policy and procedures were corroborated by documentation available on the organization's intranet, which were used to provide supporting evidence and enable propositions.Since the reasons why employees at the hostel dedicated towards achieving organizational goals seemed to involve motivation, Herzberg's (1966, re-printed in Pugh, 1997) motivation/hygiene theory provided useful tools in understanding the forces that influence people at work. Although questionable in its application to operative roles and their conditions of employment (Wood, 1994), it furnished categorised measurement scales as guidelines for the evaluation of employee's needs and wants against set business prerequisites such as reliability, work conditions, relationships at work, organizational policy and procedures. The findings were divided into motivators and hygiene factors and subdivided into topics. The sample comprises the number of employees working in the hostel during the research period. Suggestions for future research are given in the last section of this paper. A summary of the aims under each category is given Table I.\nLiterature review and findings: In hospitality management, Wood (1994, p. 144) contends that \"theories of motivation have had little application to the industry\". Despite the subjectivity of the matter or the difficult applicability of investigative results, the studies below were conducted following the works of Maslow (1943, in Wood, 1994), Herzberg (1966, in Pugh, 1997) and McGregor (1960, in Wood, 1994).Weaver (1988) discussed money as a motivator in the context of hospitality management and argued that employees in hourly-paid jobs benefit very little from motivational strategies. Those employees, he claims, have very little attachment to their jobs (hence one of the reasons for high turnover) and are fully aware of motivation programmes that appeal to loyalty without palpable, down-to-earth rewards. Chitiris (1988, cited in Wood, 1994) investigated Herzberg's (1966) theory and its application to hotel employees and found out that workers in the Greek hotel industry were more interested in hygiene factors (those which reduced dissatisfaction in the workplace) than in motivators. His conclusions were conducive to the assumption that in low, operational jobs in that industry, hygiene factors were not always present and when the minimum requirements of such factors were not met, no amount of motivating factors would have a significant impact on the improvement of employees' performance. Brown and Macintosh (2003), by studying similar establishments in three different companies of the low-wage sector of the economy, arrived at the conclusion that satisfaction with short-term rewards and long-term prospects were far more influential in determining overall satisfaction than contentment with social relationships and work intensity. They also claim that \"hiring well-qualified individuals into jobs demanding lower skill levels is a sure-fire route for creating job dissatisfaction\" (Brown and Macintosh, 2003, p. 1253). Balmer and Baum (1993) have also applied Herzberg's motivation to investigate the changing environment of the accommodation sector. Their study, however, has little application to this research.Overall, it was found that there was a balance between motivational and maintenance or hygiene factors in the hostel. Such equilibrium was in part due to employees' personality features and customer-service related factors rather than instruments provided by the employer. The customers' demand side of the operation together with management style proved to be a successful recipe to compensate for the lack of challenges and de-motivating factors of the job. This situation exemplifies Herzberg's (1966) ideas that motivational factors and hygiene or maintenance factors \"are not simply opposing reactions to the same factors\" precisely (Balmer and Baum, 1993, p. 33), and reiterates his contention that motivation combined with hygiene factors strike the necessary balance for a healthy work environment.In order to improve motivation and hygiene in the workplace, Weaver's (1988) Theory M (that benefits should be rewarded according to performance) is suggested for the application of a feasible and yet realistic reward programme. Hostel assistants seemed to be alone in the task of motivating themselves against the lack of incentives in the workplace and did not perceive the existing rewards and benefits provided by the hostel/association as of great influence. The introduction of short-term benefits would greatly improve both, motivational and hygiene factors, particularly those below the threshold: recognition from employer (as opposed to recognition from management), organization policy and pay. The adoption of short-term appraisal procedures and benefits might also respond more effectively to the characteristics of those who seek work in the association. This view is substantiated by Brown and Macintosh (2003, p. 1252) who state that \"satisfaction with immediate factors and long-term prospects are key determinants of overall job satisfaction\" in the low wages sector and are claimed to be far more influential in determining overall satisfaction than contentment with social relationships and work intensity. Thus, an immediate motivator would be an incentive programme that offered financial rewards in relation to productivity. Those might be performance appraisal procedures, already existing in the hostel but not put into practice, carried out in a shorter time-frame (every six months) and linked to training. The implementation of changes might improve future recognition and achievement results.One of the positive aspects of the research relates to empowerment and the fact that management was trying to remove barriers to motivation through delegation and understanding of the workforce, an approach supported by Reis and Pena (2001, p. 674) who claim that \"understanding is the only thing holding an organization together when line control is taken away\". This should be understood as delegating responsibility. Most probably unaware of how important this simple management approach was, it made effective accomplishment of objectives possible, despite existing hindrances, and increased the weight of positive hygiene factors as the minimum required balance for stability.Finally, contrary to Brown and Macintosh's (2003) affirmation that \"hiring highly qualified individual into jobs demanding lower skill levels is a sure-fire route for creating job dissatisfaction\" (Brown and Macintosh's, 2003, p., 1253), this was not explicitly observed with the research. What was observed is that those with the highest qualifications were the ones who displayed the most consistent performance at work. Perhaps due to characteristics of the employees in context, they seemed to successfully exert a balance between the lack of intellectual challenges in the job against objectives outside work, relationships with co-workers and the work environment. It may also be the case that the variety of task at work, together with high levels of customers' demands proved to be challenging enough to maintain the satisfaction levels. Hostel assistants were expected to deal with so many things throughout the day and so many difficult, customer-related situations that having to clean rooms or wash dishes was probably a relief, a short break, to the stressful front office-routines.\nConclusions: In summary, the research brought to the fore three outstanding characteristics in management approach towards employees and the work environment: empowerment, multi-tasking and respect. Employees were encouraged to take decisions and solve problems within their sphere of responsibility (empowerment). In case of mistakes, they were responsible for solving them and did so. They were also expected to deal with minor complaints and once decision was taken, it was backed up by management (trust). As far as multi-tasking goes, despite preferences, job rotation added variety and challenge to the job, reduced boredom and increased satisfaction. Multi-tasking also contributed to teaching employees the importance of doing a proper job and the consequences of work not done correctly.Respect was observed through consideration of employees' skills and abilities and their suggestions acted on. It also came in the form of recognition of dedication from management. Although employees' dedication was not recompensed financially, which differentiates recognition from employer, other means were used by management to compensate for that such as favourable requests for rotas, overnights, etc. Mistakes were not punished, but discussed with a view to improve future action. Staff responded with responsibility and dedication. Trust was present as a consequence of empowerment which resulted in efficient performance observed from financial and non-financial results.This led to the assumption that the above three attributes were necessary and made it possible for the hostel to effectively and efficiently achieve its objectives. As such, a \"performance triad\" deriving from them is the author's claim of the essential elements if effective business performance through workplace improvement is to be achieved, as represented in Figure 1.It is also crucial to highlight the importance of training which would make \"real\" empowerment possible. Despite limitations to the approach, such as staff and management turnover, for example, it seems a valid attempt to try and improve the work environment and conditions concomitantly. The question that arises is: how can practitioners put the above concept into practice. Perhaps the following examples might help clarify things.\nFood for thought: Case 1\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this article is to provide an insight into the importance of understanding the workforce as it affects and is affected by the internal and external environment; an essential element of effective business performance accomplishment.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The study was conducted in a 148-bed, four-star hostel over a four-week period using multiple data collection methods comprising written questionnaires, documentation collection and observation of assistants in the hostel. By using Herzberg's motivation/hygiene factors as the theoretical foundation, this piece of research investigated the factors involved in the motivation of hostel assistants. The findings were then used to interpret the results, enable comparison with previous studies in the field and provide insights into suggested courses of action.\nFindings: - The findings suggest that the favourable environment, which enabled tasks to be carried out and made it possible for the accomplishment of business objectives, was due a balance between motivation and hygiene factors supported by understanding of the workforce.\nPractical implications: - It is hoped that the findings provide the reader (managers, students and academics) awareness of the importance of a balanced work environment and help to improve practice in the context of budget accommodation where multi-tasking is an essential requirement.\nOriginality/value: - This paper provides the reader with an overall view of modern hostelling while discussing, from a human resources perspective, the requirements for a more favourable working environment.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Cooperate "and" compete: coopetition strategy in retailer-supplier relationships	[ "Cooperation", "Competition", "China", "Channel advantage", "Competitive strategy" ]	[ { "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: Researchers have been paying great attention to interfirm cooperation in vertical channel relationships (Jap, 1999, 2001); surging interest in cooperative exchanges also is evident in business practices, including relationship marketing (Izquierdo and Cillan, 2004), lean retailing (Abernathy et al., 1999), and single sourcing (Segal, 1989). Previous studies address several aspects of cooperative interfirm relationships, including their antecedents (Heide and John, 1990), contents (Noordewier et al., 1990), and consequences (Anderson and Narus, 1990), and suggest that cooperative approaches in channel relationships lead to better exchange outcomes than do more adversarial or competitive approaches (see Palmatier et al., 2006 for a review). On the other hand, the latest developments in marketing channels practice - particularly the increasing use of multiple channels (Seiders et al., 2000; Friedman, 2002), plural governance (Heide, 2003), and greater sales of private brands by retailers (Soberman and Parker, 2006) - suggest a seemingly opposite trend, in which the traditional business boundaries between retailers and suppliers are falling, and these supposedly cooperative businesses compete for the same customers (Anderson et al., 1997).In effect, modern vertical marketing practices reveal the enigma of the coexistence of cooperation and competition between exchange parties. Consider a retailer-supplier relationship: A retailer and its supplier, as members of a marketing channel, cooperate to achieve common goals (e.g. obtain a better market position). However, at the same time, those two entities act as competitors to gain individual benefits, such as securing stable channel resources. A retailer may push its own brands (e.g. Best Buy sells its private PC brand, along with brands of manufacturers such as HP and Sony), and a supplier might introduce its own retail outlets to an existing market (e.g. Apple Inc. operates its own retail stores in addition to selling through independent retailers). We call this double-edged channel approach that implements both cooperative and competitive strategies with channel partners a coopetition strategy (Zineldin, 1998). In relation to this, Zerbini and Castaldo (2007) and Bengtsson and Kock (2000) noted that this coopetitive view of buyer-seller interactions reflects the typical duality of vertical relationship, which is more stable and persistent compared to horizontal relationships among competing firms.Despite its increasing use in channel management, a review of marketing channels literature reveals a gap in examining a coopetition channel strategy. While most previous studies focused on a manufacturer's use of multiple channels for upstream (Heide, 2003) or downstream (Bradach, 1997) channel management, the motivation and benefits of pursuing an coopetition strategy from a downstream channel member's (e.g. retailer's) point-of-view have yet to be explored. Although using a coopetition strategy is supposed to lead to better channel outcomes, we lack a clear empirical understanding of what these enhanced channel outcomes are and whether the outcomes are superior to those from pursuing cooperation or competition alone. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to address that gap by analyzing the impact of a retailer's use of a coopetition strategy on its channel outcomes. For this purpose, we examine the implications of cooperative, competitive, and synergistic dimensions of the coopetition strategy of a retailer and link them to two key retailer outcomes:* a joint benefit shared with a supplier; and* sourcing flexibility that benefits only the retailer.To start, we discuss the conceptual background and the related constructs of our study.\nCooperation and competition in vertical relationships: The coopetition strategy concept\nResearch hypotheses: We develop refutable predictions regarding the coopetition strategy and its outcomes with the following premise: The effects of the cooperative and competitive dimensions of a coopetition strategy use differ across two outcomes. Specifically, we propose that the use of cooperation enhances common benefits, and the use of competition enhances private benefits.The effect of emphasizing the cooperative dimension on exchange outcomes\nMethod: Study setting\nAnalysis and results: We began the analysis with descriptive statistics for each summed scale, as well as Pearson correlations, which we report in Table II.For the empirical test of the model, we developed matched pairs of 203 retailers and their suppliers, because our focus is the relationships between a retailer's exchange approaches and its outcomes. We tested the hypotheses using a generalized least-squares regression analysis and mean centered the independent variables to minimize the potential for multicollinearity (Aiken and West, 1991). Given the concern about multicollinearity for interaction terms, we calculated variance inflation facto (VIF) scores for each term. The highest score for joint benefit equation was 1.32 for supplier competitive dimension and the highest score for sourcing flexibility dimension was 1.37 for supplier dependence, which are much lower than the threshold score of 10. Therefore, multicollinearity does not appear to be a problem. The estimation results appear in Table III.Effect of the cooperative dimension\nDiscussion: Asymmetric effects of an exchange approach on outcomes\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - This study aims to examine the strategic implications and managerial outcomes of the concurrent use of cooperation and competition in vertical channel relationships.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - This study employs a structured questionnaire to gather data regarding vertical channel relationships in China.\nFindings: - Whereas the academic literature has emphasized cooperation between channel members because of the interdependence between them, in reality, retailers may accept competition as just another part of doing business with suppliers.\nResearch limitations/implications: - The outcome variables used may not be comprehensive. In particular, the authors choose the flexibility of channel resources to stand for private benefits and joint benefits to represent common benefits, and though these variables certainly represent the intended benefits of the ambidextrous strategy, it remains to be seen whether other benefits may emerge for the exchange parties in vertical relationships.\nPractical implications: - Using an ambidextrous strategy does not damage relationship quality, though it certainly does not enhance it. This view is based on the notion that an ambidextrous strategy at least does not harm either common or private benefits. Therefore, exchange parties using the ambidextrous strategy should not experience a relationship that is worse than that which results when they use cooperation or competition alone. The results of the current study indicate that this view reflects reality more accurately.\nOriginality/value: - The value of the current study centers on the application of a conceptual framework regarding ambidextrous strategy to vertical channel relationships in a developing economy.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Dispersion of marketing activities in business-to-business firms	[ "Dispersion" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: In practice and academia, the influence and power of marketing and of the marketing department and their impact on firm performance are discussed in a very controversy way (Gnizy and Shoham, 2018). On the one hand, it is argued that marketing is very important, is increasing its power and has a strong impact on a company's market or financial success (Germann et al., 2015; Feng et al., 2015). On the other hand, marketing has also been declared as being powerless, peripheral and as having no or even a negative impact on firm performance (Schultz, 2005; Homburg et al., 2015; Feng et al., 2015). In this paper, we argue that the impact of marketing and of a marketing department cannot be assessed per se. They rather depend on the so-called \"dispersion of marketing activities\" (DoMA), which is defined as \"the extent to which functional groups, other than marketing, are involved in traditional marketing activities\" (Workman et al., 1998, p. 32). This is especially the case in business-to-business (B2B) firms, where marketing departments very often execute only a minor percentage of the total number of marketing activities (Tull et al., 1991; Moller and Rajala, 1999; Webster et al., 2005). Consequently, in B2B firms, there is typically no unit called \"marketing department,\" \"product management\" or similar, which is in charge of performing and/or coordinating marketing policies with respect to products, distribution, price and promotion, like traditionally in consumer marketing. In contrary, key account management teams encompass sales employees and engineers for technical support, pricing decisions are made in collaboration with the finance department and customer needs are transformed into products and services with the help of teams from R&D, manufacturing and/or operations. As a result, a great number of \"part-time marketers\" (Gummesson, 1991; Harris and Ogbonna, 2003) are active in B2B firms and what we know as the textbook-ideal of \"the\" marketing department does not really exist in most of these firms.\nConceptual development: In literature, there are two different approaches toward the understanding of marketing in an organization:\nMethod: Qualitative pre-study\nDiscussion: The overall objective of this study was to shed light on the formal DoMA in B2B firms. Summing up our empirical findings, this study reveals that marketing activities take place in several departments of B2B firms with different degrees of dispersion regarding each marketing activity. With respect to RQ1, the findings show that DoMA matters in B2B firms in several ways. First of all, the degree of DoMA varies immensely between different marketing activities - ranging from a very low dispersion for \"customer acquisition\" (8.92 per cent) to a high dispersion in \"product development\" (67.12 per cent). Consequently, measuring an overall degree of DoMA per organization can only be a first step in analyzing DoMA. In fact, each marketing activity should be analyzed solely to get a clearer picture of DoMA in B2B firms. Another key finding related to RQ2 is that in two-thirds of the companies, 20-40 per cent of the marketing activities were formally conducted outside the marketing or sales department. From 12 analyzed marketing activities, marketing, sales and R&D departments were involved in 11 marketing activities, highlighting the relevance of including R&D departments more deliberately. While the overall degree of DoMA (in average 32.9 per cent) shows no significant variances between services and manufacturing firms (RQ3), a cluster analysis of the firms reveals interesting differences with respect to the relationship between DoMA and the perceived performance of the marketing activities (RQ4). The respondents of the firms in Cluster 1 (medium/high degree of DoMA) perceived their companies as being more successful in conducting 9 out of 12 marketing activities in comparison to those of Cluster 2 (low/medium dispersion) and Cluster 3 (low/volatile dispersion). Participants of the companies of Cluster 2 perceived their companies as being more successful in this respect in comparison to Clusters 1 and 3 in 3 of the 12 marketing activities (\"communication,\" \"price\" and \"product\").\nContributions to business-to-business marketing research: Although the study is mainly explorative in nature, first important theoretical insights can be derived. First, there does not exist \"one\" DoMA in a firm. In contrast, the degrees of dispersion differ with respect to various marketing activities. Hence, the extent of DoMA and of the degree to which different departments are involved in their execution need to be analyzed separately for the different marketing activities. As a consequence, research focusing on single marketing activities should concentrate on the respective context of each activity. For instance, while complaint management is surrounded by finance, IT, marketing, R&D, manufacturing and the sales department, sales force activities are conducted within marketing, R&D and the sales department. Moreover, the four identified clusters of marketing activities indicate that scholars should be aware of the differences and characteristics of the respective research field. Consequently, research on marketing organization needs to be extended, and more light should be shed on the variety of marketing activities within the marketing organization. Moreover, research on the implementation of marketing strategies should focus on the involved business units.\nImplications for business-to-business marketing management: From these theoretical insights, the following managerial implications result. First, organizing marketing activities in B2B firms needs to be aware of the different degrees of their dispersion and the varying units that are involved in their execution. As the constellations of the departments vary by different marketing activities, it seems necessary to manage the interdepartmental collaboration and the coordination of the respective tasks based on the specific constellation for each marketing activity. Managing the cross-departmental conducting of marketing activities may also include aspects such as job rotation or cross-departmental trainings. Moreover, it seems necessary to put more emphasis on an activity-oriented structuring of the marketing organization instead of its formal organizational structures. Here, different approaches for the different activities such as pricing or sales are useful.\nLimitations and further research: Like any study, this study has its limitations. First, the sample we studied was a convenient sample and was restricted in its size. Hence, the generalizability of these findings is limited. However, as the nature of the study was explorative and as the aim of the study was not to test hypotheses, the results of the study help to better understand the phenomenon of DoMA, especially in a B2B context. The different group sizes build another limitation that was caused by the sample. Companies could not be included in the study if they did not hold a certain departmental structure (e.g. very small companies do not have different departments at all). Moreover, as the subject of this study is the formal degree of DoMA, the difference between the formal and informal responsibilities of the departments with respect to their responsibility of conducting marketing activities and any informal DoMA was not further examined.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore the manifestations and the effects of the dispersion of marketing activities (DoMA) in business-to-business (B2B) firms.\nDesign/methodology/approach: To analyze the manifestations and effects of DoMA, an empirical study was conducted in German B2B firms that consisted of a qualitative pre-study and an online questionnaire-based quantitative study.\nFindings: Findings highlight that there is not \"one\" DoMA in B2B firms but that the degrees of dispersion differ with respect to various marketing activities. Moreover, a cluster analysis of the firms with respect to the manifestation of their DoMA reveals interesting differences with respect to the relationship between DoMA and the perceived performance of the marketing activities.\nOriginality/value: This explorative study is one of the first to empirically investigate the extent of DoMA in B2B firms. It shows how different DoMA can be in practice with respect to single marketing activities, as well as firms, and how this impacts the perceived performance of marketing activities.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Examining the impact of organizational culture on trust and career satisfaction in the UAE public sector: A competing values perspective	[ "United Arab Emirates", "Trust", "Career satisfaction", "Organizational culture", "Competing Values Framework" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The United Arab Emirates (UAE) is an emerging Arab economy that has tried to adopt western developmental techniques in many areas (Anadol et al., 2015), and public sector organizations play a crucial role in its overall economic development (United Arab Emirates Ministry of Economy, 2015). The public sector in the UAE has undergone extensive changes (Suliman and Al Kathairi, 2012), and is under pressure to compete (Turkyilmaz et al., 2011) with its global counterparts. Public sector organizations are therefore keen to adopt novel human resource management practices to influence employee relations (Turkyilmaz et al., 2011) and organizational culture, because of the effect of these on individual thoughts, feelings and interactions (Saeed and Hassan, 2000), overall performance (Uzkurt et al., 2013) and long-term viability (Ooi and Arumugam, 2006).\nLiterature review and theoretical framework: Organizational culture\nMethod: Sample\nFindings and discussion: This section of the paper provides a comprehensive analysis and discussion of the results. Table I shows the demographic distribution of the study sample. Most of the respondents were male (67.2 vs 32.8 percent female). Around three quarters were between 22 and 39 years old. The biggest group, 55.5 percent, had a bachelor's degree.\nImplications: This study has several theoretical and practical implications. First, to our knowledge, no previous studies in the Arab world have examined organizational culture, trust and career satisfaction together. This study has therefore added to our understanding of this area, and the relationships between these variables. It has confirmed the theory that clan culture in particular is significantly associated with career satisfaction and trust in top management in the UAE. This is consistent with other studies from elsewhere (e.g. Lund, 2003), suggesting that although organizational culture may vary with nationality and type of organization, the relationships between culture type and other variables may be more constant, providing some basis for future research. Second, this study used an analytical tool (the CVF) that has been used several times in the private sector but not much in the public sector. Our use of this tool suggests that it could be used much more widely, in both public and private sectors, including within the UAE, as a tool to assess organizational culture, and therefore helps leaders to understand and then change culture if necessary.\nLimitations and recommendations for future research: As with any empirical research, this study has certain limitations. First, both the sample and the geographical location of the study potentially limit the generalizability of the findings. However, the GCC countries show considerable economic and socio-cultural homogeneity (Ellaboudy, 2010), so these results may also be applicable to other UAE public sector organizations, and public sector organizations in other GCC countries. Second, this study may also suffer from common method bias. The respondents were asked to provide their subjective assessment of organizational culture, top management and career satisfaction. No external data were available for triangulation purposes, to mitigate this bias. We therefore recommend that future studies seek to replicate the findings of this study and also incorporate other primary data sources, or a more objective measure of these variables. For example, data about staff turnover, or information from staff surveys might have been a useful addition. Third, this research used a purposive sampling method. We recommend that future researchers should use random sampling to collect more responses from other UAE-based public and private sector companies, to improve the generalizability of the results. Finally, the method used was cross-sectional, which means that it only provides a one-time, snapshot view of the data. We therefore cannot determine anything about causality, only correlations. Information about causality can only be determined through longitudinal studies, and we therefore recommend this to future researchers.\nConclusion: Organizational culture is critical for organizational performance (Valmohammadi and Roshanzamir, 2015). To the best of our knowledge, however, no previous study has investigated how organizational culture type affects trust in top management and career satisfaction in the UAE. This study focused on the extent to which different categories of organizational culture, set out in the CVF, affect the levels of trust in top-level management and career satisfaction among mid-level managers in public sector organizations. The findings show that organizations with culture types that are more focused on creation and collaboration tended to have higher levels of trust in top management. The second hypothesis, related to the influence of the organizational culture type on career satisfaction, was only partially supported.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of organizational culture on trust in top management and career satisfaction. The concept of culture was split into four types: \"clan,\" \"adhocracy,\" \"hierarchy\" and \"market.\"\nDesign/methodology/approach: A self-administered questionnaire was used to collect data from 128 mid-level managers in ten public sector organizations in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The questionnaire included demographic questions and three established scales to measure culture type, trust in top management and career satisfaction. Correlation and regression analysis were used to examine relationships between variables.\nFindings: Respondents from \"clan\" and \"adhocracy\"-type organizations tended to have more trust in top managers than those from other culture types. Respondents from \"clan\"-type organizations also had greater career satisfaction. Only a clan-type organizational culture significantly predicted career satisfaction.\nResearch limitations/implications: The study is based on a small number of mid-level managers working in ten public sector organizations. This limits the generalizability of the results. Future studies should examine both public and private sector organizations operating in various industries across the UAE, to increase the generalizability of the findings. The study results will assist organizational policy makers who wish to transform their organizational culture to one that will increase the career satisfaction of managerial staff and their trust in senior managers.\nOriginality/value: The study contributes to the literature on organizational culture, particularly on the relationship between trust and career satisfaction in the public sector in the UAE.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Understanding the normative expectations of customers toward Buddhism-themed hotels: A revisit of service quality	[ "China", "Service quality", "Religious tourism", "Theming", "Buddhism-themed hotels", "Normative expectation", "Tourism" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: \"Theming\" is a trend in contemporary society that encompasses a wide variety of spheres. This trend is most evident in theme parks. However, hotels, shopping malls, casinos and even cities have also started to engage in this marketing strategy. McGoun et al. (2003) suggested that a themed environment that has been designed to tell a story in which the visitor plays a part provides significant entertainment value. The use of theming in the tourism industry has emerged in at least three ways:\nLiterature review: Customer expectation\nMethods: The Delphi method originated from a series of studies conducted by the RAND Corporation in the 1950s. This method aims to obtain a consensus of opinions within a group of experts (Dalkey and Helmer, 1963). Turoff (1970) outlined four research objectives that call for the use of the Delphi method:\nFindings: From the 25 semi-structured interviews with travelers and service providers, 98 normative expectation items were identified (Table II). Based on Hofstede and Hofstede's culture model (2005), most items could represent one of the four levels of culture. The following common themes were derived to classify the expectation items:\nDiscussion and implications: Creating a unique theming experience\nConclusions: This study investigated the Buddhism-motivated tourist expectations of Buddhism-themed hotels as well as the perception of service providers as regards these expectations (gap 1). However, normative expectations were explored instead of predictive expectations.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: This study aims to understand the normative expectations of travelers on the services and experiences provided by Buddhism-themed hotels as well as how service providers perceive such expectations. The growth of religion-themed hotels in China follows a larger and more generalized global marketing trend in terms of providing tourists and consumers with \"themed\" experiences.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Using the service quality model, this study investigates these expectations of Buddhism-themed hotels in China. The Delphi method was used with two expert panels, namely, travelers and tourism/hotel practitioners. Preliminary interviews revealed 98 normative expectations from Buddhism-themed hotels. Two sets of Delphi questionnaires were used to compare tourist expectations with practitioner perceptions.\nFindings: Results show a wide range of expectations of travelers staying in Buddhism-themed hotels. They also reveal how the expectations of the two groups aligned as well as differed.\nResearch limitations/implications: This study extends the application of the service quality model to the context of religion-themed hotels. As this study adopted the Delphi technique through criterion sampling, future studies should use a larger random sample to verify the results of this study.\nPractical implications: The results help religion-themed hoteliers to understand their customer expectations better.\nOriginality/value: Given the lack of studies on religion-themed hotels, especially on the gap between tourist expectations and service providers' perceptions, this study is a timely contribution to improve the understanding on the needs and expectations of customers when visiting religion-themed hotels.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Public relations for peacebuilding: case study from Colombia	[ "Relationship management", "Peacebuilding and public relations", "PR for peacebuilding", "Relationship and peacebuilding" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: As a scholarly body of knowledge, public relations has been grounded principally in mass media approaches - journalism and mass communication (Bruning and Ledingham, 1999). Public relations scholarship began to develop around the mid-1970s mostly in a few western democracies, and remained quite ethnocentric until the dawn of the twenty-first century (Sriramesh, 2002). With the onset of this era of globalisation in the early 1990s, scholars have begun to study the field in other contexts and settings. In this environment, global public relations publications and studies have increased, even if international public relations studies still are far from robust (Sriramesh and Vercic, 2009). Further, the focus on corporate public relations seems to dominate scholarship and pedagogy even if, in the past decade, the focus has begun to shift to learn from experiences of governments and non-profits as well. We see benefits to studying public relations practice outside of a few familiar developed Western countries (such as the USA, UK, Western European democracies), while also emphasising that it benefits the field to expand our horizons and analyse the use of public relations for diverse purposes.\nPublic relations and peacebuilding: The literature review of public relations as relationship management (through negotiation) and peacebuilding allows us to build an assumption. On the one hand, public relations as relationship management has the potential to create, maintain and change the relationships between parties. Further, communication - the core of public relations as a function - is used to \"negotiate\" relationship - especially contentious ones. It is powerful to build, describe and measure relationships with empirically tested tools. On the other hand, peacebuilding and conflict resolution scholars stress the vital role relationship plays and highlight the complexity of measuring relationships, the different dimensions and patterns, as well as the evaluation of those involved (Mitchell, 2002). Therefore, an assumption can be made that the former can contribute to the latter. In other words, it leads us to assume that public relations not only can play a critical role in peacebuilding, but also ought to be used much more than it is currently being used in conflict negotiation.\nAn overview of peacebuilding in Colombia: Colombia lived through one of the longest-running internal armed conflicts in the world extending over half a century. As Adell (2012) explained, it is a highly complex and multidimensional conflict involving many actors - both armed (Colombian military, guerrillas, paramilitary and self-defence groups, criminal gangs and drug cartels) and unarmed. According to Beittel (2015), Colombia's armed conflict registered more than a thousand deaths and more than 25,000 persons who went missing or simply disappeared. In addition, more than 5m people were the victims of forced displacement, creating one of the largest populations of internally displaced persons in the world. Beittel further contended that the use of land mines caused a further casualty with more than 10,000 dead or severely injured since 1990. In this context, FARC-EP was one of the many - albeit the largest and most organised -armed actors in the Colombian conflict.\nMethodology: In order to examine the communication factors that facilitated the two sworn enemies to come to an agreement (RQ1), the specific public relations strategies and techniques used by FARC-EP and the Colombian Government (RQ2), and the use of relationship indicators (RQ3), we decided to conduct documentary research that produced a rich description of this complex single phenomenon (Bowen, 2009). We note here that given the sensitivity of the issue and ongoing complexities arising from the agreement, we could not get any representative from either of the parties to speak on the record about the negotiations and, therefore, we were forced to rely on secondary data. Scholars attempting to analyse such conflicts may need to take this into account when planning their research designs.\nResults and discussion: Communication factors (RQ1)\nConcluding thoughts: In sum, the secondary evidence gathered for this study confirmed that peacebuilding, so critical to the welfare of this world, can and does use many of the concepts and techniques described in the body of knowledge of public relations. It is ironic that public relations, as a discipline, has not claimed much more of a stake in peacebuilding, given how relevant many of its concepts are to building peace. Symmetrical communication whose purpose is to use two-way communication to build mutually beneficial relationships between entities was very much evident in the six-year negotiations analysed in this study. Many of the public relations strategies and techniques described in public relations literature were also evident in the negotiations studied here. Third-party mediation, contending, compromising, use of the mixed-motives model are just some of the examples of the strategies and techniques used by the two sides in this case study. Finally, the indicators of relationship as described in public relations literature were also very evident - some more so than others. This study also adds to the body of knowledge by showing that we should not only focus on trust, commitment, etc., among the principal actors in a negotiation but also the role that interlocutors (mediators) play in enhancing these relationship indicators because of the credibility they have with one or both parties.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to link public relations to peacebuilding. Although scholarship has discussed public relations as relationship management, the nexus between public relations and peace building has been understudied. To address this deficiency, this research studies the negotiations between the Government of Colombia and the FARC-EP separatist group that lead to the landmark peace treaty between the two entities that had fought for over five decades with thousands of deaths. Three research questions addressed the communication factors that contributed to the two sworn enemies - FARC-EP and the Colombian Government - finally sealing a peace agreement; the specific public relations strategies and techniques that led to relationship building between the two sides leading to the landmark peace agreement; and the use of the indicators of relationship building proposed by scholarship in the negotiations between the Colombian Government and FARC-EP.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The case study method was used and a purposive sample of news reports from three national newspapers at specific key dates yielding a final sample consisted of 504 articles was analysed. A codebook with deductive and inductive categories was developed specially to study the existing communication factors (RQ1), public relations strategies and techniques (RQ2), as well as contributions by relationship indicators (RQ3). Given the sensitivity of the issues, only secondary data could be relied upon for this study.\nFindings: The results of RQ1 fall within the scope of Grunig's (2001), Sriramesh's (1992) and Hung's (2001) notion of the personal influence model where the leveraging of individuals' network is important to facilitate communication. Indeed, the relations already existing and established with third parties are revealed to be fundamental to the success of the negotiation process. As for RQ2, findings demonstrate that the Colombian Government used third-party mediation, principled and distributive strategies, while FARC-EP mainly used contending strategies. But results showed that both used compromising during the whole process, and that both transitioned from one-way asymmetrical strategies, such as principled or contending towards compromising along the peace talks. Finally, findings demonstrate evidence of the four indicators of the relationship and their link with public relations techniques. The most evidenced indicators of the relationship were trust, commitment and control mutuality. Trust was the indicator of the relationship the most evidenced in the Colombian case. The dimension was built during the whole process and evolved continually. Distrust was the total between the two enemies at the beginning of the pre-negotiation. However, as parties entered into a relationship, confidence and trust increased.\nResearch limitations/implications: The inability to obtain primary data is the major limitation of this study. It was caused by the sensitivity of the topic.\nPractical implications: This study links public relations to a very practical case that is also vastly understudied/underreported - peacemaking/peacebuilding - while also addressing communication by governments and civil society in Latin America - an area that is largely understudied.\nOriginality/value: This is the first study that links public relations with peacebuilding.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Boost your business value with succession planning	[ "Succession planning", "Retention", "Human resource development", "Value analysis" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Over time, all enterprises evolve and grow around the vision, skill and enthusiasm of the people who lead and manage them. The business gradually becomes an embodiment of their judgment, values and decisions. If they retire or leave for other reasons, the ethos and dynamics of the business will inevitably change. If the value of the business is to be maintained or enhanced, it is vital these changes are carefully controlled.\nLooking inward for future success: The assumption is that companies will need to recruit externally to fill operational gaps as they undergo change. This is not always true. External HR specialists can be brought in to work as change managers, to identify current or anticipated gaps in managers' range of skills and employees' competencies and then to uncover the most economical ways to fill these gaps.But there is more to succession planning. Rather than only being a way of averting the dangers of a foreseeable motivational and management vacuum, it can be an opportunity to refresh, revitalize or reposition a staid enterprise in a rapidly changing world.I strongly believe that businesses can move forward by optimizing the contribution of their existing management, staff and workforce. Existing personnel may have undiscovered capabilities and talents and these attributes may not have become apparent in their existing roles because of habit and complacency rather than a failure to invest in employee development.Employees may not have been invited to extend themselves in a new work direction or to take on wider responsibilities but it is definitely more cost-efficient to uncover unsung talent in existing staff in place of recruiting and introducing new personnel. Job rotations can sometimes reveal these hidden abilities. Perhaps someone on your sales force has the potential to become an outstanding marketer or someone from your shop floor or office has the potential to be an outstanding sales generator. An operative might have innate interpersonal skills that earmark him or her for development into line management.\nHow to boost existing employees' skills: In some instances, the skill shortfalls can be filled by job rotation. Skill shortfalls in one department can be overcome by importing them from another where a competent individual's ability is being under-used. There are huge savings to be made by offering coaching, mentoring or further job training to existing staff.Companies should readily consider positive and structured training rather than launching a recruitment drive, as this can expand the skill set of employees and identify and improve areas that require development.Coaching is not merely structured learning. It is more focused on supporting individuals and teams on their developmental journey and helping them to become the people they want to be and to achieve the success they aspire to. It is a question of honing their true future potential and working on making this a reality.Similarly, I see mentoring as the passing on of knowledge by a more experienced person to a less experienced one. Again, it is not so much about structured learning; more about enabling through providing guidance, support and understanding.External or interim HR consultants can provide mentoring and coaching on a stand-alone basis, either to supplement a training course or as part of a larger-scale training and development program.\nThe benefits of investing in existing employees: Investing in existing employees and working to improve their skills can prove hugely beneficial to an organization. Apart from the obvious time and money savings there are numerous other aspects that can affect the corporate ethos and performance.Employees' perceptions of their career-progression prospects change. They will obviously be prepared to make a deeper commitment to an enterprise that demonstrably invests in them and their route to achieving their personal ambitions, perhaps through promotion. It also inculcates the wider perception that, as others advance, the gaps they leave will create promotion opportunities for their immediate delegates rather than outside recruits. This creates a sense of career scope and momentum among the whole workforce.This should be an ongoing process. Trainers, coaches and mentors need to do far more than recite prescribed catch-all programs. They must dedicate time really to get to know their client's business and absorb its culture as a prerequisite of cultivating teamwork and enhancing productivity.It is about nurturing people who have the capability to fulfill key roles both now and in the future; knowing who could step in immediately, who could be an asset to the company in a couple of years and who is likely to be leading the company in the longer term.Background, qualifications and experience paint only part of the picture. The qualities that make people exceptional managers, leaders, drivers and visionaries are somewhat more elusive. You do not get certificates in perseverance, determination, emotional intelligence and resourcefulness. Years of service that may be attributed to the individual's lack of enterprise and ambition might actually be because of unwavering loyalty or the lack of real opportunity to develop.\nAssessment: Internal recruitment for senior or critical positions is vital to the future of the organization and needs to start much ahead of the time of the expected succession so the transfer of responsibility can be a gradual process rather than a sudden dramatic event.After identifying the particular competencies a company needs to achieve its goals, HR advisers can devise exercises to identify and develop strengths, and remedial programs to overcome shortcomings where there is need for improvement.A precise psychometric assessment of an individual's range of skills and capabilities will define his or her suitability for bridging the gaps that he or she will be required to fill. The objective is to get the closest possible fit between the under-used potential and operational shortfall.If it eventually transpires that existing employees do not have the skills or potential to fill a role, it may be necessary to seek guidance in recruiting candidates who match the exact requirements of a particular role and culture of the company.\nFailing to prepare is preparing to fail: The key to future success lies in assessing and understanding the value of the human resources you have at present and what resources you are likely to need in the coming years. The future performance of any company is reliant on the thoroughness and vigor of today's succession planning. Those with an interest in acquiring or merging with an existing business must put a finite value on it.Any investor will agree that running a slide-rule over the fixed assets, past performance and future profit expectations of a target company is comparatively straightforward. What really interests investors is the quality of the next generation of management and its preparedness to propel the enterprise to new heights.Every management hopes it will be able to bring about a smooth transfer of control after an acquisition, merger or other transaction. Having competent and consistent management and an able workforce in place from day one will be a decisive factor in negotiations. It will influence the viability banks and equity houses place on the entire deal and the fiscal value placed on the business.Careful planning also means your workforce will be less unsettled and disrupted.In short, improving the value and saleability of your business for the future is reliant on planning for, and building, the next generation of human resources now.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - This paper aims to put forward the view that, when the owner-managers or drivers of a successful business have to give responsibility to a new management, careful succession planning can minimize the risk of damage and enhance the value of the business.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Explains the various aspects of good succession planning, and how they can be put into practice.\nFindings: - Emphasizes the importance of optimizing the contribution of existing management, staff and workforce through, for example, job rotation, training, coaching and mentoring. Concedes, however, that it will not be possible to promote from within in all cases.\nPractical implications: - Contends that employees will be prepared to make a deeper commitment to an enterprise that invests in them and their route to achieving their personal ambitions, perhaps through promotion.\nOriginality/value: - Advances the view that the future performance of any company depends on the thoroughness and vigor of today's succession planning.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Searching for quality in the Quality of work life: an Indian power sector perspective	[ "Quality of work life", "Job satisfaction", "Supervisor support", "India", "Work stress", "Power sector" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The core focus of the power sector is to create customer satisfaction by generation and supply of electricity at the right time, in the right quantity, maintaining the right quality and at right cost. It entails critical tasks like planning, design, engineering, construction, procurement, handling and storing, operation and maintenance of power plants, equipment, transmission, distribution, and selling energy and collection of revenue, management of human resources and finance, etc. To accomplish each task, a highly stimulated and satisfied workforce is required. Power sector is experiencing rapid technological advancements and requires especially skilled artisans, managers, supervisors and engineers to perform. However, working environment characterized by extreme temperatures, and heights, makes the work more challenging. Hence, power sector, though capital intensive, should be receptive to employees' needs, as they are pivotal in accomplishing the growing expectations of power-hungry India.\nLiterature review: The literature review focuses on previous researches done on QWL and then moves toward discussing various variables which have been found to be linked to QWL. The section is dedicated to understand the need of studying QWL in the Indian power sector.\nPower sector in India: In power generation capacity, India stands fifth and consumes about 4 percent of the total world energy. On January 31, 2013, the installed power generation capacity was 211,766.22 MW; nearly 1,00,000 MW (Deloitte, 2012) of new capacity is aimed to be accomplished in the 12th plan.\nQWL: Martins and Van der Berg (2013) define QWL as follows: \"most individuals spend a great deal of their time participating in job or work-related activities and even plan their time, living standards and social interaction around the demands of their work\" (p. 4). Mostly people define themselves and others also in terms of what they do, which makes QWL in organizations a major factor of the quality of life in general (Kotze, 2005; Rathi, 2009; Yadav and Rangnekar, 2016). QWL as a construct, though, was first introduced in the 1950s, but its foundation as a concept was laid in 1972 in the first international conference on QWL, which called for development of a credible measure for making the environment at work more humane (Koonmee et al., 2010; Kotze, 2005). Since then, extensive research has been done, but, still, its definition as well as the application is vague. The definition given by Serey (2006) has been found to be the most elaborate one till now and will be taken to define QWL in the present study. \"It includes (i) an opportunity to exercise one's talents and capacities, to face challenges and situations that require independent initiative and self-direction; (ii) an activity thought to be worthwhile by the individuals involved; (iii) an activity in which one understands the role the individual plays in the achievement of some overall goals; and (iv) a sense of taking pride in what one is doing and in doing it well\" (Serey, 2006, p. 6). The following variables have been taken in our study to measure QWL in the Indian power sector.\nMethod: The population of the study constitutes full-time Indian employees from both public and private power sector organizations. Management development programs (MDPs) were chosen as the means for collection of responses. In all, 13 MDPs were conducted; of these 6 were for organizations in power generation, 3 for transmission and 4 for power distribution. To be sure, for valid responses, QWL concept was discussed in detail with respondents before circulation of questionnaires. In total 340 questionnaires were distributed and only 300 were found to be completely filled, leading to a response rate of 88.24 percent.\nMeasure: QWL scale by McDonald (2001) with 53 items has been taken to measure the level of QWL in Indian power sector employees. The responses are taken on a five-point Likert scale with responses varying from 1 for \"strongly disagree\" to 5 for \"strongly agree.\" The sample items are as follows: \"The feedback I receive on my work from my manager/ supervisor is constructive\"; \"Relationships with work colleagues are frequently a source of stress\"; and \"I would like more opportunities to contribute to decisions at work\". QWL scale covers seven dimensions:\nData analysis: To test the measurement model, confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was conducted using AMOS. The kh2 difference test based on the Bonferroni method (Simes, 1986) was also conducted checking discriminant validity of all the pairs on constructs under study. Pearson correlation analysis was used to determine the relationship between various constructs. The pattern of QWL was analyzed with ANOVA and Tukey post hoc test. And at last, the influence put by various dimensions on overall QWL was analyzed by standardized coefficients and model fit indices.\nResults: Profile of sample\nDiscussion: Though the work performed in power sector is highly technical, a lack of public dealing, with other factors, means employees require less supervision. Because of the entry of private sector with 29.49 percent share in power generation, salary and additional benefits have increased. Surprisingly, we witnessed a lack of job involvement, showing management's control over decisions to great level. With the level of privatization, scores showed an inverse relationship in terms of relationship with work colleagues and also job security and communication. Job security and communication reduced with the level of privatization, and this is one of the reasons the power sector is facing huge attrition now a days. Another reason is the terrain and environment of working, with generation processes established in extreme areas like high altitude, water bodies, etc., making the work difficult for employees. In terms of job satisfaction also above analogy stands confirmed. A constant pattern of results in various variables here shows that work environment and culture play a great role in employee's QWL. QWL mean score shows huge potential of improvement in power sector.\nImplications of the study: Based on the results of the study some implications and suggestions can be drawn. First, mentorship programs and other activities, to increase bonding between supervisor and employees, will help solve many unwanted problems at work (Naim and Lenka, 2017). Reduction in the time taken, low wastage and employee plus supervisor development can be achieved with fostering supervisor support. Second, recreational activities need to be developed to reduce stress at workplace, an employee needs to take his/her mind off from mounting stressful activities at work. Third, high salary and other benefits can be used to attract skilled and efficient manpower and make power sector more lucrative destination to work. Fourth, employee involvement, which is nearly missing in power sector and also pulling down QWL perception, also needs attention; involvement varying from floor activities like quality circles to seat in board meetings can be the key to reducing transmission and distribution losses, fostering generation by tapping the employee's skills and ideas. Fifth, festival celebration, team-building exercises, employee social gatherings, etc., will create positive feeling, feeling of belonging to group among employees and will give reasons to stay as well as work hard. Sixth, regular issues of news on the bulletin board, personalized mails, performance sharing will give employees a sense of security. Open communication, i.e. platforms for sharing and clarifying queries and worries need to be created (Naim and Lenka, 2016). Seventh, positive culture and environment in every relationship, though a challenge for HR, will foster QWL. Eighth, the ever decreasing appeal of power sector can be uplifted, but then it requires constant efforts and funds from government as well as private investors.\nLimitations: Although this paper has unveiled a new dimension of research in QWL study, it does have some limitations also. First, the study was unable to analyze the QWL of contractual workers as they make majority of workers working on site; so, they can be included in similar future studies. Second, the scope for causal inferences from the relationships was constrained, because of the cross-sectional nature of data collected. However, the limitation can be tackled by utilizing a longitudinal research design. Third, comparison is also missing on demographic levels like age, gender or marital status, etc., which can have an influence on QWL perception in employees. Fourth, QWL was the only variable around which study revolved. As QWL has a wide variety of consequences as well as antecedents, future studies can study QWL in power sector along with other such variables. Demographic variables can be studied as moderators in those studies to complete the model. Fifth, the sample size catering to power sector is small. Future studies should be taken on a large sample size to get better results.\nConclusion: The government is struggling to provide a facilitating environment for power sector reforms. With the removal of lack of political will and vision, which is quite harmful for the power sector and also to growth in India, the government has to look for strategic planning based on correct scientific data and ground realities like the law and order situation, etc.; employees, who were until now neglected should be entrusted to carry out expected reforms until ground level. The ignored QWL of employees can have serious impact on service quality, billing, collection, etc., because it will bring a positive energy which is missing till now. Culture, which is made by management and employees together, needs to be re-established for reaching the goal of efficient and effective power generation, transmission and distribution system. One cannot discard the importance of motivations like salary, pension and other material benefits, but can target high to do well for the masses.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Inspired by India's focus in the 11th and 12th Five Year Plans on fulfilling the surging energy needs, the purpose of this paper is to capture the Quality of work life (QWL) in the Indian power sector.\nDesign/methodology/approach: QWL measured with seven dimensions was validated with CFA, and the kh2 difference test based on the Bonferroni method (Simes, 1986) was used for discriminant validity. Individual processes were analyzed with correlation analysis and ANOVA. The influencers of QWL in three processes were compared with standardized coefficients and model fit indices.\nFindings: Freedom from work-related stress, salary, relationship with work colleagues, job security and communication and job satisfaction positively influenced QWL. Supervisor support was not found to influence QWL, while job involvement was found to negatively influence QWL.\nResearch limitations/implications: The scope of this study is limited to India, however, and results may not generalize to other countries. Hence, future studies should replicate the study in power sector or allied manufacturing sector in different cultural settings. Another limitation lies in its relatively small sample size; therefore, generalizability of the results may be restricted.\nPractical implications: The findings provide useful information to assist HR managers in improving the QWL among Indian power sector employees.\nOriginality/value: The study is one of the first studies to date to empirically examine the QWL among Indian power sector employees.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Advance manufacturing strategy and firm performance: An empirical study in a developing environment of small- and medium-sized firms	[ "Manufacturing strategy", "Firm performance", "Advanced manufacturing", "Manufacturing practices", "Organizational knowledge" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Changing and increasing customer expectations and the inefficiency of conventional manufacturing have led manufacturers to consider new manufacturing approaches such as advanced manufacturing technology (AMT), which allows higher quality and flexibility at lower cost. Many academicians and practitioners' focus on understanding the linkages between manufacturing strategy and performance (Vickery et al., 1993; Ward and Duray, 2000). Schroeder et al. (2002) use the resource-based view of a firm to explore the linkages. This view identifies a firm's key resources that are unique and not easily imitable, and deploying them to generate competitive performance. Trade-off is at the heart of economics (Skinner, 1969). Central to the trade-off theory is that firms cannot perform well on all capabilities. Superior performance in some can only be gained at the expense of others. Organizational units could learn from their own direct experience or from the experience of other units (Levitt and March, 1988). Diaz et al. (2003) said \"relevant literature dealing with an analysis of AMT investment patterns is fairly recent and still relatively scarce\". Boyer et al. (1996) proposed a taxonomy of AMTs used in the North American metal-working industries based on relative investment in design, manufacturing, and administrative technologies. Every business has its own process structure while the type of business affects the associated manufacturing activities (Hayes and Wheelwright, 1979; Swamidass and Newell, 1987). For this reason, AMT investments may change from one country and one industry to another, and the technological strategies identified in the previous studies may not be relevant to firms in developing countries. Swamidass and Newell (1987) discussed manufacturing strategy as a set of tools/practices proposed to produce effective manufacturing strengths for improved competitive performance. Alternative definitions are offered by Leong et al. (1990), Platts et al. (1998), Ward et al. (1996), and Ang et al. (2015). Ferdows and De Meyer (1990), however, argued that manufacturing firms can augment their capabilities in a sequential manner and that there is no need to engage in trade-offs. This cumulative capabilities view is shared by Nakane (1986) and Noble (1995). Swink and Way (1995) proposed the contingency perspective. Leong et al. (1990) and Dangayach and Deshmukh (2001) postulate a theoretical framework, the main thrust of which consists of decomposing manufacturing strategy into competitive priorities and decision categories.\n2. Literature review: In today's era of globalization and competition, business excellence is important which needs co-ordination between business strategy and manufacturing strategy (Dangayach and Deshmukh, 2004). Since the realization of Hayes and Wheelwright (1984) and others that manufacturing actually has a strategic role to play in many firms, external conditions have continued to create pressure for fast and agile development of manufacturing in many firms. The competitive environment is changing for many industrial firms these days.\n3. Proposed hypothesis and conceptual model: A growing body of literature suggests that in dynamic environments, increased organizational knowledge reduces risks, and uncertainties (Liebeskind, 1996). This learning process starts with information assimilation, which is related to the company's pre-existing knowledge. The external knowledge so, improve the manufacturing practices. Therefore it is hypothesized that the external organizational knowledge is positively related with manufacturing practices:\n4. Research methodology: In this study the questionnaire was developed based on the topic of research linkages in learning through advanced manufacturing strategies for manufacturing and business performance. The questionnaire was designed using the approach of Clark (1996) for structuring interviews with executives. The final questionnaire is divided in to five sections: Sections A to E. First six questions of Section A are related to manufacturing business unit information, next five questions are based on general information about the respondent, while next two sets of questionnaire are related to identification of competitive priorities and identification of order winner. Section B consists of questionnaire related to organizational knowledge and process of manufacturing strategy formulation from resource-based approach. Section C consists of questionnaire based on survey of manufacturing practices. Section D consists of questionnaire based on survey of manufacturing outputs and business performance. Questionnaire in Section E is related to assessing degree of uniformity with advanced manufacturing practice. Respondents are asked to assess the questions on seven-point Likert's scale, other than first basic business and personal information questions.\n5. Discussion and conclusion: The scale for the research is adopted from previous literature and validated for the industry through pilot study. After identifying variables for the research, data are collected through survey methodology. A sample is selected across the India. To explore causal effect of organizational knowledge, source of information, cross-functional orientation, resource-based view of manufacturing and global view on manufacturing practices, manufacturing performance and business performance, path analytic approach is employed using SEM. The path analytic approach is used to explore impact of one or many variable as independent variable on one or many dependent variable. Following specific conclusions can be drawn from the study:\n6. Managerial implications: The finding has implications for the business practice of manufacturing units that are relevant because the research was empirical in nature, relied on ownership experience and feedback, and was based on a sound theoretical framework (Covin and Kilmann, 1990). The conclusion here is that dynamic capabilities which foster capability for variation must be embedded in the manufacturing firms, particularly dynamic capabilities that promote knowledge creation and integration within the firm. These dynamic capabilities include:\n7. Limitations of the study: It is widely accepted that all forms of research have certain limitations; so following are the limitations of this study:\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to assess the implications of organizational knowledge, source of information and functional orientation, resource-based view of the manufacturing and global orientation, on manufacturing practices which include advanced manufacturing strategies.\nDesign/methodology/approach: An empirical study approach has been used to assess the implications of advanced manufacturing strategies on firm performance.\nFindings: This paper provides a framework for managers to: assess competitive priorities of the industry; identify order winners for the industry; identify key decision areas or practices for improvements; and to assess the role of implications of organizational knowledge on the manufacturing practices.\nResearch limitations/implications: The limitations are as follows: the issue of organizational knowledge and learning is assessed from manufacturing view point only; plants located all over India are considered for study; and considers plants employing different manufacturing systems and products.\nPractical implications: Saturated with the conventional manufacturing technologies, a growing number of small- and medium-scale industries began to explore advanced manufacturing technologies (AMTs). Investment in AMTs remains a promising but potentially risky venture. This paper helps the small- and medium-scale industries to adopt viable AMTs and business performance strategies and then provides guidelines for enhancing their competitiveness.\nSocial implications: This paper may help all the stakeholders of small- and medium-scale industry.\nOriginality/value: This paper is based on one of the few studies conducted to assess the implications of advanced manufacturing strategies on firm performance in Indian scenario.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Local government financial key performance indicators - not so relevant, reliable and accountable	[ "Performance measures", "Depreciation", "Local government", "Decision making", "Management accountability", "Australia" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Public sector reforms are occurring throughout the world in an effort to improve the efficiency, effectiveness, responsiveness and accountability of the public service. Local government reform, as a subset of the overall reform process, has been implemented in an attempt to increase transparency of those agencies empowered with providing essential services to our communities. In Australia, the introduction of Australian Accounting Standard 27 (AAS 27) Financial Reporting by Local Governments (ACA, 1999) in 1993 and other legislative initiatives meant the adoption of accrual accounting by local government councils. This entailed a major change for councils as it meant the compulsory capitalisation of assets and the inclusion of depreciation expense in the operating statement. Since the introduction of these legislative changes, concern has been expressed by the NSW government that differences exist between and also within councils when it comes to reporting annual transport infrastructure information such as depreciation expense[1]. With no specific guidelines to follow, problems regarding depreciation, especially with respect to transport infrastructure assets, continue to plague NSW local councils. As transport infrastructure assets form, on average, 54 per cent of councils overall assets, incorrect depreciation calculations not only lead to misinformation being supplied to users of council financial statements but can also have a significant impact on resulting financial key performance indicators (FKPIs).In line with the aim of this study three research issues are examined:1. How are local government FKPIs calculated?2. Do the targeted FKPIs meet the \"relevance, reliability, and accountability\" criteria?3. Can these FKPIs be used legitimately to make informed judgements about local council performance? (As per Boyne (1997)).Little, if any, research has occurred within Australia examining the veracity of financial figures used in FKPIs in local government. By addressing these three issues, this research offers some reparation for the relative lack of empirical research literature on local government FKPIs and, in particular, those that do not meet the underlying accountability focus of performance measurement as determined by the NSW State Government. As Boyne and Law (1991, p. 179) stated:...effective accountability in practice is impossible without accurate information of local authority performance... In the absence of performance data, the concept of accountability and indeed the whole democratic process is simply a sham.Future research may provide outcomes that will enable the preparation of alternative policies for local government in Australia addressing the issue of internal benchmarking and external performance measures for comparative and assessment purposes. The way in which performance measures are used is of concern - especially to local authorities as they are accountable to numerous stakeholders. Hence, any move towards a better system of accountability as a result of this research can only be viewed as a positive outcome for all those involved.This paper begins with a discussion of key performance indicators, including a brief history of the development of FKPIs in local government in Australia. Following on from this, asset valuation and depreciation issues are examined in particular as they apply to transport infrastructure. A summary of results analysing the reporting of transport infrastructure over a period of four years is included to illustrate methodological inconsistencies. Finally, detailed analysis of two sample groups of councils comprising 28 councils on financial watch [2] and a sample of 28 purportedly non-risk councils, is used to demonstrate that certain FKPIs, based on questionable valuation and depreciation figures, are irrelevant for decision-making[2]. To maintain confidentiality, councils classified as being on financial watch will be referred to as C1-C28, non-risk councils G1-G28 and any others as C29-C31.\nKey performance indicators: In today's society both public and private organisations, and their citizens, are required to be \"accountable\". Customer satisfaction, quality management and cost effectiveness all affect how accountability is defined and measured. Accountability relies on the ability to provide an account of one's actions - whether it be via a financial report or some other method. \"...To be accountable means that there is an obligation to answer for one's actions and decisions which arises when authority to act on behalf of an individual or body (the principal) is transferred to another (the agent) ... \" (Funnell and Cooper, 1998, p. 30). Accountability can be further divided into two areas - internal and external. External accountability operates when public organisations give an account to, and are held accountable by, external individuals or agencies (Boyne, 2002, p. 693) and it is this definition which complements the discussion in this paper.The accountability of local councils to the community is more complex than that of other levels of government. Local governments are elected and are accountable to their electorates for local planning, regulation, expenditure and revenue raising decisions and are subject to state laws including financing arrangements. According to Funnell and Cooper (1998, p. 31) the key to successful accountability is access to relevant information on performance. Performance information, particularly measures of comparative performance, have been seen as a means by which interested parties can gauge the provision of local government services. However, Kravchuk and Shack (1996, p. 348) warn that performance measures may misinform as much as they inform, if users are unaware of the subtle limitations of measurement systems. Hence, if the performance data are inaccurate - where does this leave accountability?Brief history of the development of KPIs in local government\nValuation and depreciation issues - local councils: Valuation\nMethod and results: A longitudinal study of all NSW councils (170) from 1999-2000 to 2002-2003 was conducted using archival research combined with in-depth case study analysis and interviews. Data were obtained from annual reports provided electronically to the DLG and checked against hard copies of these reports, including supporting notes. Inconsistencies were found to exist both between and within local council groups with respect to the valuation and depreciation of transport infrastructure assets which, in turn, raised questions regarding the accuracy, not only of the reported \"bottom line\", but also the subsequent FKPIs - indicators upon which council performance could be judged (DLG, 2003). First, an ANOVA was performed on average useful life allocated to transport infrastructure between 1999-2000 and 2002-2003 to determine whether there was any significant movement in the mean useful life. Council groups [4] were used as the defining variable. Results indicate that mean useful life is becoming significantly more variable (Table II).Descriptive statistics were then analysed showing a useful life allocation range over the four years of between 3 and 265 years, and an overall mean of 62 years - demonstrating the diversity of useful lives. It was then discovered that of the 170 councils in NSW, up to 98 per cent recorded an error in depreciation of some component of transport infrastructure during 1999-2000 and 2002-2003. The error margin ranged from 11 to 73,520 per cent significantly impacting on the three targeted FKPIs.Following this initial examination, detailed analysis of 28 local government councils classified as being on \"financial watch\" by the DLG was conducted. This analysis was expanded when it became obvious that other councils were also reporting contestable figures. For comparison an additional sample of 28 councils was selected [5]. It was indicated by case study interviews that depreciation expense was often included in the operating statement as a \"balancing figure\". Therefore, it was decided to recalculate depreciation for each of the transport infrastructure components over a period of four years and compare these figures with those reported in the annual reports. For the 56 councils included in the study, differences ranged from councils over recording their depreciation expense by around $20,000,000 to those under stating their expense by up to $52,000,000.Sealed road surface (as the largest cost component of transport infrastructure) was then selected to demonstrate the reason behind some of the differences in Table III[5]. Of the 28 councils on financial watch, 32 per cent did not report a depreciation expense in 1999-2000. In 2000-2001 and 2001-2002 this decreased to 25 per cent and 11 per cent, respectively, but rose again in 2002-2003 to 21 per cent.With respect to the allegedly non-risk councils it was discovered that just as many, and in some years more, errors existed in depreciation calculation. However, evidence collected provides the reason for this - demonstrating the adhocery and blatant misrepresentation of the reported figures and raising the question as to why these councils were not included on the financial watch list. In 2002, 36 per cent of councils did not provide any value for their transport infrastructure, yet, they willingly allocated a useful life to this \"non-existent\" (for reporting purposes) asset and recorded a depreciation expense. On the other hand, 39 per cent of councils recorded a value for their roads but no subsequent depreciation expense, hence producing a better than expected operating result. Overall these 28 non-risk councils produced an operating result that was more than $45 million different from what it would have been if an expense had been recorded.2003 Local Government FKPIs[6]\nConclusion and future research: This paper argues that in NSW it would appear that not all performance indicators meet the original goal of accountability as outlined by the Industry Commission (1997).Performance indicators designed to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of local government and to enhance accountability should be relevant and soundly based (Industry Commission, 1997, p. 6).Although the initial objectives behind the introduction of FKPIs in NSW were in line with those in other Australian states as well as overseas (see for example, Kluvers, 2003; Boyne 2002), continuously inconsistent and erroneous reporting of figures included in these FKPIs have lead to the misrepresentation of a council's true financial position, as demonstrated by results reported in this paper. Of the 170 councils in NSW, up to 98 per cent recorded an error in depreciation of some component of transport infrastructure during 1999-2000 and 2002-2003. The error margin ranged from 11 to 73,520 per cent significantly impacting on the three targeted FKPIs.The findings from the study illustrate that valuation and depreciation of non-current assets gives rise to the potential for manipulation to occur by both preparers and users. It is demonstrated that inconsistencies, ambiguity and hence irrelevance with respect to specific financial decision models are characteristics imbedded in the current reporting practices of local councils in NSW. As a result, figures that are based on ad hoc cost allocation choices and result in ambiguous reports cannot satisfy local government reforms demanding efficiency, effectiveness, responsiveness and accountability. In turn, any decisions by legislative, political or other stakeholders based on these figures must bring into question the accountability of all involved.To return to the original three research issues:1. How are the FKPIs, as reported by local government, calculated? As demonstrated, at least three of the seven current FKPIs are calculated based on questionable transport infrastructure valuation and depreciation figures.2. Do the FKPIs meet the \"relevance, reliability, and accountability\" criteria? The current FKPIs are based on financial health check criteria established in 2000. In 2002 an independent enquiry was held into the financial health check criteria used to determine councils' financial viability. The consultants report included findings such as the financial health check not being a suitable vehicle for comparative analysis and that many of the indicators were \"not inherently reliable\" (Maxwell and Maxwell, 2002, p. 1). The effectiveness of financial indicators relies on the accuracy and completeness of the basic information upon which they are calculated. The consultants found that this requirement had not been met. This enquiry adds to the evidence provided in this paper that the FKPIs set by the DLG are not adequate when it comes to the way in which local councils are reporting figures included in these performance measures.3. Can these FKPIs be used to make judgements about council performance? As Boyne (1997) stated, stakeholders would find it difficult to base decisions on the FKPIs discussed here. For example, what judgement could be made based on the amount of depreciation expense allocated annually by councils? There is currently no requirement for local councils to fund depreciation, hence this \"non-cash\" expense could easily be misinterpreted by stakeholders - such as the media as illustrated earlier in this paper.The paper highlights problems associated with the valuation and depreciation of transport infrastructure which, in turn, impact on both the operating result and FKPIs as reported by local authorities. Future research will question whether what in fact appears in local council annual reports is what was intended by the preparers. This will be achieved with the aid of interviews and a questionnaire. Variables such as manipulation, political influence and staff qualifications will be factored in to attempt to try and explain some of the decision-making processes behind valuation and depreciation of transport infrastructure. Then, like Boyne (1997), the extent to which councils use these performance measures will be analysed.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - Local government in Australia has a complex system of accountability, part of which includes the publication of financial comparative performance measures. The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate how questionable financial figures not only distort the reported \"bottom line\" of local councils but can also be included in a number of financial key performance indicators (FKPIs) upon which council performance is judged. Valuation and depreciation of transport infrastructure assets form the basis for the evaluation.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - A longitudinal study of all New South Wales (NSW) councils (170) from 1999-2000 to 2002-2003 was conducted using archival research combined with in-depth case study analysis and interviews (New South Wales (NSW) is the largest of Australia's eight states and territories). This paper provides detailed analysis of 28 local government councils classified as being on \"financial watch\" by the Department of Local Government and a comparative sample of 28 councils not classified as at risk but reporting figures considered to be contestable (At risk, or financially challenged councils, are defined as \"having issues of concern with their financial operations\").\nFindings: - Of the 170 councils in NSW, up to 98 per cent recorded an error in depreciation of some component of transport infrastructure during 1999-2000 and 2002-2003. The error margin ranged from 11 to 73,520 per cent significantly impacting on the three targeted FKPIs.\nPractical implications: - Future research will examine preparation of possible alternative policies for local government addressing the issue of internal benchmarking and external performance measures.\nOriginality/value: - This research offers some reparation for the relative lack of empirical research literature on local government FKPIs and, in particular, those that do not meet the underlying accountability focus of performance measurement.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Silver lining of envy on social media? The relationships between post content, envy type, and purchase intentions	[ "Purchase intention", "Social media", "Benign envy", "Experiential purchases", "Malicious envy", "Material purchases" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Social comparison theory suggested that people tend to compare themselves with others in order to evaluate themselves (Festinger, 1954). The use of social media, such as Facebook, has amplified the social news of our friends whom we rarely encounter with in real life. The carefully crafted presentations of other's perfect life online, ironically, make Facebook a \"perfect\" place for upward social comparison (Taylor and Strutton, 2016). Recently, more and more researchers have found that the use of Facebook evokes envy and they were concerned about the negative effects of envy on consumers (Chou and Edge, 2012; Krasnova et al., 2015; Lim and Yang, 2015; Tromholt, 2016; Verduyn et al., 2017). However, this paper aims to address the positive sides of envy on social media by taking the type of envy into consideration.\n2. Theoretical background: 2.1 Experiential vs material purchases\n3. Study 1: The first study examined the correlational relationships between post content, envy type and the purchase intentions. It asked participants to recall the last time that they experienced (a little) envy on social media. The perceived purchase type and the degrees of benign and malicious envy were measured, as well as the future purchase intentions of the same and a superior object. In addition, for the purpose of future research, some antecedents of benign and malicious envy were also measured.\n4. Study 2: 4.1 Method\n5. Study 3: So far, there was no strong evidence showing that envy type depends on the post content, but there was evidence for how envy type alters different types of purchase intention. Study 3 will examine these issues from another angle, by showing participants either an experiential- or a material- post (a between-subjects design) and then measuring the degrees of benign and malicious envy and purchases intentions. In order to exclude the other confounding variables, an experiential product that can be phrased in both an experiential and a material way was used. Based on the previous reasoning and findings, it is hypothesized that:\n6. General discussion: Three studies were conducted to examine which type of envy is more prevalent on social media, the antecedents of benign and malicious envy, how post content influences envy type, and how envy type uniquely influences purchase intentions. An overview table is available in the Table AI. The first study was an online survey asked participants to recall the last time they felt envious due to browsing other's social news and describe the situation. Participants identified whether the envied object was a material or an experiential purchase and then reported the degrees of benign and malicious envy and purchase intentions. The second study was a between-subjects experiment in which participants were asked to recall an envy-triggering situation about either a material or an experiential purchase and then report the type of envy and purchase intentions. The last study examined whether different phrasings (experiential vs material) of the same product can trigger different types of envy, and therefore influence purchase intentions.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore the prevalence of benign and malicious envy on social media, and to examine the relationships between shared content (experiential vs material purchases), envy type (benign vs malicious), and purchase intention (toward the same vs a superior object).\nDesign/methodology/approach: Three studies (N=622) were conducted to ask participants to recall the last time they experienced envy due to browsing social media, report an envy-triggering post about either an experiential or a material purchase shared by others and read a post about a friend's newly bought MacBook in either an experiential or a material phrasing. The degrees of benign and malicious envy were measured, as well as the future purchase intentions toward the same and a superior object.\nFindings: The results showed that most of the envious emotions were actually benign envy. Although there was no main effect of purchase type on envy type, both experiential purchases and phrasings were less likely to be perceived as showing off, and therefore triggered less malicious envy. Furthermore, benign envy was positively associated with the purchase intention of the same envied purchase, and malicious envy was positively associated with the purchase intention of something even superior.\nOriginality/value: As browsing other's social news sometimes evokes envy, people were concerned about the negative effects of envy on consumers. However, this paper addressed the positive effects of envy which comes along with a motivation of moving up. This positive motivation can also be utilized for social media advertising.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
How cross-culture affects the outcomes of co-creation	[ "Loyalty", "Co-creation", "Cross-cultural", "Customer satisfaction", "WOM" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Global markets are characterised by fierce competition which has put pressure on firms to seek external collaboration and invest in value generation as a strategy to maintain their customer base (Chen, 2015). Value generation and value sharing are important to both academics and practitioners, as reflected in the myriad of studies published (Gummesson and Mele, 2010; Saarijarvi et al., 2013). Literature highlights the importance of value as a determinant of consumer behaviour (Zeithaml, 1988; Holbrook, 1994) due to the relationship with fundamental marketing-related constructs such as perceived price, service quality, customer satisfaction (Fournier and Mick, 1999; Gupta and Zeithaml, 2006) and as a means of gaining competitive advantage (Payne et al., 2008).\n2. Service-dominant logic and co-creation: potential influence of cross-cultural characteristics: A plethora of customer management literature examines customer satisfaction (Fournier and Mick, 1999; Gupta and Zeithaml, 2006; Kumar et al., 2013), and some extant research considers the relationship between co-creation and satisfaction (Ramaswamy and Gouillart, 2010; Kristal et al., 2016; Navarro et al., 2016). However, whilst the relationship between satisfaction-loyalty and satisfaction-WOM is widely acknowledged, there is scarce empirical research that assesses these relationships within the context of co-creation. Additionally, Fuller (2010) also highlights the importance of analysing customer characteristics within the context of co-creative frameworks. In this sense, to the best of our knowledge, no research exists that examines the influence of customers' cross-cultural characteristics. Whilst Voyer et al. (2017) present a conceptual study, there is a lacuna of empirical evidence.\n3. Development of a conceptual model and corresponding: 3.1 Conceptual model\n4. Research methodology: To test the proposed hypotheses, a study was carried out in the Spanish and British retail banking sector. The service sector has often been used in co-creation studies because of the unique characteristics of services (inseparability, intangibility, heterogeneity and perishability). These characteristics epitomise the importance of customer participation in the service experience (Zeithaml, 1988), and as such, insurance companies, airlines, hotels and restaurants have been used in co-creation studies (Ind et al., 2017). The importance of services in developed economies is unquestionable as they currently represent approximately 75 per cent of the GDP.\n5. Findings: The first step is to analyse the general structural model, i.e. the general relationships without taking into consideration the potential moderating effect of cross-cultural references. To assess the statistical significance of the loadings and of the path coefficients, a bootstrap analysis was performed. We created 500 subsamples, using -student distribution with 499 degrees of freedom (N - 1, with N: number of subsamples), obtaining the values: t(0.01; 499) = 2.5857; t(0.001; 499) = 3.3473. From these values, we determined the acceptance or rejection of our hypotheses (see Table I):\n6. Discussion: 6.1 Theoretical implications\n7. Conclusions: This paper concludes with a series of insights on co-creation from a customer perspective: co-creation can lead to greater customer satisfaction; it has a direct effect on loyalty and WOM, both of which can positively contribute to a firm's profitability. In addition, satisfaction mediates the relationship between co-creation and loyalty and WOM. As such, customer satisfaction strengthens the effect of co-creation. Furthermore, firms should be careful to detect cultural differences and adjust accordingly. With these insights in mind, the authors encourage firms to put co-creation frameworks (such as those shown in Figure 1) into practice.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The aim of this study is two-fold. Firstly, to examine the outcomes of co-creation from a customer perspective using well-recognised customer management variables (customer satisfaction, loyalty and word-of-mouth (WOM). Secondly, to assess potential cross-cultural differences that may exist within the context of co-creation.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A questionnaire was completed in the banking services industry, and the final valid sample comprised individuals from the UK and Spain. Multi-sample analysis was carried out using PLS software.\nFindings: Co-creation has a direct influence on customer satisfaction, customer loyalty and WOM; co-creation activities lead to cumulative customer satisfaction, which also affects customer loyalty and positive WOM. Furthermore, the results show that the direct relationships between co-creation and loyalty and WOM are more powerful for British consumers than Spanish consumers, who need to feel satisfied prior to demonstrating loyalty and engaging in positive WOM.\nPractical implications: Firms can use co-creation as a strategic tool if they provide trustworthy collaboration spaces. Furthermore, firms need to adapt the way they interact, listen and respond to customers in different cultural contexts. Trustworthy collaboration spaces and adapting to cultural differences can result in customers who are more satisfied, loyal to the company and more likely to carry out positive WOM, which can ultimately lead to future business.\nOriginality/value: This study provides insights into co-creation from a customer perspective. Although much service research has examined the drivers of customer co-creation, literature that analyses the consequences of customer co-creation is still scarce. Moreover, this is the first study to provide empirical evidence of cross-cultural differences within the context of co-creation.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Challenging tensions: critical, theoretical and empirical perspectives on social enterprise	[ "Entrepreneurialism", "Social welfare organizations", "Non‐profit organizations" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: This special issue presents five papers exploring the concept and significance of social enterprise and social entrepreneurship internationally. As attention on the topic heightens and the terms are becoming more en vogue, questions remain about social enterprise and the characteristics of social entrepreneurship. This special edition builds on the 1st Critical Perspectives on Social Enterprise seminar, held at Manchester Metropolitan University, organised by the Centre for Enterprise (see www.mmucfe.co.uk/news/26112006/criticalreflectionsonsocialenterprise). The papers presented here raise some interesting issues about current conceptualisations of social enterprise and entrepreneurship, challenging tensions from critical, theoretical and empirical perspectives.\nCritical reflections on social enterprise: A new \"enterprise culture\" is emerging throughout the world, and there is great optimism about the development of social enterprises (Leadbeater, 1997; Nicholls, 2006). Frequently heralded as the saviour of public and private business failure (Evers, 2001; Nicholls, 2006; Westall and Chalkley, 2007) and the answer to \"worklessness\", social isolation and inequality (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, 2006), social enterprise has much to accomplish. Many governments have taken an active interest in social enterprises; in the UK, this has been recognised with the recent emergence of the first social enterprise specific business model, the \"community interest company\", in July 2005 and establishment of the \"Office of the Third Sector\" (OTS) in May 2006.Academically, research in social enterprise and entrepreneurship is gaining some salience as a field of study, predominantly from business and management schools (Ritchie and Lam, 2006; Westall, 2007). Interest, according to Westall (2007), extends from those in corporate social responsibility, co-operative and non-profit centres of expertise (p. 16). However, while the characteristics of social enterprise have yet to reach a level of common understanding, Arthur et al. (2006) suggest that the dominant discourse within the literature amplifies the \"business model\" above all other perspectives.Critical reflection is called for in order to assess different perspectives and provide some challenge to the dominant view. This special issue of the journal builds on the first \"Critical Reflections on Social Enterprise\" seminar in November 2006, held at Manchester Metropolitan University, which gave both theoretical and empirical attention to the development of social enterprise research. To introduce the reader, a critical reflection on social enterprise provides an indication to some of the challenges in the conceptualisation of the field before outlining the five papers that follow.The emergence of the term \"social enterprise\", and the organisations recognised as such, have evolved globally over the past 20 years due to:* the decline of state involvement in the planned provision of services in society; and conceptualisation of the \"market\" (Mulgan, 2006);* the focus of a culture that emphasises self-reliance and personal responsibility and the rise of entrepreneurship more generally (Scase and Goffee, 1980; Kuratko, 2005); and* changes in funding opportunities within the community, voluntary and non-profit (social) sectors - specifically the move from grant giving to contract/competitive tendering and the devolution, deregulation and privatisation of welfare states globally (Pearce, 2003; Goerke, 2003).Hence, the push for the third sector to become more \"entrepreneurial\" and for social enterprises to blend values (Emerson, 2006) and operationalise business principles (Leadbeater, 1997; Pearce, 2003; Nicholls, 2006). But at what cost? A sector built on community, trust and togetherness is being challenged by trends towards \"business-like\" practices (Dart, 2004; Pharoah et al., 2004) and \"managerialism\" (Turnbull, 1994; Terry, 1998; Hulgard and Spear, 2006). At the fore is the swing from grant aid to competitive tendering and contracts, which entails a heightened focus from funding providers that requires more from organisations in terms of management systems, quality standards and marketing (Smallbone et al., 2001; Paton, 2003; Pearce, 2003) than previously required of the non-profit sector.Social enterprise has been described as \"blurring the boundaries between non-profit and profit\" (Dart, 2004). Pearce (2003) describes social enterprise as trading organisations behaving as businesses, closer to the private system than the public, and within the third system. However a distinct image of what constitutes a social enterprise is hard to capture, as no single legal structure or business format encapsulates the term. In the UK, for example, social enterprises can be sole traders, unincorporated and incorporated organisations. There are three overarching (and overlapping) routes for business incorporation:1. company;2. society; or3. charity.These routes provide the conditions for social enterprise through various business formats, such as community interest company (CIC), social firm, development trusts, voluntary community groups, housing associations, football supporters trusts, leisure trusts, community interest organisation (CIO), co-operatives and trading arms of charities (Office of the Third Sector, 2006, p. 11). All of these types can define themselves (or be defined by others) as social enterprises. Dees (1998) suggests that because of the complex structures of third-sector organisations, generalisations of what defines a social enterprise is essentially problematic and ultimately affects our understanding of the sector. To further complicate matters there are differences in interpretation of social enterprise across the globe, highlighted between the USA and Europe (Kerlin, 2006). In the USA the term \"social enterprise\" embraces the entrepreneurial culture, where the individual, the entrepreneur, is focused upon far more than the collective or community (Boschee, 2001; Emerson, 2006; Chell, 2007). The Social Enterprise Alliance, USA (2006), state that a social enterprise is:An organization or venture that advances its social mission through entrepreneurial earned income strategies.Kerlin (2006, p. 249) states that the \"concept of a social economy is not used [in the USA] and non-profit social enterprises are often discussed as operating in the market economy\".In mainland Europe, the term \"social enterprise\" is characterised in terms of a \"stakeholder democracy\" (Turnbull, 1994). L'Emergence des enterprises sociales en Europe (EMES) suggests social enterprises benefit the community and are characterised as autonomous organisations, with group objectives, shared aims and a decision making power that is not based on capital ownership:... one member, one vote or at least a voting power not distributed according to capital shares on the governing body which has the ultimate decision-making rights (L'Emergence des enterprises sociales en Europe, 2004).The European definition then addresses the governance and the distribution of power and focuses much more on democracy of control (Defourny and Nyssens, 2006). In the UK, the concept of social enterprise is seen as comprised of ideas from both Europe and the USA (Hulgard and Spear, 2006; Westall and Chalkley, 2007). The Department of Trade and Industry (2002) states:A social enterprise is a business with primarily social objectives whose surpluses are principally reinvested for that purpose in the business or in the community, rather than being driven by the need to maximise profit for shareholders and owners.The DTI definition outlines the primary intention as social, distinguishing social enterprise as not operating for private profit. The term \"surplus\" - not \"profit\" - is a key indicator of a social enterprise (see Smallbone et al., 2001). Attention is focused on an enterprise as a business \"trading\" and generating surplus as the differentiation between social enterprise activity and other organisations in the social economy (namely charities and voluntary community organisations; see Pearce, 2003).However, the drive towards \"enterprise\" and enterprise culture within the sector is not without its problems (Pharoah et al., 2004). Newman and Wallender (1978) warn that business management concepts in not-for-profit enterprises must be qualified as concepts and needs differ widely. Furthermore, Anheier (2000) suggests that a variety of different management approaches and styles are required but as yet, the management of non-profit organisations remains ill understood because our understanding of these organisations has not gone deep enough. The discourse that surrounds social enterprise has predominantly become enterprise focused, as Arthur et al. (2006) further explain:... a \"business case\" narrative and discourse is being privileged in the practice of social enterprise research to the detriment of providing conceptual and theoretical recognition of the social (p. 2).The dominance of the business discourse and drive for social enterprises to be the quick fix for societies' ills has detracted the attention from the foundations of these organisations - from the social. Arthur et al. (2006) suggest that there appears to be an implication and assumption that \"social\" and \"enterprise\" are mutually inclusive. Arthur et al. (2006) state:Ten or so years ago it would have seemed like an oxymoron to amalgamate the terms social and enterprise. Since that time the concept has rapidly passed from obscurity to the status of orthodoxy (p. 2).To amalgamate social and enterprise is then problematic. Legitimising the union of the terms suggests the narrative in the literature has moved toward one that if the business activities are a success in the market it will follow that the social aims will, in essence, take care of themselves (Arthur et al., 2006). This leap of faith is complicated, as it characterises social enterprise as a way of \"doing\" business.The competitive environment and race for profits can be destructive, particularly if service delivery is about being more efficient and making profits at the expense of meeting community needs. Goerke (2003) suggests a rejection of the conceptualisation of social enterprise as \"businesses\" per se and indicates that for these organisations business decisions are influenced by a different agenda to the private and public sectors. Pearce (2003, p. 33) states: \"The primary purpose of a social enterprise is social [...] commercial activity is secondary in the sense that it is the means to achieving the primary purpose\" - understanding how this influences the decision making in social enterprises in practice is lesser known and there are gaps between the theory and practice (Hines, 2005). This represents a challenge for theoretical development and highlights a lack of empirical understanding of the organisations in this sector. The critique here suggests the synergy of the terms \"social\" and \"enterprise\" are not as reconcilable in practice. It would therefore appear that the complex nature of social enterprise is more than simply a new dimension to business culture. This Special Issue of the journal seeks to expand the debate in social enterprise and bring to the fore some critical perspective in order to highlight alternative views which are often in conflict with the wave of euphoria and optimism that is driving current theoretical development in the field of social enterprise and entrepreneurship.The papers contribute to knowledge capital on social enterprise in five distinctly different ways. I hope you enjoy the Special Issue and reflect on this very important field that is set to change the world and change the way in which many businesses work.The first contribution from the 1st Critical Perspectives on Social Enterprise Seminar is from Curtis, who considers critical management theory in light of his own research, from one particular research project. The paper recognises the influence of culture, history and social position and applies a number of theoretical lenses through which to view the social enterprise movement, namely \"contractualism\", \"managerialism\", \"agencification\", \"militant decency\", \"social movements\" and \"post-liberalism\". Curtis concludes that the cynicism at the \"outliers\" of an otherwise successful project, where such descriptions of SEs as \"un-businesslike\", \"yet to learn the language\" and \"amateurism\" are found, are actually part of the \"recalcitrance and resistance\" and characteristics of being and becoming social enterprises. It is not that weakness and failure are to be disregarded but part of the rich tapestry and the very pearl that social enterprise is meant to be.The second contribution from the 1st Critical Perspectives on Social Enterprise Seminar is from Ridley-Duff, who asks whether the goal of social enterprise policy is the creation of a \"not-for-profit\" or a \"more-than-profit\" business movement. The author outlines four typologies of social enterprise and a framework that reflects the heterogeneity of social processes that drive social enterprise development. Ridley-Duff argues that instead of viewing \"social enterprise\" as a subset of the social economy, it can be viewed as a range of business practices that proactively build economic and social capital across the affected stakeholder groups. As such, it regains an ideological character (and basis) that moves the definition away from \"profit\"-based definitions towards an understanding of social enterprise as the development of alternative business structures (and practices) that support socially rational objectives.The third paper, by Cato, Arthur, Keenoy and Smith, extends the concept of entrepreneurship, focusing on the enterprising activities that are undertaken by groups of people using innovative ownership and control structures to achieve their aims of producing renewable energy and community benefit. They explore where the classic business model needs refinement to accommodate the mutual values of social and \"associative entrepreneurship\". Using case study research of seven organisations in the renewable energy sector in Wales, Cato et al. provide insights into the pluralist motivations of groups of people that have acted entrepreneurially in order to establish their organisations. This exploratory paper moves towards an understanding of community commitment and co-operative virtues that seek to challenge the assumptions of entrepreneurship as a lone figure, solely for the purpose of the accumulation of individual wealth, by exposing the potential of entrepreneurship as a positive community endeavour.The fourth paper, by Jones, Latham and Betta, examines the process by which the social entrepreneurial identity can be constructed through narrative. The research questions the process by which social entrepreneurs construct their identity. They use case study analysis of a social activist entrepreneur from a major Australian city. The paper takes a constructivist approach, allowing the entrepreneur to tell their story. The focus of analysis is on understandings and meanings through language and discourse. Jones et al. discuss how this social entrepreneur, through narrative construct identity, dealt with the tension of managing conflicting discourses through a process of \"crafted divisioning\" and \"discourse suppression\". The authors state that this approach can make a strong contribution to the social entrepreneurship literature as this can unpack the social enmeshment of the sense making of the social entrepreneur.The fifth contribution, by Urban, provides an empirical investigation into the social entrepreneurial intentions of university students in South Africa. Urban interrogates the social entrepreneurship literature and identifies the necessary factors for social entrepreneurship to flourish. He then seeks to measure quantitatively students' intentions to engage in activities associated with successful social entrepreneurs through an instrument designed for the research. Two hypotheses based on definitional controversies and distinctions between managerial and entrepreneurial skills were formulated and subsequently tested for significance. Further questioning captured students' inclinations towards trying to start/manage any kind of social, voluntary or community service, activity or initiative. The results conclude that students are likely as a group to be engaged in socially entrepreneurial activities and display the kinds of skills sets needed to flourish in the sector.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to introduce the special issue, which explores the concept and significance of social enterprise and social entrepreneurship internationally.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - This introductory article examines the literature that exists to date and presents an outline of some of the fundamental issues and the challenging tensions within the conceptualisation of social enterprise. The article concludes with a discussion of critical future research needs.\nFindings: - The findings suggest that a critical perspective is required in order to add originality and value to this developing area of research.\nOriginality/value: - The papers presented raise some interesting issues about current conceptualisations of social enterprise and entrepreneurship, challenging tensions from critical, theoretical and empirical perspectives. The Special Issue seeks to expand the debate in social enterprise and bring to the fore some critical perspective in order to highlight alternative views which are often in conflict with the wave of euphoria and optimism that is driving current theoretical development in the field of social enterprise and entrepreneurship.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Remarks on the quality of the construction of business concepts	[ "Business analysis", "Quality", "Competences", "Customers" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The present and increasing interest in the management of new business concepts largely lies in the early history of modern information technologies (Morris et al., 2005). Such questions as how to establish and manage new business forms and make them profitable became topical due to the rapid diffusion and huge application potential which the emerging information and communication technologies (ICT) seemed to imply (Shaw, 2000). A number of new potential ways of doing business emerged, anticipating that new technologies would be capable of breaking down any conventional competitive structure. In accordance with this development path a general management view has started to gain some footing indicating that doing business in a new way is possible through the development of new business concepts and the establishment of corresponding business models (Mitchell and Coles, 2004; Kim and Mauborgne, 2001; Osborne, 1995).Any fresh internet search can easily indicate that business educators, managers and consultants frequently refer to new business concepts or new business models. The academic community has simultaneously acknowledged that the status and origin of the whole idea of the business concept or model are ill defined calling for more conceptual clarity and rigour (Schafer et al., 2005). Relevant literature indicates that the term business concept is often used as a synonym for any business idea, which in turn is often used as a synonym for business models. All this naturally indicates that the basis of these concepts is inherited from the field of strategy research (Hedman and Kalling, 2003). Given that there is no full agreement either on what such a broad concept as strategy exactly means, the prevailing situation does not make the capturing of the essence of business conceptualization or modelling easier. It is questionable if we are dealing with a new and promising workable research and/or management tool worth employing or with some modification of old management ideas only. In approaching this dilemma the key premise of this study is that business concepts do not result from managerial planning or as a by-product of strategy making but are rather subject to innovation and recognition of new opportunities. In this respect the aim of this study is twofold. Firstly, the basic components of traditional strategy making and any implications these may have are studied in order to identify what a business concept is all about and how it might be constructed. Secondly, relevant literature as the basis an integrating framework is suggested indicating, what are the most fundamental elements of business concept construction.\nThe origins of the business concept: According to Webster's English vocabulary the origin of concept lies in its Latin root word \"conceptum\" or \"a thing conceived\". The term \"concept\" was used to mean a draft or abstract, something which in medieval times came to mean an idea or some kind of thinking model. In this respect, the term \"idea\" corresponds very closely to the meaning of the term \"concept\" implying that as English phrases both concept and idea basically refer to the same facet of a given business firm as to its basic characteristics, activities and ability to compete. By employing the term \"idea\" Richard Normann as early as the 1960s introduced his concept of business idea - something for which, for example, Hackner (1993) substitutes the notion of business concept.The demands of an effective exchange system means according to Normann (1975) that any firm needs a business idea that makes it possible to govern a firm's product/market segments or territories in a given exchange context. The governance of territories takes place via superior competencies or abilities which are unique and often result from a long-term development process. Governance also depends on the firm's organizational circumstances. As a whole the business idea is based on a systemic view implying that the essence of a successful business is a proper fit between key business components. The core of a given business idea becomes a harmonious working whole which comprises the firm's product, customers and way of doing business (Normann, 2001). A business idea in other words makes it understandable what the firm's success factors are (Van der Heijden, 2001).Finding a good fit\nThe role of innovation: Competitive basis of innovation\nValue creation: Nature of value creation\nConstructing business concepts: Taking advantage of new opportunities\nExploring the empirical evidence: In order to learn and enrich the understanding of the key character and change factors behind the construction of new business concepts two firms about which the author of this paper had a good preknowledge were visited during the summer 2005. Based on this background a full access and confidential atmosphere could be created. Correspondingly, an information-oriented, intrinsic case approach was applied (Flyvbjerg, 2004; Stake, 1994; Dyer and Wilkins, 1991). Both firms have a strikingly similar background as to their top management. Director-owners have only a limited formal education, but they have a long personal experience in their field and their present business concepts have emerged more or less by accident. A narrative interviewing approach was applied in the sense that the interviewees were asked to remember the key phases and incidents in their firm history and to describe any major changes which followed. Those inputs - whether resources or activities - the managers believed were decisive in the development of the firm and which they insisted on leading to the present market position and the way of doing business were in particular discussed and emphasized. Extra questions and counterarguments were always asked when relevant in order to confirm what was stated earlier and also to generate a holistic view of the underlying decision-making context (Gummesson, 1988). In both cases the length of discussions was about three hours during which an instant memoing also took place.Generating a new concept for forest machines\nFinal notes: Based on the case evidence it can be stated that in the case of the construction of business concepts the original meaning of the idea as a modelling thinking has less value. Given that innovation forms the driving force behind a new business concept it simply emerges independent of the order and context of modelling thinking. The key characteristics of the development of new business concepts can hence be understood by digging deeply into the roots of innovation management and the underlying unexpectedness which innovation by definition implies. The proposed framework offers a holistic view of which elements are worth focusing on in terms of the construction of new business concepts. According to the case evidence similarity with the innovation management and defining one's business is evident. In both cases the framework makes it possible to identify the demands of configuration and any embedded terms of competence building once some new ideas have emerged.Given that the exploration of two cases only is in question more empirical research is called for. A crucial question to be answered in the future research is which type of construction is successful and how the underlying configuration can be managed? The case firms indicate that new business concepts can offer a growth path too. It can be seen, however, that this implies a paradox which in particular concerns smaller firms which try to enter into new markets. If it is agreed that understanding the everyday reality of customers is the major source of innovations, one has to be present in the targeted market. On the other hand, given the inherent competition and lack of resources, which small firms tend to face, they may not have the ability to compete before a proper innovation exists. The configuration of existing business activities may offer a solution through differentiation but is something which is not in general possible without building new competences. Innovation and competence building in other words proves the two most decisive critical factors behind the construction of successful new business concepts.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to develop a framework for the construction of business concepts.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The proposed framework is developed through a discussion which is based on a review of existing literature and prevailing views as regards the concept of the business concept. The key premises of the study are tested through an explorative case research.\nFindings: - Customer value is the core of the proposed framework. Customer interface, product offering and differentiation form the key value creating platform in the management of business concepts. All three components of the platform are tightly linked and dependent of each others, implying that in order to find a good harmony firms must think holistically and be prepaid for adjustments. A new business configuration becomes necessary each time when the terms of the value creation are changed to deal with the competition. Configuration of existing business activities may offer a solution through differentiation but is subject to the building of new competences. As a whole innovation and competence building form the two most decisive critical factors behind the construction of successful new business concepts.\nPractical implications: - The suggested framework indicates upon which key issues business managers should focus when they aim to identify and develop new business concepts.\nOriginality/value: - The concept of business concept is highly undeveloped as to its conceptual clarity and relation to strategic thinking. Also the existing literature of this topic is very scarce. The suggested framework improves this situation in attempting to develop a concrete tool for the understanding of what a business concept is.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
The art and science of effective feedback: What works, what does not ... and why	[ "Feedback", "Employee development", "Performance", "Performance management" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Feedback. The very word can tie our stomachs in knots, whether we need to give it or have to receive it. In this article, I will explore some of the reasons our brains struggle with this area of human interaction - and some strategies for doing it more effectively.\nThe pain of social rejection: We evolved to live co-operatively, in small groups. It was the only way to survive for the 200,000 years we have been homo sapiens, and in our evolutionary history before that. Our need to belong is as real and pervasive - and as important to our survival - as hunger or thirst. In fact, brain studies have shown that being rejected activates many of the same regions of the brain that are involved in physical pain.It makes sense if we think about this from an evolutionary perspective. In terms of sheer survival, we are always safer assuming threat than not, whether it is a stick-shaped snake that we jump away from or a vague sense that a person may not like us. Our limbic system, responsible for scanning for threats, and therefore keeping us alive, is finely tuned to whether we are safely part of the group, whether we are deemed acceptable or deficient, whether we belong.Feedback, even well intentioned, can often trigger a limbic response. We think we should be responding rationally, but deeply entrenched safety-driven neural pathways are screaming \"threat!\" On a basic level, even if it is not true in today's society, being left out of the group makes us fear for our survival. This puts us in a mode where our higher brain shuts down, making it hard to take in what the other person is saying. In other words, when feedback is given without relationship firmly in place, it often quite literally is not heard.\nWhat to do: get authentically connected: If you do nothing else, do this. When the person you are giving feedback to really knows that he or she is safe, you have a lot more room to say things and have them heard. As outlined above, a limbic (fight or flight) response takes our higher brain \"offline\" by flooding it with norapenephrine, the adrenalin of the brain. This makes us less focused, present and able to create and retrieve memories. When connection and safety do not feel threatened, the higher brain stays available to process and make sense of the information.We have also come to believe that there is little benefit to unsolicited feedback. It is like seeing a snake in the road - we react first and this makes it hard to hear and interact with the feedback effectively. Context and relationship must be created before the feedback is given if you want it to have the most powerful, positive impact. Ideally, the person receiving the feedback will also have a choice as to whether he or she wants to hear it, and when. (Note: in terms of performance reviews and formal feedback structures, the choice was made as part of the terms of the job.)\nWe tend to listen from our dominant hemisphere: People tend to listen from the dominant hemisphere of their brain. This can have a positive or negative effect, depending on whether the person receiving feedback has gone into fight or flight or is staying present and open.On the up side, the left hemisphere of the brain, highly dominant in the western world, brings the capacity for logic and rationality, thus analyzing feedback for what it is, taking what is helpful and leaving what is not.On the other hand, the left hemisphere also has a tendency to eliminate things from its focus that do not fit what it has already decided. In other words, if what you are telling me does not match what I already believe about myself, I may not take in your feedback at all. I may literally not hear or see it.Add this to the fact that the left hemisphere also has a strong bias towards positivity, and you get a strange sort of Teflon phenomenon, where the person is pointed towards areas of improvement and yet acts as if he or she can do no wrong and continues with his or her previous behavior.In flight or flight mode, the left hemisphere also sees things in terms of competition and dominance, and this can lead to defensiveness and arguing with the feedback.The right hemisphere, on the plus side, sees things in terms of the big picture, human connection and empathy. This is helpful when receiving feedback because we take it in context, stay connected and have empathy for the impact we created.On the down side, the right hemisphere has a tendency toward negativity and depression. It can take people to a place of self-judgment where they invalidate themselves and want to give up. This hemisphere, in fight or flight, has a tendency to feel overwhelmed and lost in a chaotic emotional state where the value and the truth of the feedback are lost.\nWhat to do: get the opposite hemisphere activated in the feedback process or, ideally, activate both: A head-to-head battle with a person's left hemisphere is a losing proposition. If you are faced with someone who seems impervious to feedback, or fights and competes, use strategies to activate the more sensitive, empathic and receptive right hemisphere of the brain.A simple non-threatening one is having the person use a metaphor to reflect back the feedback he or she heard. This will activate the visual circuitry in the brain, which taps into deeper awareness and understanding. (Note: it may take a skilled coach to get a person to reflect in this way.)For example, the feedback might be about the person having a strong, overwhelming impact in meetings. In debriefing this, the left hemisphere may be thinking: \"Well, what is wrong with that? I am a leader, and they can get out of the way!\" If it ends there, the person \"got\" the feedback, but it did not make any difference.If instead, the person asked for a metaphor, then he or she might say: \"OK, I guess I am an elephant! What is wrong with that?\" A coach can then help the person to look at the experience of being an elephant; what is good about it and what are the drawbacks. By using metaphor, the person is much more likely to begin to see that there may be limitations to this way of being that they are unaware of, leading to authentic motivation to change.Of course, there are other strategies that will engage people's right hemisphere. Having them reflect on the bigger picture (holistic thinking) and take different perspectives (activating empathy) are two other ways to create greater awareness.To balance an over-activated right hemisphere where the person is emotionally overwhelmed and invalidating himself or herself, it can be helpful to bring in logic and rationality. Having the person reflect on where he or she is doing things well and has succeeded can bring the person back to a state of openness and presence.Additionally, the left hemisphere provides structure and accountability. Helping the person to see a step-by-step plan for improvement can create an energy of receptivity and hope, which can pull him or her out of the \"emotional overwhelm\".If you are managing someone who has a tendency toward taking feedback in an overly emotional way (feedback will bring up emotions in most people - this is normal, natural and appropriate) or who does not take it seriously at all, the best strategy is to have the person to tell on himself or herself. This does not tend to activate the limbic system, pushing us into fight or flight, but appeals to our higher brains that actually love to reflect.\nSubjectivity, culture and personal reference points: Our feedback to someone often reveals more about ourselves than it does about the other person. For example, when we are asked to rate someone's behavior, such as in a 360-degree review, we tend to rate it in reference to ourselves. As Marcus Buckingham said in a 2011 article on 360-degree reviews: \"If you rate me high on setting a clear vision for our team, all we learn is that I am clearer on that vision than you are; if you rate me low, we learn that you are clearer than I am\" (Buckingham, 2011). Buckingham calls this \"bad data,\" and says that even if you have 20 people's answers in a 360-degree review, 20 inputs of bad data do not make a reliable report. Bad + bad does not equal good.In addition, we tend to think that there is a right and wrong way to do things. Each culture, including the culture within an organization, has its own ideals. For example, if the ideal/assumption in your organization is that challenging people and \"calling them on their BS\" creates the most growth, and you personally believe more in nurturing and focusing on strengths, you will be given \"feedback\" that you are not measuring up. And you will not be, but only relative to the ideal, which ultimately may or may not be effective.\nWhat to do: provide feedback in terms of the impact you experienced: Marcus Buckinham adds: \"Although you are not a reliable rater of my behavior, you are an extremely reliable rater of your own feelings and emotions.\" Thus, while you cannot necessarily trust your own judgment of my performance or behavior, you can trust the impact it had on you. This is good data, and although, as the saying goes, \"one swallow does not make a summer,\" adding good data to good data will provide a much more accurate reading of what is going on.Through studies in neuroscience, psychology, consciousness and even quantum physics, we are learning new things daily about how humans think and behave. Effectiveness is a moving target - what was promoted a few years ago as the key to success may not actually be so. As we develop our awareness we need to stay flexible and open as to whether we are stuck in a bias about what works and what does not. This is another reason why providing feedback on the person's impact is so important.\nIn conclusion: Providing truly effective feedback is an art and a science. It requires awareness of the other person's emotional state and a commitment to authentically connect with him or her. When feedback is done well, it can be one of the most powerful tools in a leader's toolbox for effecting change and growth. When done poorly, it can lead to little change at best, and profound disengagement at worst. I hope these ideas will help you to take your feedback to the next level.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to explain how to provide effective feedback.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The paper considers three impediments to effective feedback - the pain of social rejection, the fact that people tend to listen from their dominant brain hemisphere and subjectivity, culture and personal reference points - and describes how to overcome them.\nFindings: - The paper highlights the importance of getting authentically connected, getting the opposite brain hemisphere activated in the feedback process or, ideally, activating both, and providing feedback in terms of the impact a person experienced.\nPractical implications: - The paper asserts that context and relationship must be created before the feedback is given for it to have the most powerful, positive impact. Ideally, the person receiving the feedback will also have a choice as to whether he or she wants to hear it, and when.\nSocial implications: - The paper reveals that, through studies in neuroscience, psychology, consciousness and even quantum physics, new things are being learned daily about how humans think and behave.\nOriginality/value: - The paper reveals why feedback can make people feel threatened and explains what to do about it.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Exploring the performance effects of performance measurement system use in maintenance process	[ "Performance measurement", "Operational performance", "Maintenance management", "Exploratory case study", "Leadership style", "Field service" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: There is more to the successful use of performance measurement systems in maintenance processes than the act of measurement. To be sure, designing an appropriate set of measures and applying them correctly are key to avoiding many known pitfalls (Neely et al., 1997, 2005). However, in the case of misuse or non-use, the intended positive influences of performance measurement on the organisation's performance are lost (Johnston and Clark, 2008; Neely and Bourne, 2000). It is of high practical interest to determine how performance measurement systems should be used operationally to achieve performance effects and what the antecedents of such use are.\n2. Literature review: To begin with definitions, we view performance measurement as the quantification of an organisation's goals in terms of efficiency and effectiveness. In simple terms, performance measurement is about quantifying performance (Johnston and Clark, 2008). Following Neely et al. (1995) we see performance as having two aspects: efficiency and effectiveness. Efficiency measures how economically the organisation uses its resources and effectiveness captures the extent to which customer requirements are met.\n3. Methods: 3.1 Research design\n4. Results and analysis: This section presents the results derived from the analysis of the survey data. Section 4.1 introduces the summated scales established through principal component analysis and discusses their meaning. Section 4.2 then presents the results of the regression analyses, which explore and elaborate on the propositions of the conceptual model. Finally, Section 4.3 synthesises the results and outlines the main findings of the study.\n5. Discussion: The conducted study provides a complementary, operational-level view of performance measurement to the strategic, higher-level management perspective provided by current literature on maintenance performance management (Coetzee, 1999; Kutucuoglu et al., 2001; Parida and Kumar, 2006; Gaiardelli et al., 2007; Muchiri et al., 2011). The study identifies a set of situations to be investigated in the evaluation of outcomes on operational-level from introducing a performance measurement system in a maintenance process. In the section that follows we discuss the reasons for the observed effects of the performance management system in the case organisation, the role of organisational context, and practical implications. A note on limitations concludes the discussion.\n6. Conclusions: This paper has discussed different usage practices of performance measurement systems and their role in the constitution of the performance effects of performance measurement. Prior literature has identified broad categories of performance measurement system use and focused rather heavily on strategic, upper-level management in the use of these systems. In this exploratory single-case study, we examine usage practices and their contribution to improved performance in more detail in maintenance. According to our analysis, the main usage practices of performance measurement system are Inspect and Improve, Decision Making, and Motivate. Regarding the performance effects, Inspect and Improve and Motivate were the central usage practices contributing to improved performance in the maintenance process. Furthermore, our findings emphasise motivation as an important behavioural factor that is achieved with the use of performance measurement systems and that relates to improved performance.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The intended function of performance measurement is to support the effective management of an organisation and the improvement of organisational performance. However, how performance measurement should be used operationally to support the achievement of improved performance is not self-evident. The purpose of this paper is to examine the operational use of performance measurement in practice and to describe how different use practices contribute to improved performance.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The authors conducted an exploratory single case study in a maintenance process. Data were collected using a mixed methods approach that encompassed qualitative meetings and interviews (identification of usage practices) followed by a quantitative survey (elaboration of usage practices and their performance effects).\nFindings: Three usage practices are relevant: Inspect and Improve, Motivate, and Decision Making. Improved performance is best achieved through motivational and supportive improvement use. Furthermore, performance measurement systems must be designed properly to establish their use.\nResearch limitations/implications: Being based on a single-case study, the identified usage practices may be limited to field service organisations or other organisations with similar organisational structures. The findings suggest opportunities for further research linking operational performance measurement system use and the body of knowledge on the design and purpose of performance measurement in maintenance processes.\nPractical implications: A performance measurement system can be used as a motivational improvement tool in operational level leadership. Upper level management must support its use by designing an understandable and applicable system.\nOriginality/value: This paper identifies specific usage practices that contribute to improved performance, thereby providing a more detailed view than the usage categories found in the extant literature. The focus is on operational, rather than strategic, level management.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Organizational cognitive neuroscience - potential (non-) implications for practice	[ "Organization development", "Leadership", "Management", "Knowledge exchange", "Organizational cognitive neuroscience" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The new field of organizational cognitive neuroscience (OCN) is deepening understanding of managerial decision making (for a systematic review of recent developments, see Butler et al., 2016). This statement refers to deepening theoretical understanding of decision making within management and organizations. However, deepening understanding about the application of theoretical advances in the context of leadership and organization development is proving more problematic. This is mainly because mobilizing the new knowledge for the education of leaders and their teams is not easy. What do the results of neuroimaging and physiology-based research methods tell us about the practice of decision making? Some scholars tell us that OCN theory may have implications for practice (Boyatzis et al., 2012), whilst others, are much more circumspect (Lindebaum and Zundel, 2013). This paper takes a middle line. The paper should be read as a parallel contribution to Butler et al. (2016), emphasizing here the potential implications and non-implications of Butler et al. (2016) for those leading change and organization development activities.\nWhat is OCN?: OCN is not yet fixed in its definition. This is not surprising because OCN is an emerging field of research which is just beginning to explore the application of biology within leadership and organization development. What most observers may agree on is that there is a contemporary focus on understanding the relationship between people's mental processes and their behaviours and effectiveness in organizations. Hannah et al. (2013, p. 406) would go as far to state that this is a \"cognitive revolution\". Lindebaum and Zundel (2013, p. 857), though, take the opposite view: \"we find suggestions that we are at the brink of a neuroscientific revolution in the study of leadership premature, and a sole focus on neuroscience, at the expense of insights from other social science disciplines, dangerous\". A systematic review of 40 empirical studies focussed on OCN and managerial decision making (Butler et al., 2016), does not constitute a revolution, but it signals the emergence of OCN as new resource for leadership and organization development. More than that, OCN is a missing level when exploring the process of change and the variability of the success in implementation (Butler and Senior, 2007). This is because OCN deepens understanding of managerial decision making at the cognitive level (Butler et al., 2016), and contributes to emerging debates about materializing strategy as a practice that \"people do in organizations\" (Arnaud et al., 2016, p. 38).\nNeuroimaging: Neuroimaging is still the main research method for OCN research. An example from each of the three clusters of economics, marketing and organizational behaviour will be presented. The clusters were identified in Butler et al.'s (2016) systematic review of OCN and managerial decision making. This will be followed by a discussion about the potential implications of the OCN empirical articles for leadership and organization development.\nPhysiology-based research methods: Following a similar pattern to the section on neuroimaging, the paper now turns to briefly summarising key findings from a selection of studies which used physiology-based research methods in Butler et al.'s (2016) systematic review. This section will then explore the potential implications of the findings for leadership and organization development. Similarly, an example from each of the three clusters (economics, marketing and organizational behaviour) will be presented.\nContributions to the practice of leadership and organization development: Butler et al. (2016) argue that there is a need to explore translational activities about how OCN research findings can be ethically applied to the management of organizations. This paper makes three overall contributions to OCN translational activities, which relate to the practice of leadership and organization development. Future directions for knowledge exchange in this area are identified.\nConcluding remarks: Currently, there does not appear to be a sufficient discussion about critically exploring the potential implications of OCN for practice. With the growth of published OCN research, and its consolidation through a recent systematic review of empirical developments (Butler et al., 2016), such a discussion becomes more important. This is because OCN research raises profound ethical issues related to leadership and organization development. This paper is part of the start of the evaluation of the practical and social implications of OCN research. OCN is a brave new world of research and practice opportunities, but it comes with debates and concerns, and more basic and applied research is needed to more fully understand managerial decision making.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to highlight the potential implications and non-implications for leadership and organization development of a recent systematic review of empirical developments in organizational cognitive neuroscience (OCN).\nDesign/methodology/approach: Butler et al.'s (2016) systematic review of 40 empirical articles related to OCN is re-interpreted in terms of its potential to reveal (non-) implications for practice. OCN is critically discussed, then related to the research findings from studies with two methodological designs.\nFindings: At this stage of OCN's emergence, it appears that neuroimaging and physiology-based research methods have equal potential in their implications for practice, though hormonal data poses ethical public interest dilemmas. Both methods cannot be reduced to specific forms of application to practice, but they set an aspirational direction for the future development of leadership and organizations.\nPractical implications: There appear to be two paces of translational activity - practitioners are moving more quickly than academics in applying OCN to practice. It is suggested that a meeting of minds may be needed to ensure that any risks associated with applying OCN to practice are minimized or eliminated.\nSocial implications: Inter-disciplinary research, like OCN, requires a social consensus about how basic research in cognitive neuroscience can be applied to organizations. A think tank will provide opportunities for deeper engagement and co-production between academics and practitioners.\nOriginality/value: Critically exploring the potential implications of OCN for practice, by basing the discussion on a systematic review of empirical developments.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Overcoming cross-cultural barriers to knowledge management using social media	[ "Web 2.0", "Culture", "Knowledge management", "Social networking" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: According to a latest Forrester report (2012) on competitive advantage through social business, smart leaders in organizations are increasingly moving toward aiding problem solving by reducing the barriers between individuals and the available information. This increased emphasis on accessibility to knowledge is also due to rapidly changing technology, market scenarios and pressure to make decisions within a short span of time. Organizations are counting on effective knowledge management (KM) to help them achieve their goals in an efficient and faster way. As a result, understanding and implementing KM has become an important goal for leaders across all organizations. Various factors can significantly impact the KM practices (with or without technology) within the organization. For example, research has shown that organizational culture plays an important role in the proliferation of KM as well as acceptance of KM systems and practices within the organization (De Long and Fahey, 2000).\nKey concepts in KM: The term \"KM\" has been discussed and defined by many researchers. For example, Alavi and Leidner (1999) define knowledge as a flow of information that has been processed in the mind of an individual. They indicate that KM is the communication, integration and application of knowledge throughout the organization. Another usable definition is that knowledge is a mix of experiences, values and insights that can help us integrate and evaluate new information (Davenport and Prusak, 2000). Data, information and knowledge are often incorrectly used interchangeably. Data are a view of \"what\" happened. Information gives you the context in which it has happened. Finally, knowledge leads into the consequences of \"knowing what you know now\" and its application to future scenarios. Thus, the move from data to information and to knowledge involves adding value at each step (Davenport and Prusak, 2000).\nNational culture: Many organizations are now transcending national borders and have diverse workforce which may belong to multiple nationalities. In such cases, characteristics of the national culture within individuals may impact KM activities such as knowledge creation and sharing. Knowledge is often tacit and embedded in context. When an organization has employees from different cultures, understanding the context of knowledge held by individuals or processes needs to be understood as well. Research on cross-cultural influences on knowledge sharing is important and needed (Weir and Hutchings, 2005) as this will influence the success of KM practices within the organization.\nCultural barriers to KM processes: In this section, we discuss how different dimensions of national culture may act as barriers to the various KM processes within the organization.\nSocial media and KM: Social media is often interchangeably used with the term Web 2.0, which refers to the collection of technologies that enable easy sharing and flow of knowledge. Some of the commonly used social media tools include Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, Wikis and Blogs, etc. The advent of social media has huge implications for organizations in this knowledge economy. Social media is being driven by Web 2.0 tools whose main claim to fame is that it encourages participation and emphasizes contribution of users in creation and organization of knowledge as opposed to the traditional store-and-retrieve methods (Tredinnick, 2006).\nSocial media: the antidote to cultural barriers: There has been considerable research on the roles of Blogs, Twitter, Wikis, etc., as a tool for knowledge collaboration and sharing (Jung, 2009; Hsu and Lin, 2008; Cayzer, 2004). Let us discuss how some of the common social media tools can be used to alleviate the reviewed cultural barriers to KM.\nImplications for practice and research: This paper addresses the critical issue of cultural barriers to KM processes. For KM practitioners, it means KM system failures due to cultural factors may exist and can be overcome using social media. However, managers first need to understand the different cultural dimensions that may impact their KM process. They can then address the barriers due to specific cultural traits by choosing appropriate social media technology. Using the appropriate social media tools will help managers facilitate the various KM processes and ensure KM success.\nSummary: In this paper, we explored the relationship between national culture and social media enabled KM. We looked at how the various dimensions of national culture can significantly impact the KM processes. Social media can help by using its rich interface and technology to overcome some cross-cultural barriers that global organizations face.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the barriers to knowledge management (KM) due to various national cultural dimensions and to understand how social media can be used to mitigate those barriers to KM processes within organizations.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The paper begins with a focussed review of existing literature to understand the key concepts in KM and national culture. The paper then outlined the important dimensions of national culture and the barriers they introduce to the KM processes. The paper also briefly reviews the features of some of the popular social media tools available. The paper then conceptually link the three areas of KM, national culture and social media to emerge with a clear picture of how social media can overcome KM barriers due to specific cultural traits.\nFindings: National culture has multiple dimensions and each of these dimensions can act as a significant barrier to KM within organizations. Social media tools have rich interactive features which can help overcome these barriers. Choosing the correct social media tool with specific features can help alleviate the issues introduced by specific cultural traits.\nOriginality/value: This paper integrates the three areas of KM, national culture and social media. It provides an understanding of how the various cultural dimensions can act as barriers to KM. It particularly outlines specific social media tools to remedy obstacles to KM due to each of the national culture dimension.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Graduate employment in SMEs: a longitudinal perspective	[ "Graduates", "Small to medium‐sized enterprises", "Training", "United Kingdom" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Many small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) exhibit conservative, inward looking and paternal workplace cultures. Skill deficiencies can act as barriers to SME growth (DfEE, 1998;; De Faoite et al., 2003). Over the last two decades, British governments have introduced initiatives that have dramatically expanded the size of the higher education (HE) system in the UK (Johnson, 2002). Through its lifelong learning agenda the Labour government is promoting skills initiatives to enhance the competitiveness of SMEs (DfEE, 2001). Government is encouraging more SMEs to employ university graduates. Few empirical studies have, however, focused upon the graduate skills supplied and sought by owners of SMEs. Also, there is scant evidence relating to the profiles of students considering careers in entrepreneurship.This study discusses evidence from a large representative sample of students who participated in the 1994 Shell Technology Enterprise Programme (STEP). Specifically, this comparative static longitudinal study focuses on outcomes presumed to be associated with the programme. Three issues are explored. First, we review the skills reported by STEP and non-STEP graduates (i.e. a control of students who had never participated in the programme) reporting full-time employment positions in 1997 (i.e. two years after graduation). Second, we review the skills of STEP and non-STEP students who obtained full-time jobs in small private firms in 1997. A human capital framework is utilised. Supply and demand-side factors associated with the recruitment of students are explored. Third, we review the supply and demand-side factors associated with students reporting favourable attitudes to self-employment or business ownership in 1997.The next section reviews the barriers to graduate employment by SMEs. Benefits associated with the STEP are summarised in the following section. Theoretical insights guiding the study are then briefly discussed. In the next section, the research methodology is summarised. Results are then reported. Finally, conclusions and implications are outlined.\nBarriers to graduate employment in SMEs: In the UK, the HE sector is expanding but the traditional graduate job market is in decline due to the downsizing of larger organisations. Policy makers are seeking solutions to reduce graduate unemployment rates and the growing graduate under utilisation problem (DfEE, 1998; Nabi, 2003). They believe that more SMEs should recruit graduates. It is assumed that due to their inherent flexibility, SMEs \"... can suddenly find a new direction, and flourish with a new input of expertise ... \" from new graduates (DfEE, 1998, p. 7). However, most SMEs do not perceive new graduates as a natural source of recruitment. Williams and Owen (1997) argue that those owner/managers who employ graduates focus mainly upon a specific portfolio of skills, including an ability to learn, intelligence and knowledge, ideas, creativity and imagination as well as good communication skills.Owner/managers of SMEs are suspicious of new graduates, particularly their contribution to enhancing a firm's performance. They are also unsure whether their firm is of a sufficient size to justify the employment of a graduate (Roffe, 1996). Other barriers to graduate employment include the cost and work suitability, the extent of assistance and supervision that they might require, and concerns regarding their lack of flexibility and practical skills. New graduates can be equally suspicious about the potential benefits associated with employment opportunities in SMEs (Holmes et al., 1998). Policy makers in the UK tend to believe that most new graduates have little knowledge of opportunities, work conditions or career progression offered by SMEs (DfEE, 1998). Further, new graduates have no visible models of success by gaining jobs in SMEs and may, therefore, exhibit an \"ignorance gap\" in relation to personal development in smaller firms.Owner/manager and new graduate \"ignorance\" must not be perceived as the only factor to explain low rates of graduate employment in SMEs. Several bottom-line \"market forces\" reasons may also be important. For example, graduate recruitment can prove both expensive and risky for owner/managers in SMEs. Similarly, most owner/managers prefer informal channels of recruitment and these might not cover new graduates. Few SMEs, therefore, have the time or financial resources to enable them to build mutually beneficial links with higher education institutes (HEIs) and tend to miss out on vacation placements and milk round type of recruitment drives. Typically, SMEs tend to exhibit short-termist, reactive human resource strategies and usually prefer to up-skill or multi-skill existing staff rather than address skill shortages by recruiting placement students or new graduates. Most owner/managers need and expect new employees to make rapid and real contributions to productivity. As such, only proactive owner/managers are likely to foresee the contribution and real economic benefits appertaining to graduate recruitment.New graduates generally prefer large rather than smaller employers, due to \"ignorance\" and \"market force\" reasons (Westhead et al., 2001). Typically, graduates do not view SMEs as providing prestigious, well-paid or desirable workplace opportunities. In their view, smaller employers are less likely to provide induction or job-related formal training, which many of the new graduates expect and need at this early stage in their personal development. When compared to larger businesses, a markedly higher proportion of SMEs fail within five years of start-up and these are not viewed as secure or long-term employment prospects. Similarly, a large proportion of SMEs can be defined as family firms and it may be difficult for outsiders to secure progression to key management positions designated exclusively for family members. It, therefore, appears that, in terms of graduate employment, the culture gap between SMEs and HEIs is yet to be significantly bridged, despite the commitment and support of policy makers, owner/managers and university representatives (Holden and Jameson, 2002).\nThe STEP: The cultures inherent in SMEs and HEIs differ markedly both in terms of timescales and priorities. Further, these tend to exhibit different objectives and motivations, with little tradition of collaborating on recruiting or staff development (DfEE, 1998). It has long been argued that public policy should encourage new graduates emerging from HEIs to enter the SME sector. Similarly, owner/managers should be made aware of the skills that new graduates could bring to their firms. Initiatives have been introduced in order to improve the take-up of new graduate by SMEs. The STEP was implemented in 1986 in order to subsidise the employment of students in SMEs. It currently places over 1,000 undergraduates and postgraduates in SMEs throughout the UK. Typically, placement on the programme lasts for eight weeks during the summer vacation of a student's second year. SMEs and students can benefit from participating in the STEP (Kirby and Mullen, 1990). Owner/managers can explore the benefits of graduate recruitment and use the energy of students to acquire valuable technical or commercial knowledge. Further, students can gain practical experience in SMEs through task-orientated assignments and to apply classroom-based learning solutions to real life workplace problems. They can develop their practical skills, enhance curriculum vitae and record of achievements and improve their employment prospects upon graduation. In 1994, the STEP was co-ordinated throughout the UK by a project team contracted to the Shell Enterprise Unit of Shell UK. Limited. At a local level it was delivered by a national network of 72 agencies (i.e. Training and Enterprise Council, Local Enterprise Council, Business Link, Enterprise Agency, Enterprise Trust, etc.) with established SME links (Westhead, 1997). To encourage SMEs to participate in the programme, most placements were subsidised by up to 50 per cent by government funding agencies or private-sector sponsors. Agencies received a payment to cover their direct costs associated with running the programme. In 1994, STEP students were paid a training allowance of PS100 per week.\nTheoretical insights: Human capital theorists suggest that individuals with pools of human capital resources consisting of achieved attributes are associated with increased levels of productivity (Becker, 1975). The term human capital has been broadened to include cognitive characteristics as well as accumulated work and habits that may have a positive or negative effect on productivity (Becker, 1993). General human capital is generic to all types of economic activity and includes education, age and gender. Specific human capital relates to experience, skills and attitudes shaped by work and business ownership experience (Cooper et al., 1994). With reference to a construct of opportunity for skill use, Warr (1987) has asserted that jobs (and work placements) can allow an individual to use their existing skills, and to develop new ones. Most notably, individuals who obtain employment positions with higher skill requirements will be more likely to utilise their existing skills, and develop new skills (Arnold, 1994). We can, therefore, reasonably speculate that graduates can leverage their general human capital and specific human capital acquired during work experiences to obtain employment positions in small private firms. Also, they can leverage their human capital (as well as financial and social capital) to address attitudinal, resource and operational barriers to self-employment or business ownership.Empirical studies was used to guide the selection of \"supply\" (i.e. a student's human capital profile) and \"demand\" (i.e. employer and external environmental profile) variables (see Westhead et al., 2001). Hypothesized directions of associated between a student's human capital profile and their ability to obtain full-time jobs in small private firms are summarised in Table I. Further, hypothesized directions of association between a student's human capital profile and their propensity to consider self-employment/business ownership as a career option are summarised.\nResearch methodology: Studies focusing on the employability of students (Nabi and Bagley, 1999) and training interventions (Westhead and Storey, 1997) are associated with limitations. The benefits of the 1994 STEP were explored for participating students over a 12-month and a 36-month period (Westhead et al., 2001). We ensured that STEP students responding to the questionnaires administered in 1994 were representative of the population of the 1994 STEP participants; this was achieved by obtaining exceptionally high response rates to the questionnaire survey. Students that participated in the 1994 programme were compared with a \"matched\" control group of students (i.e. in terms of age, gender, degree course, and location of home address) that had never participated in the programme. Objective and subjective outcomes associated with the programme were consistently measured by a series of structured questionnaires separated in real time over a 36-month period.During 1994, 1,025 students participated in the 1994 STEP, of which 691 students completed a questionnaire prior to the programme (67 per cent response rate). Profiles of respondents are reported in Westhead (1997). Eight weeks later, 431 STEP students completed a questionnaire at the end of their placements. One year later, 78 per cent of these respondents completed a questionnaire. A structured questionnaire was sent, in 1997, to the 691 STEP students who had responded to the pre-STEP questionnaire. In total, 444 STEP students responded to the questionnaire administered in 1997 (64 per cent response rate). The 691 STEP students were matched with students who had never participated in the programme. In total, 200 non-STEP students were contacted in 1994. One year later, in 1995, 118 of the original 200 matched non-STEP students responded to a second questionnaire (59 per cent response rate). A third questionnaire was sent in 1997 to the 200 non-STEP students who had responded to the first questionnaire administered in 1994. In total, 129 non-STEP students responded to the questionnaire administered in 1997 (65 per cent response rate). Respondents in 1997 were not markedly different from those who responded in 1994 (see Westhead et al., 2001).\nResults: Activities of STEP and non-STEP students in 1997\nConclusions and implications: Evidence from the wider reviews of the 1994 STEP (Westhead, 1997; Westhead et al., 2001) suggest that the programme enhanced the immediate street credibility of graduates as far as employers were concerned. The programme persuades employers that STEP graduates are serious when they seek full-time jobs. Univariate statistical evidence reported in this study suggests that the skills more likely to be cited by STEP students reporting full-time employment positions (i.e. business sense, computer literacy, practical business skills and project management skills) are those being promoted by policy makers and those being sought by owner/managers of SMEs. Nevertheless, the multivariate evidence reported in Model 1 in Table I fails to confirm that participation in the programme significantly increased the probability that a STEP student would join a small private firm two years after graduation. The challenge for the programme is to identify and hone the skills most urgently being requested by owners of small private firms. Controlling for other factors, Model 1 suggests that students reporting technical knowledge skills and/or increased self-confidence were more likely to obtain jobs in small private firms. Also, we detected that students who are prepared to trade lower wages for an executive position are more likely to be employed in small private firms. We can, therefore, reasonably speculate that \"market forces\" rather \"ignorance\" shapes the lower probability of graduates obtaining employment positions in small private firms. The challenge for policy makers and owners of small private firms is to clearly identify the positive (i.e. non-financial) benefits of graduates obtaining employment in SMEs. In addition, in response to continued large firm downsizing, many more graduates may have to change their attitudes towards careers in small private enterprises.The univariate statistical evidence suggested that a larger proportion of STEP rather than non-STEP students reported in 1997 that they were considering self-employment or business ownership. However, the multivariate evidence summarised in Model 2 in Table I failed to detect a significant association between participation in the programme and the latter outcome. STEP students are, therefore, not more likely than non-STEP students to report the desire to become self-employed or business owners. A positive attitude to self-employment reported in 1994 is the key factor associated with the same desire reported in 1997. Controlling for other factors, Model 2 suggests that the students reporting imagination and creativity and/or business sense skills were more likely to consider self-employment or business ownership. Additional research is required to detect whether the programme has selected students who already have these skills (i.e. a selection bias), or has the programme made a major contribution to the take-up of the latter skills.This study suggests that the owners/managers of SMEs are seeking specific business-related skills. The onus is now on HEIs to provide courses that embed these skills through the higher education curriculum. There is now a growing case for HEIs to proactively liaise with their local business communities (DfEE, 2001) to ensure that all students obtain a broad range of skills required by SMEs as well as large organisations.From a phenomenological as well as a positivist paradigm, future studies should evaluate the processes, outcomes and effectiveness of student work experience programmes. A broader range of career progress indicators and objective entrepreneurial indicators should be considered. The challenge for future studies is to identify and utilise valid and reliable student skill constructs generated from numerous questions relating to skill issues (i.e. personal self-reliance skills; communicative skills; problem-solving skills; personal attributes; key work-related skills, etc.).\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - To evaluate the abilities, skills and expertise of undergraduates who participated in the UK-based Shell Technology Enterprise Programme (STEP) and their suitability for prospective employment in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The authors employ a longitudinal postal survey approach, involving a sample of undergraduates who responded in 1994 and in 1997.\nFindings: - Evidence suggests that the STEP has enhanced the skills, expertise and credibility of graduates seeking employment in SMEs. Prospective employers consider the skills and experience gained by STEP graduates as an advantage.\nResearch limitations/implications: - The longitudinal data under investigation is relatively old, but not obsolete. A further investigation of the impact that the STEP had on the research sample is planned for the near future.\nPractical implications: - The result suggests that owners/managers of SMEs are increasingly seeking specific business-related skills. Higher education institutes should proactively liaise with their local business communities to ensure that students gain a broad range of skills, as required by employers in this important and expanding sector of the British economy.\nOriginality/value: - The authors adopt a human capital perspective on skill accumulation and its impact on the future of graduate employment.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Organizations as discursive gravitational fields	[ "Organizations", "Metaphors", "Society", "Discourse", "Gravitation", "Lacan", "Einstein" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: We have been living in a society dominated by organizations for already some time (Perrow, 1991). Just adding to that trend, the recent development of new technologies of communication (Namsu et al., 2009; Yuqing et al., 2007) has been associated with the spreading of such organizing approach to daily life also to areas of human activity, like social interaction, that until recently were much more disorganized and spontaneous. The seemingly anarchic freedom of virtual environments like Facebook and Twitter is in fact dependent on major business operations that have excelled in their own organizing abilities.In this paper I present a metaphor of organizations as discursive gravitational fields, based in Einstein's general theory of relativity (Einstein, 1993; Stannard, 2008) and in Lacan's theory of the four discourses (Bracher et al., 1994; Fink, 1995; Lacan, 1975, 1991). That metaphor provides us with insights and new meanings concerning the way organizations acquire power and exert influence on their surroundings.The importance of studying discourses in organizational settings, as well as the value of metaphors in such study is something already vigorously established in the literature (Andriessen and Gubbins, 2009; Bonet and Sauquet, 2010; Boxenbaum and Rouleau, 2011; Cornelissen et al., 2008; Cornelissen and Kafouros, 2008; Czarniawska, 2003, 2004; Flory and Iglesias, 2010; Morgan, 1980, 1986; Putnam and Boys, 2006). Most studies so far, however, have focused in the content of discourses and also in discourses as tools for organizational power. Adopting a different view, Lacan has defined discourse as being a \"social bond mediated by language\" (Evans, 1996, p.44; Lacan, 1975, 1991). He has presented a theory of the discourse where it is understood as being a structure inside which endless variations of content can unfold. Besides, his theory also shows that discourse can be understood as something that acts as a supporting framework for power (Lacan, 1991, pp. 31-59). We can talk, for that reason, about discourse-as-content and discourse-as-structure. The Lacanian approach presented here adopts a higher level of abstraction than previous works about discourses in organizations, amplifying their scope without invalidating them.I explore in this work mainly the discourse-as-structure. The metaphor of organizations as discursive gravitational fields allows for exploring the inner discursive core that frames organizations, also allowing for the construction of a discourse-based definition of organization that enlightens the connection between its birth and the actions of individuals in a society.The paper is structured as follows: in the next section I present the literature review. After that follows the description of the metaphor itself. The analysis of derived insights is then presented, followed by final remarks in the conclusion.\n2. Literature review: In this review I will discuss relevant literature concerning two topics: organizational power in relation to stakeholder management and the connections between Lacan's and Einstein's works. Specific aspects of those thinkers' theories will be discussed during the description of the metaphor itself.2.1 Organizational power: an approach through stakeholder management\n3. Metaphor description: The metaphor presented here consists in the exploration of one insight: that organizations act upon their social surroundings in a way that is similar to the way massive bodies act on their physical surroundings. Both exert influence upon such surroundings and transform it in a very fundamental way. From that initial insight, a set of concepts is analogically adapted from physics in order to explore the derived insights. The most important of those concepts is the idea that the \"force\" responsible for both bringing organizations into being and for acting upon their surroundings is a symbolical equivalent of gravitation. I sustain here that such symbolic equivalent can only be discourse. So, \"organizations as discursive gravitational fields\" is a metaphor that aims at transferring insights from physics into organization studies. Relativity theory is an ideal starting point for its non-positivistic stance towards reality, something that can be seen in the non-intuitive way it deals with the space-time continuum.The metaphor will be described in a logical (but not necessarily chronological sequence concerning related real-world phenomena) sequence of phases. Each phase represents a higher level of organizing. The single logical assumption needed to this description is the intellectual representation of the set of human discursive interactions as a social discursive field. That field is analogous to the Einstenian space-time continuum in the sense of not-being an Euclidian (Einstein, 1993, pp. 94-6) concept: it is not a field in the sense of usual magnetic field, but one where space and time lose the ordinary boundaries. So, the discursive field may act more intensely over an individual or over an organization that is much further away geographically than over something that is much closer from that strict Euclidian standpoint. The discursive dimension is a symbolic one, and for that reason it can travel through history and through geographical and political boundaries as well.In an ideal and perfectly democratic society, the field's intensity would be the same at any of its points. That would happen because no discursive relation would be asymmetrical or would possess an a priori higher or lower power to influence human behavior. Such ideal field would present absolute relational homogeneity. We can represent that by saying it would possess a discursive Gini coefficient of 0 (total equality), applying to it that measure of statistical dispersion widely utilized in social sciences (Dagum, 1987). The metaphor describes the process by which such equality vanishes, as it can be observed in the real world. In a maximally undemocratic world, one single institution would amass all the discursive power, case in which the discursive Gini coefficient would be 1.3.1 First phase: human discursive interaction\n4. Implications of derived insights: The metaphor suggests a number of valuable insights, which will be described here. Only main ideas and implications are outlined, but further research can deepen the derived knowledge.4.1 The distortion of discursive surroundings by organizations\n5. Conclusion: The metaphor presented in this article offers a number of insights and new meanings in a way that can be further explored. Its fundamental characteristic is the building of a connection between the pre-organizational individual and the appearance of organizations. Also, it relates organizational power to an individual act of interpassive cession of his or her power to it. All those aspects can be further developed in connection to more specific phenomena of organizational life.Moreover, the metaphor makes it clear the importance of the relationship between individual freedom and organizational power, and presents a way to understand the function of Civil Society and State in a society that aims to have organizations that really empower their citizens.A number of insights were derived from the metaphor. The first one is that organizations can distort their discursive surroundings up to the point of stopping any flux of independent discourse. The second refers to the way that boundaries of organizations are to be understood as a gradient of discursive influence which fades away, often much beyond its legal limits; that also creates degrees of \"stakeholding\", corresponding to different levels of dependence on a specific organization by their stakeholders. The third derived insight is the idea that discursive fields of different organizations are often superposed, creating the phenomena of interference and superposition among organizational discursive fields. The fourth derived insight suggests that speciation among organizations is related to the kind of symbolic element attracted predominantly by their surrounding fields. Finally, Lacanian theory suggests that no absolute and permanent discursive power is possible to persons or organizations, leaving room to the continuous production of new and potentially emancipating meaning, whose appearance, however, can be very difficult to predict due to its \"discursive quantum nature\".The metaphor of organizations as discursive gravitational fields also can be explored to better understand the moral duality of organizations. As presented in the description of the metaphor, they can be understood as being agglutinations of discourses in a previously homogeneous social discursive field. Therefore, they add to the total enthalpy of the discursive system, by creating inequalities. Those inequalities determine the distortion of surrounding discourses, which causes the appearance of new meanings and new rhetorical possibilities. New rhetorical possibilities have been described by McCloskey (2010) as being an essential element of social development. However, new meanings and new rhetorical possibilities have also been described by Klemperer (2006) as a tool of totalitarianism. Between those opposed poles of innovation and violation, lies the whole set of organizational-related phenomena, and exploring further the metaphor of organizations as gravitational fields can help us to better understand the mechanism that makes organizations position themselves closer to one of those poles.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to present a metaphor of organizations as discursive gravitational fields.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The metaphor was built based on Einstein's general theory of relativity and Lacan's theory of discourse. The dialogue with organization studies was made possible through the utilization of the communicative theory of organizations as theoretical background.\nFindings: - A number of insights were derived from the metaphor. First, organizations can distort their discursive surroundings up to the point of stopping any flux of independent discourse; second, the boundaries of organizations are to be understood as a gradient of discursive influence which fades away, often much beyond its legal limits; that also creates degrees of \"stakeholding\", corresponding to different levels of influence and dependence on a specific organization by their stakeholders; third, the discursive fields of different organizations are often superposed, creating the phenomena of interference and superposition among organizational discursive fields; fourth, speciation among organizations is related to the kind of symbolic element attracted predominantly by their surrounding fields; and fifth, Lacanian theory suggests that no absolute and permanent discursive power is possible to persons or organizations, leaving room to the continuous production of new and potentially emancipating meaning, whose appearance, however, can be very difficult to predict due to its \"discursive quantum nature\".\nPractical implications: - This metaphor can help researchers and managers to interpret the discursive phenomena involving organizations as a whole, as well as organizational relations with stakeholders.\nOriginality/value: - By bringing together organization theory, Einstein's and Lacan's theories, this paper provides a new view on the relation between organizations, discourse and society.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
The role of serendipity in the story ideation process of print media journalists	[ "Newspapers", "Written communications", "Information Science", "Generation and dissemination of information", "Research", "Social sciences" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The study of serendipity in the field of journalism is a relatively novel endeavor, especially from an interdisciplinary perspective that incorporates models and theories from the areas of library and information science and journalism. This type of pursuit is timely as information science researchers in the past have mostly focused on active, specific and direct searching. For the past 25 years, the study of information behavior has seen a growing trend in nonlinear, opportunistic discovery of information as our modern digital environment inspires a shift from focusing on information searching and seeking to how we are exposed to information (Agarwal, 2015; Foster and Ellis, 2014; Savolainen, 2016).\nLiterature review: As an interdisciplinary study, the literature in the field of journalism was reviewed along with the literature in library and information science. The literature from journalism focuses on the story ideation process of journalists, the reporting routines of journalists, and the sociology of news. The LIS literature covers information needs, information seeking, serendipity and opportunistic discovery of information. Together, this body of literature traces a complementary trajectory whereas information scientists are increasingly exploring the role serendipity plays in a wide range of disciplines and situations, and journalism scholars are exploring variations in routine news reporting behaviors.\nConstruct of story ideation: The work of Tuchman (1978) and Molotch and Lester (1999) laid the foundation for the assumption that journalistic routines do not vary among media organizations or journalists. This assumption was strengthened by Eliasoph (1988), Cook 1998, Oliver and Maney (2000) and Ryfe (2006). Vlad and Becker (2009) argue that the lack of variability in news routines limits the value of this concept in news construction research. To find value in probing deeper into the processes of news construction, \"The researcher needs to find situations where the routines are not followed or in some other way are altered in order to understand why the routines are not followed or differ and to understand the consequences of the routines\" (p. 63).\nThe progression of serendipity in the field of information science: Agarwal (2015) traced the presence of serendipity in the field of information science to the literature on the library cataloging system as a means for encouraging exploration in finding books (Cutter, 1876; Toms, 2000; Grose and Line, 1968). Agarwal used Wilson's (2000) nested model of information behavior as a theoretical lens for his paper to map the construct of serendipity in information behavior but called for a more explicit place in models for the discovery of information by chance or accident \"because information behavior implies a wider term that includes activities other than purposive information seeking\" (p. 1).\nResearch questions: RQ1. What is the nature of journalists' serendipitous encounters with story ideas?\nMethod: This study utilized semi-structured telephone interviews, which began by asking the journalists to recall memorable situations when they serendipitously encountered story ideas. The questions then probed into whether those were typical situations in which they experienced this phenomenon. These interview questions addressed all three research questions. Additional interview questions also sought insight into the journalists' sense of autonomy, which will be used in a follow-up study. The interviews took place over the telephone, and the conversations were recorded and then transcribed.\nSources and time affect serendipitous story encountering: The greatest constraint to serendipitous story ideas found in the interviews was issues stemming from sources for stories and time. The construct of time here should not be confused with deadline pressures. Few of the journalists cited deadline pressures during the interview but many referenced a lack of time to pursue \"weird,\" \"creative\" or \"off-beat\" stories. Essentially, staff cutbacks, organizational policies to boost readership through online metrics and strict confines of beat reporting left the journalists less time to pursue encountered stories.\nSerendipity facilitated by \"knowing enough\": One of the journalists in this study provided an emblematic example of how someone with deep knowledge or specialization in a topic or subject is more alert to useful serendipitous encounters. He said that as a young reporter, he applied to work at the Washington Post and interviewed with Bob Woodward, one of the reporters who broke the Watergate story. Woodward offered insight into the importance of knowing enough in order to come across good stories. \"You know, we're talking and he said you know, the good stories are the ones when you hear something and you go 'Oh, shit.' That's an 'Oh, shit' story, you know,\" the reporter said. \"You didn't know about it, but you're familiar enough about the issue to go 'Oh, shit' because you know enough about that area to understand that the various details add up to an 'Oh, shit' story.\"\nDiscussion: The three research questions that guide this study are designed to gather data and insight regarding how journalists perceive serendipitous encounters with story ideas and the frequency in which they encounter new ideas incidentally. This insight is enriched by considering the social and organizational context in which story ideas are encountered serendipitously. In general, these questions are designed to elicit anecdotes framed in ways that most journalists are not used to explaining because, many times, the journalists perceive these chance encounters as routine.\nJournalists with a prepared mind encounter meaningful stories: Most journalism textbooks geared for students new to the field provide general terms that help shape the definition of \"news judgment.\" These terms include prominence, impact, conflict, timeliness and novelty/uniqueness. However, how a journalist knows who is prominent, what is significant about the impact of certain events, what makes certain conflicts significant, what makes something unique and why certain scientific inventions and breakthroughs are important, depends on many different factors. Education, experience, general knowledge, interests and curiosity are some of those factors. In other words, a journalist with a prepared mind is well equipped to serendipitously encounter story ideas.\nLimitations and future studies: The sampling frame for this study was relatively small. However, a focused study on the information behavior of elite journalists serves as a useful lens to build upon for future studies that focus on journalists working in smaller markets.\nConclusion: Serendipity helped change the world for the better when Sir Alexander Fleming accidentally discovered penicillin while researching influenza, when George de Mestral wondered how cockleburs stuck to clothing and invented Velcro, and when Isaac Newton watched an apple fall straight down from a tree, leading to his law of gravity. Serendipity in journalism has similarly influenced society. Published stories that were discovered incidentally led to federal laws that better protect the environment and public health. These stories also elicit empathy for programs beneficial to people. They help us learn more about the depth of human compassion, and they inspire journalists to pursue useful topics that shape the trajectories of their careers. Serendipity is inextricably tied to the field of journalism.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to build upon the studies of journalism from an LIS perspective by exploring and differentiating the purposive behavior of newspaper reporters from their serendipitous encounters with information that lead to new story ideas. This paper also provides a path toward pedagogical improvements in training the modern journalism workforce in being more open to creative story ideas.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This study utilized semi-structured telephone interviews. Participants were recruited via e-mail after collecting contact information through the Cision database. The study sample was drawn from newspaper reporters who work at or freelance for the top 25 metropolitan newspapers in the USA, in terms of circulation size, based on data from the Alliance for Audited Media. A total of 15 participants were interviewed.\nFindings: This paper provides insight into the story ideation process of journalists in that the study participants generally do not think about how they are coming up with story ideas as much as they are striving to place themselves in situations where, based on their experience and interests, they know they are more likely to encounter a good idea. Each encounter proved meaningful in some powerful fashion, which speaks to the historical importance of serendipity in achieving breakthroughs and discoveries in a wide variety of fields.\nResearch limitations/implications: The sampling frame for this study was relatively small, representing 8 percent of the total number of working newspaper journalists from the top 25 newspapers in the USA, in terms of circulation size. Therefore, the findings are not generalizable to the entire population of journalists in this country.\nPractical implications: The findings point to the importance of a prepared mind in facilitating serendipitous episodes. In the case of journalism, that means developing a heightened news sense and cultivating routines where they place themselves in trigger-rich environments. Pedagogically, journalism education must include courses in creative storytelling to help train the modern newspaper workforce in an ever-expanding and competitive media landscape. These courses, ideally paired with techniques and models from the field of information science and learning technologies, could help train young journalists in methods that enhance their ability to identify, seek and pursue serendipitous stories.\nOriginality/value: This paper fulfills a need in journalism studies in finding variability in news routines by utilizing an interdisciplinary approach that combines journalism studies and library and information science models to probe how journalists encounter ideas incidentally. Previous research in this area has focused on how news consumers serendipitously encounter information. This paper takes a fresh approach to explore how creative ideas are encountered serendipitously in the construction of news.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Consumers' reactions to cross-border acquisitions: The role of psychic distance and acquirer's corporate reputation	[ "Consumer behaviour", "Corporate reputation", "Psychic distance", "Cross-border acquisitions" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Cross-border mergers and acquisitions (M&As) have become increasingly popular in recent decades and represent an important alternative for strategic growth. It is a common practice for multinational companies (MNCs) augmenting their brand portfolio through local acquisitions, hence managers need to make decisions in a global context. Literature focused on cross-border M&As performance in order to define and suggest good practices and reduce the number of failures of such operations (Teerikangas and Very, 2006; Christofi et al., 2017). The success of a company mainly depends on consumers buying its products (Smith, 1990); thus, managers involved in a cross-border acquisition (CBA) should also implement a marketing-oriented strategy directed to consumers, instead of focusing only on financial and strategic outcomes. A lack of focus on the consumer's perspective may be a contributing factor to the CBA's failure (Heinberg et al., 2016). Some scholars investigated the impact of customer loyalty on financial performance in CBAs (Homburg and Bucerius, 2005), but the acquisition literature dealing with the consumer remains limited (Fong et al., 2013).\n2. Theoretical background: 2.1 Psychic distance\n3. Methodology: 3.1 Contest of analysis: food industry\n4. Results: 4.1 Manipulation checks\n5. Discussion and conclusions: In the current scenario, the construct of psychic distance is very relevant in the context of CBAs because many MNCs from emerging countries are acquiring firms from developed ones.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to focus on consumers' reactions to cross-border acquisitions (CBA) by exploring the role of consumer perceptions of the psychic distance between the country of the acquirer and that of the target firm when the acquiring corporation has a good or poor reputation.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A 2x2 experimental design which manipulated psychic distance and acquirer's corporate reputation was conducted in Italy. The study considers an Italian food target firm and compares four foreign acquiring firms with different combinations of corporate reputation (good/poor) and psychic distance to Italy (small/large).\nFindings: The authors found that the degree of psychic distance between the countries of the acquiring and targeted firms was inversely related to Italian consumers' intentions to repurchase the products of the post-acquisition target, and unrelated to the acquirer's corporate reputation.\nOriginality/value: This is the first study focusing on psychic distance in the context of CBA, especially from the perspective of consumer behavior, which can help to better understand certain negative reactions toward the acquisition of a business.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Effect of information on consumer preferences and willingness-to-pay for sparkling mock wines	[ "Organic food", "Alcoholic drinks", "Sensory evaluation", "Soft drinks", "Product information", "Consumer choice" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: According to the World Health Organization, the global alcohol consumption rose from 5.5 litres of pure alcohol per person, aged 15 years or older, in 2005 to 6.4 litres 2016. High-income countries are those having the highest alcohol per capita consumption, though alcohol consumption in Europe slightly reduced over the last two decades (World Health Organization, 2018). Meanwhile, global soft drinks sales, both in volumes and value, expanded in the recent years reaching a retail market size of over EUR1.4bn in 2016 (Euromonitor, 2017). Driven by increasing consumer preferences for healthier and more sustainable food and beverages (Eden et al., 2008; Siro et al., 2008), low-alcohol and no-alcohol beverages are slowly increasing their market share. According to a recent research report by Global Market Insights (Verma and Rawat, 2018) the world non-alcoholic wine and beer market, valued 20bn dollars in 2018, is expected to surpass the 30bn dollars in less than a decade (by 2025), growing at a CAGR over 7 per cent. The 2019 IWSR \"Global Low-and No-Alcohol Strategic Study\" reports that though the segment is still very small, low- and no-alcohol brands are showing significant growth in key markets. No-alcohol still wine was forecasted at 13.5 per cent growth in the period 2019-2022. Nevertheless, low- and no-alcohol products currently account for only 0.5 per cent of the total US beverage alcohol market and 1.3 per cent of the UK market. (IWSR, 2019a, b). Nielsen estimated the low - no-alcohol wine category has sold just under PS40 m, or 6.1 m 75cl bottles in 2017 (Stares, 2018). In Europe, Spain and especially Germany are considered the more prominent low/no-alcohol beverage markets. In Germany, no-alcohol wine is expected to grow up to 4 per cent by 2022, especially driven by sparkling products (IWSR, 2019a).\n2. Materials and methods: Given virtually no previous studies exist on mock (no-alcohol) wines, qualitative research was conducted to explore consumer expectation, attitudes and preferences on non-alcoholic-grape-based beverages. Qualitative research via focus group was conducted to explore consumers' expectations, attitudes and preferences towards beverages and their opinions on non-alcoholic drinks as an alternative to wine and other alcoholic drinks. Results showed very little awareness and knowledge of mock wines. Once informed, while drinkers reported doubts about the taste of these beverages, non-drinkers mentioned taste and health (dietary) issues potentially guiding their choice of mock wines among the broad spectrum of soft drinks. The results of this exploratory research informed the design of the subsequent quantitative study on liking and WTP. By manipulating information about products, the relative impact of sensory and information (or brand) cues on overall liking was assessed, at the individual level and in the same controlled environmental settings, in two steps.\n3. Results and discussion: 3.1 Comparison between products\n4. Discussion: Despite hedonic ranking results about the sparkling beverages after blind tasting, both with and without alcohol were similar for both non-drinkers and drinkers, the mock wines obtained significantly higher hedonic scores by non-drinkers and young people. As reported by previous studies (Meillon, Urbano, Guillot and Schlich, 2010; Meillon, Viala, Medel, Urbano, Guillot and Schlich, 2010; Stasi et al., 2014), these results were expected: younger people, not drinking alcohol very often, are more likely to prefer less alcohol content options.\n5. Concluding remarks, limitations and future research: Despite previous literature highlighted well-known discrepancies between consumer preferences in blind taste tests and non-blind ones (Barney, 1995), in the case of the non-alcohol brands investigated the non-blind tests does not seem to be a better reflection of reality, and offering less information to the companies than a blind taste test does (Ghose and Lowengart, 2013).\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore the role of information about alcohol content, organic labelling and packaging on consumer preferences and willingness-to-pay (WTP) of non-alcoholic sparkling mock wines.\nDesign/methodology/approach: In a two-step study, the consumer's expectations and overall liking of two novel brands of mock wines were investigated by focus groups followed by a common hedonic test combined with a choice experiment aimed at measuring consumer WTP. A total of 240 consumers were assigned to two tasting groups of equal size: all were presented at least one brand of mock wine, while drinkers also tasted a familiar brand of low-alcohol sweet sparkling wine. A paper-and-pencil choice experiment followed the tasting sessions.\nFindings: The results demonstrate that participants in blind or manipulated \"informed\" conditions are not able to discriminate among mock wines and wine, whereas significant differences in preferences for brands under investigation appeared when labels and other information were disclosed. In effect, drinkers and non-drinkers did not differ in hedonic scores of mock wines. While younger participants exhibited the highest scores in blind liking, the overall expected liking is significantly higher for non-drinkers and women if compared, respectively, to drinkers and men. WTP for mock wines is influenced by taste, glass bottle packaging and the organic label, while mock-wine colour is not relevant.\nResearch limitations/implications: Although limited in sample size and representativeness, this study has brought some new insights into the consumption of non-alcoholic mock wines. In this study, a significant influence of blind sensory liking on WTP is demonstrated. This result has theoretical implications: while the effect of product information on WTP is well established, the relationship between hedonic scores and WTP - while theoretically consistent - is not so clear-cut in the literature. Further research is needed to confirm/disconfirm these findings.\nPractical implications: Sparkling no-alcohol mock wines, despite their sweetness, appear not different in taste to medium-to-low APV (7.5 per cent) sweet wines.\nOriginality/value: The paper suggests that marketing of mock (no-alcohol) wines needs careful branding to elicit significant hedonic effects, while interacting sensory (blind liking) scores with price information in choice models may help to represent taste heterogeneity in WTP estimates in a better way.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Knowledge diversity and firm performance: an ecological view	[ "Firm performance", "Knowledge diversity", "Diversity–stability principle", "Knowledge ecology" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Recently, knowledge has emerged as an organizational resource for competition. In other words, a knowledge-based view of organizations has gained considerable attention (King, 2007). Successful management of organizational knowledge is considered an essential element for a firm to remain competitive in the new century (Billinfer and Smith, 2001; Migdadi, 2009; Andreeva and Kianto, 2012). Consequently, knowledge management, particularly that based on information technology (IT), has recently received substantial attention (Alavi and Leidner, 2001).\n2. Knowledge management and firm performance: In the knowledge economy, knowledge management has played a critical role in advancing organizational performance. Activities entailing knowledge management processes, such as knowledge acquisition, transfer and creation, improve organizational processes directly and lead to enhanced organizational performance (King, 2007; Andreeva and Kianto, 2012). Because knowledge has been the most crucial competitive asset in organizations, numerous previous studies have discussed the relationship between knowledge management and organizational performance.\n3. An ecological framework for knowledge management: Ecology is a science in which relationships among members of a community and their interactions with the environment are analyzed. The essential components of an ecological community are the various species and the materials exchanged between the species and the environment. Within an ecosystem, there are two major streams of focus: population ecology, which concerns evolution and change in species, and community ecology, which concerns diversity and balance in the species of a community (McGlade, 1999). Various elements within an ecosystem coevolve: they change together on the basis of their relationships within the system. This is similar to knowledge in organizations: various types of knowledge coevolve to build organizational core competence.\n4. Research framework and hypotheses: In this section, a research model based on the diversity-stability theory is developed to link the relationships among IT capabilities, knowledge ecology and firm performance. As shown in Figure 1, the research model has two stages. The first stage exhibits the relationship between IT capabilities and knowledge ecology. Here, knowledge ecology is represented as the strength and diversity of knowledge in an organization. The second stage presents the relationship between knowledge ecology and firm performance. There are several ways to measure firm performance. In this research, we focus on financial performance, represented by the average earnings per share (EPS) and their variations. Performance variation is represented as negative performance stability in firms. A firm with higher variation has lower stability.\n5. Design of the empirical study: To test the research model, an empirical study using a focus group of 58 experts was conducted on 20 firms in four industries. Industry type is a crucial factor in research on organizational knowledge management (Cheng et al., 2014). To investigate the moderating effects of industry type, four industries were chosen to represent different organizational natures along two dimensions: knowledge intensity of products or services and environmental uncertainty. Because knowledge may include several different types of intangible asset, the knowledge intensity of products is measured by the ratio of the intangible portion of the total revenue in financial statements: (total revenue - tangible costs)/total revenue. For example, if the total revenue of a firm is 100 million and the total tangible cost (including materials, equipment depreciation and other fixed assets) is 70 million, then the knowledge intensity of its product is 0.3. Environmental uncertainty is measured by the degree of product deviation and average product life cycle. An industry whose product life cycle is short implies a higher environmental uncertainty. For instance, the environmental uncertainty of a PC manufacturer is higher than that of a steel company because PCs have a much shorter product life cycle than steel does.\n6. Analysis of results: 6.1 Difference in knowledge importance\n7. Discussion: In this paper, we propose an ecological approach to knowledge management in organizations, which stresses the importance of maintaining a healthy intensity and diversity of knowledge at the macro level rather than examining the creation, storage and transfer of knowledge at the micro level. Our empirical study shows that IT capabilities can enhance both the intensity and the diversity of knowledge. Higher knowledge intensity improves the average performance of a firm but reduces performance stability. However, higher knowledge diversity reduces the average performance of a firm but increases performance stability by reducing EPS variations. Different industries also seem to have different keystone knowledge types.\n8. Conclusion: The findings of this paper expand those of previous research on IT values and knowledge management by introducing the dimensions of knowledge strength and diversity. Knowledge ecology is shown to be an effective intervening variable between IT capabilities and firm performance, serving as a new paradigm for performance-related research. The results also provide a new knowledge management concept for managers. An organization should maintain a balanced strategy between knowledge intensity and diversity for sustainable development. An effective knowledge management strategy should focus on more than just a few specific knowledge assets by maintaining a balance among different knowledge assets. In other words, managers should compose knowledge management strategies at the macro rather than the micro level.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Knowledge has been considered a crucial organizational asset for gaining competitive advantages. It is critical for a firm to maintain a knowledge composition that is productive. This study aims to examine the applicability of the diversity-stability principle in ecology to knowledge management and further investigate the impact of knowledge diversity on firm performance.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A theoretical framework for knowledge diversity and firm performance is proposed; a questionnaire survey was conducted to evaluate the research framework. Fifty-eight valid responses from experts were collected to measure knowledge strength and diversity of 20 enterprises in four industries, and financial indexes of the 20 enterprises from 2008 to 2012 were collected to analyze the research model.\nFindings: The results show that higher information technology (IT) capabilities in a firm lead to higher levels of knowledge strength and diversity. The strength and diversity of knowledge in a company can improve average company performance and reduce performance variations.\nResearch limitations/implications: This paper presents a new perspective that applies the ecological concept of diversity to examine the value of knowledge in organizations. The findings expand our understanding of the role of IT and knowledge in organizational performance. A limitation is that the sample size is relatively small, which may limit the generalizability of the findings.\nPractical implications: CEOs and chief knowledge officers can apply the findings herein to assess their organizational knowledge profiles and maintain a healthy knowledge ecology in strategic planning. They should be aware that both knowledge strength and knowledge diversity are crucial to the stability of firm performance.\nOriginality/value: The ecological view of knowledge management stresses the importance of maintaining a healthy intensity and diversity of knowledge at the macro level and indicates a new direction for knowledge management.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Leveraging procurement-related knowledge through a fuzzy-based DSS: a refinement of purchasing portfolio models	[ "Purchasing", "Decision-making", "Knowledge management", "Fuzzy sets", "Case study", "Decision support systems", "Portfolio model" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The effective management of knowledge is recognized as a factor fostering decision-making processes (Becerra-Fernandez and Sabherwal, 2014; Giebels et al., 2015). In supply chain management, an appropriate knowledge base about both the nature of the goods that must be purchased and the kind of relationship with the suppliers strongly improves the purchasing dynamics and performances (Liyanage et al., 2009; Kilpi et al., 2018). Such a knowledge base can support the purchasing decisions and strategies (Macris and Georgakellos, 2010), and its development and exploitation are strongly related to the performance and the effectiveness of the firm's purchasing function (Hult et al., 2004; Wagner et al., 2018). The support that purchasing-related knowledge management can provide to the purchasing strategic decision (e.g. fostering close working relationships, open communication and strategic planning with a limited number of suppliers) has often been embedded in purchasing portfolio models (PPMs), whose role is well-established in the literature (Ellram and Carr, 1994; Montgomery et al., 2018).\n2. Theoretical background: In this section, we analyze the state of the art to frame this work within the appropriate literature. We mostly draw attention on the overall perspective of PPMs (Section 2.1) and on the related recognized gaps (Section 2.2).\n3. Decision support system modeling: This section explains the development of the FST-based DSS model. Section 3.1 briefly describes the FST and points out its suitability for our research purposes. Section 3.2 presents the overall architecture of the DSS we propose. Section 3.3 explains the decision-making logic, including the fuzzy processing of inputs and outputs and the aggregation procedure. Section 3.4 details the inputs and outputs of the model, while section 3.5 provides the used control variables. Thus, the main adopted dimensions, variables and measures are analyzed.\n4. Methodology: Given the nature of our research objectives, expressed through how research questions (cf. Section 1), the case study methodology was suitable (Yin, 2013). The objective of the case study was to highlight the practical applicability of the DSS and to validate it in a real-life context. The selected case was a branch of a power electronics multinational company that needs to revise its purchasing strategy to align it with the corporate policies and directions and to systematize, support and automate the purchasing decision process to assure effectiveness and efficiency.\n5. Case results and discussion: Following the Kraljic's classification, the chosen items belong to the Bottleneck class, which is characterized by a low purchase importance (profit impact) and a high complexity in managing the B-S relationships (also supply risk).\n6. Conclusion and further research: To our best knowledge, this work is the first attempt to effectively integrate traditional purchasing portfolio approaches with additional strategic-oriented priorities and contextual constraints to provide managers with refined and suitable purchasing directions. Thus, it tries to overcome several major shortcomings in the literature, contributing on three levels: theoretical, methodological and managerial (Table XIII).\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: This paper aims to model a decision support system (DSS) that could overcome the oversimplified, subjective, compensatory decision logic of extant purchasing portfolio models (PPMs) by leveraging the firms' procurement-related knowledge base.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The DSS was developed through a fuzzy-based approach, whose design and application were framed within a case study in a multinational company.\nFindings: The application of the fuzzy-based DSS to a product class suggests investing in the relationship with two specific suppliers and to loosen the relationship with a third one.\nResearch limitations/implications: Exploiting the fuzzy set theory and fostering the elicitation of procurement-related knowledge from the decision-makers, the DSS effectively tackles the concerns about the existing PPMs by including strategic-oriented priorities and contextual constraints in the evaluation.\nPractical implications: The recommendations in output from the DSS are feasible, more analytical and easy to interpret, enabling knowledge sharing, group decision processes and better decision-making.\nOriginality/value: To the best of the authors' knowledge, this manuscript is the first attempt to effectively integrate traditional PPMs with contextual, strategy-related factors to refine the purchasing directions and make them objective.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
A model of entrepreneurial intention: An application of the psychological and behavioral approaches	[ "Entrepreneurship education", "Start‐up", "Entrepreneurial intention", "Psychological approach", "Behavioural approach", "Structural equation modelling", "Mathematical modelling", "Entrepreneurialism" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: An extraordinary proliferation of entrepreneurship education programs and courses has been underway worldwide in the past 15 years (Solomon, 2008). The revolution from trivial to \"colossal\" interest in entrepreneurship education presents significant curricular and pedagogical challenges for managers, researchers, and educators.According to Garavan and O'Cinneide (1994), the most commonly referred aims of entrepreneurship education and training programs are:* to get useful knowledge of entrepreneurship;* to acquire skills in the use of techniques, in the analysis of business atmospheres, and in the synthesis of action plans;* to identify and stimulate entrepreneurial drive, talent and skills;* to develop empathy and support for all unique aspects of entrepreneurship;* to develop attitudes towards change; and* to encourage new start-ups and other entrepreneurial ventures.The various skills required by entrepreneurs can be categorized as follows (Hisrich and Peters, 1998):* technical skills (written and oral communication, technical management and organizing skills);* business management skills (planning, decision-making, marketing and accounting skills); and* personal entrepreneurial skills (inner control, innovation, risk taking, persistence and being change-oriented).Henry et al. (2005) refer that the development of these personal skills differentiates an entrepreneur from a manager.To Garavan and O'Cinneide (1994), the three major characteristics of innovators and entrepreneurs are their knowledge, skills and attitudes. This last aspect of attitudes, the psychosocial forces of the individual and the cultural context, is of prime importance in influencing entrepreneurial behaviour patterns.Thus, very different skills, abilities and knowledge may be required to fulfil these different aims of entrepreneurship education programs. The debate on whether entrepreneurs can be taught still rears its head from time to time. Not everyone has what it takes to be an entrepreneur but, then, our society does not need everyone to be an entrepreneur (Garavan and O'Cinneide, 1994, p. 3). There is preliminary evidence that entrepreneurial attributes can be positively influenced by educational programs (Athayde, 2009) and that many entrepreneurship programs and courses are able to build awareness of entrepreneurship as a career option and to encourage favourable attitudes toward entrepreneurship (Anderson and Jack, 2008).There is increasing interest in attempting to teach not only about entrepreneurship, nor even for entrepreneurship, but also through entrepreneurship (Kirby, 2006), using new education programs to help students to obtain a range of both business understanding and transferable skills and competences. Kirby (2004) advanced that often such programs equate entrepreneurship with new venture creation or/and small business management and educate about entrepreneurship and enterprise, rather than educating for entrepreneurship, and only rarely is the focus on developing in their students the skills, attributes and behaviours of the successful entrepreneur.Entrepreneurship education and training programs are designed straight at stimulating entrepreneurship, which may be defined as independent small business ownership or the development of opportunity-seeking managers within enterprises (Colton, 1990). Sexton and Kasarda (1991) advance the idea that the objectives of most businesses education programs are to prepare people for career success and to increase their capacity for future learning. Athayde (2009) found out that participation in a company program can foster positive attitudes toward self-employment and that participants displayed greater enterprise potential than non-participants. Similarly important is the learner's personal achievement and contribution to society. The final measure of entrepreneurship education and training is how well it fosters all these aspirations and leads to start-ups.Measuring entrepreneurial intention automatically needs to incorporate insights from both psychological and behavioural approaches. This presents our research problematic: to develop a model that combines both psychological and behavioural approaches, in order to identify what variables have an influence on entrepreneurial intention.We organise the paper in the following major sections. The first section reviews the literature about entrepreneurship intention, specifically in relation to the psychological and behavioural approach. The second section presents the research hypotheses and the resulting structural model. The third section discusses the research methodology and the fourth section presents the results. Finally, the last section presents some conclusions and discusses some practical implications.\nEntrepreneurial intention approaches: Psychological approach\nProposal of a structural model: As a result of the literature review, we support our research on Azjen's (1991) theory of planned behaviour (TPB). His research is considered as a relevant tool to model the development of entrepreneurial intention (EI) through pedagogical processes and learning contexts (Fayolle et al., 2006; Radu and Redien-Collot, 2008). Ajzen (1991) considers that intentions toward target behaviour depend on a set of underlying attitudes. Particularly, intentions to take a certain course of action depend on the perceptions of participants regarding personal and social desirability of the behaviour and the perceptions of participants of whether they can successfully perform such action.The literature review also reveals that theoretical and empirical research has associated psychological characteristics with entrepreneurship (Bygrave, 1989; Robinson et al., 1991; Armstrong and Hird, 2009). These authors find that achievement, innovativeness, control and self-confidence could be good predictor of entrepreneurial attitudes. Figure 1 presents the model that will be explored in this research and it describes the attitudinal dimensions as latent variables of EI.The model above considers a group of variables likely to influence the EI and it is composed of various constructs, each one being measured by several indicators. These constructs are related to both to the behavioural and psychological characteristics.In what concerns to the behavioural approach, as we can see, the constructs Personal Attitude (PA), Subjective Norms (SN) and Perceived Behavioural Control (PBC) are included in the model and, all together, will contribute to the Entrepreneurial Intention (EI). There is also a connexion between the constructs PA and PBC. The construct PA includes five indicators; the construct SN includes three indicators; and the construct PBC includes six indicators.Related with the psychological approach, the model includes the constructs Locus of Control (LC), Propensity to take Risk (PR), Self Confidence (SC), Need for Achievement (NA), Tolerance of Ambiguity (TA) and Innovativeness (IN), which all together, will contribute to Entrepreneurial Intention (EI).In order to test the entrepreneurial intention model (Figure 1), a set of research hypotheses was formulated, as it follows:H1. Subjective Norms positively influences Personal Attitude (SN-+PA).H2. Subjective Norms positively influences Entrepreneurial Intention (SN-+EI).H3. Subjective Norms positively influences Perceived Behavioural Control (SN-+ PBC).H4. Personal Attitude positively influences Perceived Behavioural Control (PA-+PBC).H5. Personal Attitude positively influences Entrepreneurial Intention (PA-+EI).H6. Perceived Behavioural Control positively influences Entrepreneurial Intention (PBC-+EI).H7. Locus of Control positively influences Entrepreneurial Intention (LC-+EI).H8. Propensity to risk influences Entrepreneurial Intention (PR-EI).H9. Self Confidence positively influences Entrepreneurial Intention (SC-+EI).H10. Need for Achievement positively influences Entrepreneurial Intention (NA-+ EI).H11. Tolerance of Ambiguity positively influences Entrepreneurial Intention (TA-+EI).H12. Innovativeness positively influences Entrepreneurial Intention (IN-+EI).So it seems to be possible to present and test a model based in these assumptions (H1-H12). The entrepreneurial intention model used in this study includes several constructs related both to the behavioural and psychological characteristics. Each one of the constructs was depicted by means of several items used in a questionnaire survey, as it will be explained in the following section.\nMethodology: This research was developed involving a sample of secondary students. The method of data collection was a survey by self-administered questionnaire with several groups of questions related to demographic characteristics, behavioural and psychological constructs and entrepreneurial intention. The behavioural scales used were developed by Linan and Chen (2009), and the psychological scales by Koh (1996). The construct LC includes seven indicators; the construct PR includes six indicators; the construct SC includes six indicators; the construct NA includes six indicators; the construct TA includes six indicators; and the construct IN includes five indicators. Finally the construct EI includes six indicators.Data was analysed using structural modelling equations, through the statistical software SPSS 16.0. The partial least squares (PLS) technique was also used to test the model recurring to the Smart PLS software.This method, PLS, consists of a statistical modelling-based technique through structural equations that allows for the simultaneous estimation of a group of equations, by measuring the concepts (measurement model) and the relationships between them (structural model), and it has the capacity to address concepts not directly observable (Chin, 1998). Table I shows the main methodological aspects related to the investigation.\nResults and discussion: Questionnaires were administered to two secondary student classes, aged between 14 and 15 years old; 47.3 per cent were female, and the average age was 14.3 years. We divided our analysis in two parts:1. the descriptive analysis; and2. the PLS modelling.Descriptive analysis\nConclusion: The Entrepreneurial Intention model used in this study includes several constructs related to psychological characteristics: locus of control, propensity to take risk, self-confidence, need for achievement, tolerance of ambiguity and innovativeness. It includes also the following behavioural variables: personal attitude, subjective norms and perceived behavioural control. Results show that need for achievement, self-confidence, and personal attitude affect entrepreneurial intention. Furthermore, subjective norms and personal attitude affect perceived behavioural control.The education and training should centre itself much more in changing personal attitudes than in knowledge, because the effects could be more significant to the process of business creation and to overcome the perceived barriers to entrepreneurship. The educational systems need to be oriented to emphasise and value entrepreneurship in order to promote an enterprise culture. Methods to teach entrepreneurship should also be explored further.The main contribution of this paper are the results of an empirical attempt to complement existing, mainly conceptual, literature on the role of both behavioural and psychological approaches in the explanation of entrepreneurial intention and the propose model to promote it. Results could have a significant impact upon the knowledge of the behavioural theory contribution to the entrepreneurial intention. This study has shown that it is possible to design test based on psychological and behavioural approaches and to measure a concept defined as entrepreneurial intention in secondary students which can take account of a number of other influences on secondary students' intentions toward enterprise.Beside the variables mentioned in the our model, the intention of carrying out entrepreneurial behaviours may be affected by several factors, such as needs, values, wants, and beliefs, as well as the motivational antecedents. Our research model could be improved by eliminating some constructs that demonstrated to be non significant and certainly a number of additional constructs could be introduced by wider application during further research. More effort needs to be done, in particular, to specify the domain of entrepreneurial intention to permit the development of better test constructs.Further research is needed to develop a more coherent multidimensional construct for entrepreneurial intention and applying this methodology to different samples is required to evaluate the contribution of behavioural and psychological approaches to the entrepreneurial intention.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The field of entrepreneurship is dotted across different paradigms. Measuring entrepreneurial intention automatically needs to incorporate insights from the psychological approach and behavioural approach. The purpose of this study was to develop and test a comprehensive structural equation model which combines both psychological and behavioural perspectives aiming to identify what variables have influence on entrepreneurial intention of secondary students.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - This research was developed involving a sample of secondary students. The method of data collection was a survey by self-administered questionnaire, to two secondary student classes, with several groups of questions related to demographic characteristics, behavioural and psychological constructs and entrepreneurial intention. Data was analysed using structural equation modelling (SEM).\nFindings: - The results show that need for achievement, self-confidence, and personal attitude positively affect entrepreneurial intention. Furthermore, subjective norms and personal attitude affect perceived behavioural control. These findings could have a significant impact on knowledge of the contributions of behavioural and psychological theories to the entrepreneurial intention.\nResearch limitations/implications: - Understanding of the ways in which several psychological and behavioural characteristics influence the entrepreneurial intention could help to advance our knowledge of the entrepreneurial process. Educational systems need to be oriented to emphasize and value entrepreneurship in order to promote an enterprise culture. Methods to teach entrepreneurship should also be explored further.\nOriginality/value: - This is one of the first studies to provide evidences of the entrepreneurial intention explained by several constructs related to psychological and behavioural characteristics in a 14-15-year-old student population. Additionally, most studies of the entrepreneurial intention associated to these approaches have been mostly conceptual, and the few empirical studies have not used structural equation modelling. The use of these statistical tests helps to overcome the limitations evident in conceptual studies and provide evidence of the relationships between behavioural and psychological traits simultaneously.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
The legitimacy of the business of business schools: what's the future?	[ "Business schools", "Accreditation", "Regulation", "Management research", "Relevance", "Strategic choice and change" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: It is a truism to say that business schools and business education are big business (Pfeffer and Fong, 2002). Thomas and Wilson (2011, p. 444) note the phenomenal expansion of business schools worldwide, \"a feature of which has been to make Business Schools a Business in their own right\". The spread of business schools throughout Asia and Europe from their dominant base primarily in the USA has been a story of constant growth (10 per cent per year on year, according to Pfeffer and Fong, 2002) and are significant attractors of students and their fees from countries around the world. Business schools have become an industry. Eric Cornuel (2005) from EFMD wrote that: \"in the future the legitimacy of business schools will no longer be questioned\" he argued that they had become \"legitimised parts of society\" and that \"their role was clear\". Thomas and Wilson (2011, p. 446), drawing on earlier work by Antunes and Thomas (2007), delineate the various providers of this legitimacy. In the first generation of business schools (nineteenth to the early twentieth century), legitimacy could be traced to the creation of management employment by the state, industrialists and entrepreneurs. In addition, this generation saw the introduction of institutionalised management systems (such as accounting practices). The second more academically rigorous generation (1970s) garners legitimacy from national governments which support business schools and from universities which recognised the growth and financial potential schools could bring. The third generation (1980s to present) see issues of image and reputation as legitimacy providers and these include research rankings, citations, global performance rankings and international accreditation bodies.Today, these claims of legitimacy are being questioned to a degree where they seem neither robust nor accurate. For example, The New York Times printed several letters on 3 March 2009, reacting to a news story about the pressure these trying economic times have exerted on the teaching of the humanities. The letter writers argued that: by studying the arts, cultural history, literature, philosophy, and religion, individuals develop their powers of critical thinking and moral reasoning. Podolny (2009) is one of many authors who argue that business schools fail to develop these powers of critical thinking and moral reasoning. Podolny (2009) argues that, paradoxically, many business school academics allegedly are not curious about what really goes on inside organisations. They prefer to develop theoretical models that obscure rather than clarify the way organisations work. Podolny continues by arguing that many academics also believe that a theory's alleged relevance is enough to justify teaching it as a solution to organisational problems. The failure of business schools to embrace and teach critical thinking and moral reasoning is allegedly why MBAs made the short-sighted and self-serving decisions that resulted in the current financial crisis and other organisational crashes (e.g. Enron, Parmalat, WorldCom). Thomas and Wilson (2011) neatly summarise the allegations of business school failure. They divide these into knowledge creation (schools research the wrong things); pedagogical issues (schools teach the wrong things); and ideology, purpose and leadership (schools focus almost exclusively on free market economics, are unclear about their roles in academia or the world of practice).The question of how business schools have arrived at these positions and what might be done to secure the future of business schools is the topic of this paper. First, we briefly examine the current situational contexts of business schools which have led to the current tensions and problems faced by deans and their senior teams.\nSituational contexts: Business schools present themselves as academic institutions mimicking the more established disciplines in universities. At the same time, they are expected to demonstrate their abilities to manage themselves as businesses and conduct research and teaching which is considered \"relevant\" to practitioners and to funding bodies (Thomas and Wilson, 2011). This creates a series of tensions which have been increasing in recent years. We argue in this paper that the stage has been reached where this context has become almost impossible to manage and that, to secure their futures, business schools will have to make some key decisions and undergo considerable change in the next few years.Research in business schools faces strong internal and external criticism for the production of theoretically grounded, but irrelevant research. These criticisms are driven by unfavourable comparisons of the academic nature of business schools relative to other professional schools (such as law, medicine, architecture and engineering) and to the university communities in which they reside (Starkey and Tiratsoo, 2007; Starkey and Tempest, 2008; Thomas and Wilson, 2009, 2011).The business model of business schools is also a context in which concerns have been raised about the sustainability of the current business model (Peters and Thomas, 2011) who argue that a dialectic takes place between the goal of producing knowledge and the goal of educating students. This has led to different business schools adopting different strategic responses to this dialectic. These range from research-intensive institutions at one end of the spectrum and teaching led (sometimes research-less schools) at the other. Peters and Thomas (2011, p. 24) argue that the majority of business schools, however, lie in between these polar positions leaving them with a \"dual system of purposes and corresponding metrics that are all too often contradictory and confusing rather than cohesive\". The choices that individual institutions have made broadly share one common element. They are, the authors believe, financially unstable and probably unsustainable.They are financially unstable for a number of key reasons. Government funding for schools (and universities) has been progressively cut over the past decade and there are the highest levels of tuition fees being charged (with a UK undergraduate fee of PS9,000 per year coming into force in 2012). The cost of an MBA has risen to extremely high levels everywhere in the world. In the USA, the top 20 MBA programmes command tuition fees of $100,000 and charge even more for Executive MBA programmes (up to $170,000). Traditionally, the MBA has been regarded as an investment by those undertaking the programme. They could recoup their substantial outlay by securing well-paid jobs after gaining an MBA and be able to pay off loans and debts accrued whilst studying. It is arguable that the point has now been reached where it is no longer easy (or possible in some cases) to pay off the high costs of doing an MBA by relying on the job market and future salaries. The traditional high return on investment may very soon reach a stage where the costs of undertaking an MBA outweigh the financial benefits it might promise. Price elasticity may be approaching its limit.Salary costs in most business schools are high. They can easily approach 75 per cent of institutional expenditure. This produces some key questions about what are the appropriate roles and tasks of staff. Costing teaching time per hour for academic staff can produce extremely high hourly rates (Peters and Thomas, 2011, estimate hourly rates can reach around PS2,000 per hour where teaching hours are kept relatively low in research-intensive schools). The expectation is that such staff will engage in research and produce measurable output (publications) which will help the research ranking of schools and the career path and progression of individual academics. However, output measures are difficult to cost - for example, estimates suggest that an A-journal article may cost PS70-100 K. This is largely because there is such wide variation in the input side of the research equation (how long does it take to write a journal article and get it accepted in a top journal, or how long does it take to craft a research grant proposal?) and in the ratio of outputs (publications and research grants) in relation to research inputs (effort and time). In terms of research funding, some research is directly funded by research grants from foundations or from research councils (usually government money). However, research funding is also cross-subsidised from teaching income, where premium priced programmes such EMBAs become the \"cash cows\" for the funding of the business school (Peters and Thomas, 2011).The situational context of academic staff also raises some questions over the current business model of business schools. Many academics consider relevance to pedagogy or practice to be unimportant for perhaps ideological and certainly for career progression reasons. Career progression for academics is largely a function of research output (4/A-rated journals) and research income. The drive to achieve 4 journal publications largely precludes other activities (such as teaching, pedagogical development and relevance to practice) and creates an individualistic culture in which publication tallies are all. It is easy to see why this is the case. Most academic staff are rewarded (by promotion) for publication (and citation) and they choose the 4/A-rated journal route rather than concentrate on relevance or teaching excellence, for that matter (Adler and Harzing, 2009; Harzing, 2010). Indeed, O'Brien et al. (2010) propose the notion of \"excessive research\" by academics, resulting in negligible added benefit to students from schools where staff publish widely in 4/A-rated journals - but substantial benefit to the academic staff themselves (promotion and other rewards). They argue that there is a curvilinear relationship between research conducted in a business school and \"added economic value\" for its students. Taking added economic benefit as the prime indicator of business school performance, O'Brien et al. (2010) argue that schools in the \"upper echelons\" of research activity would benefit from reducing these research efforts.As Wilson and McKiernan (2011) and Saunders et al. (2011) note, the problems with journal rankings are legion. They represent a \"one size fit all\" approach which then places journals in a rank order. This privileges some journals over others (depending on the measures used to construct the ranking), as well as providing a seemingly objective list of \"quality\" which senior university managers can use to assess the \"quality\" of individual staff research performance. Rankings also have the tendency to reduce innovation and diversity in the field. Mainly, papers which fit the mould of research topic, method and theoretical perspectives favoured by particular journals are published. Those that do not are rejected. The result is that the \"value\" of the publication outlet (the rank of the journal) becomes privileged over both the content and the contribution of the paper and its scholarship.Defining which journals are A rated is also problematic, since different lists of rankings (e.g. the Financial Times, Association of Business Schools (ABS) and the University of Texas at Dallas lists) contain differences in which journals are included. Saunders et al. (2011, p. 407) provide a useful list of journals which appear in all of the above three lists and argue that these journals can truly be classified as A rated (see Table I).\nStrategic choice: The situational context of business schools raises key questions about their current business model; sustainability of current practice as well as raising fundamental question of what business schools do (i.e. what is their purpose)? These questions confront \"strategic choice\" for business schools (Child, 1972) and what they might do to re-position themselves in the scholarly and practice-based landscapes. There are many debates and suggestions in the literature to try and resolve this question of strategic choice. For example, Khurana (2007) argues that the role of business schools should be to produce better and more highly skilled professionals. To this end, core subjects taught (particularly to MBA students) would include, inter alia, law and psychology. Mangematin and Baden-Fuller (2008) would add \"global professionals\" to Khurana's plea as schools from around the world increasingly focus their strategies to occupy places in the Financial Times listings of the top 100 of business schools in the world. Alternatively, Gabriel (2002) suggests that the core role of business schools is to increase the dissemination and consumption of research to practitioners whilst Starkey and Tiratsoo (2007) and Reed (2009) suggest that business schools need to \"engage\" with practice and put in place a dialogical rather than linear model of knowledge production (research) and dissemination to reduce the theory/practice gap.Whilst there may be many theoretical \"choices\" a business school can make, there are also a range of pressures which impact on business schools' which effectively constrain the range of strategic choices that can be made. These include accreditation and regulation, rankings and mimetic tendencies across the sector.Accreditation and regulation\nWhat kind of business school?: The obvious challenge, arising out of the all the constraints and isomorphic tendencies listed above, is to illustrate what kind of business school might be more appropriate (and robust) for the future.Indeed Henry Mintzberg (2004), the most consistent and insightful critic of management programmes argues that management is an art not a science and that the managerial task is all about practice. He would favour a greater emphasis on managerial skill and capabilities and the virtues of critical and synthetic thinking offered by the study of the humanities and social sciences as well as conventional analytic thinking.We argue that schools will have to make substantial changes in what they research and teach. This means broadening the traditional focus of research and teaching in business schools to look more broadly at wider society, to embrace multi-disciplinary perspectives and to turn its theoretical perspectives and research focus towards \"big\" questions. In turn, this means engaging to a greater extent in public and private policy debates - reclaiming the terrain of work, employment and society.A first move would be to develop a strong norm of learning and not primarily viewing management qualifications and degrees as increasing individual salaries (maintaining/developing research and teaching in the \"mother\" disciplines of management - sociology, philosophy, psychology, economics, law and mathematics, for example). This means prioritising learning over \"added value\" of a business education. A second move would be to place far greater emphasis on the ethical and moral questions endemic in modern capitalism and to critically examine the role of businesses and managers in society. This would entail going significantly beyond the current debates over corporate social responsibility which arguably act as a convenient moral \"cloak\" for deeper questions over the accountability of managers for their actions and decisions and the role of business in wider society. A third move would be to research and teach \"big questions\" which impact upon organisations and society. These could include a wide range of topics ranging from, for example, an examination of why there is simultaneous obesity and poverty and starvation in a world technologically able to feed itself, to topics such as social and economic policy, understanding the impact and the risks of exogenous events such as climate change, disasters and terrorist activities, and the impact of a newly emerging global economic order as China and India become key players in the world economy. Finally, as managers operate increasingly globally, business schools themselves will have to become less insular and nationally oriented. An understanding of language, comparative social cultures and the impact of religion on global economic activity would seem essential parts of the teaching and research curriculum of business school in the near future. To the extent that schools do not undertake these changes, we argue that they are likely to become irrelevant and unnecessary institutions operating on the sidelines of key social, economic and political issues. Deans need to have the courage to build curricula which develop simultaneously so-called T-shaped individuals, i.e. those have significant disciplinary depth achieved through a liberal education involving critical, synthetic and analytic thinking and appropriate training in the important functions and languages of management education. Unfortunately the similarity in many business school curricula arises sadly from the mimetic and isomorphic tendencies stressed in this paper.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to examine some challenges facing business schools and their continued legitimacy. Particular attention is paid to the problems of accreditation, regulation and rankings and how these constrain strategic choice.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The paper builds on existing literature to provide an analytical overview of the challenges currently facing business schools.\nFindings: - The paper assesses the current context of business schools and assesses to what extent they are becoming less relevant both in terms of practice and theories. It suggests changes business schools might make in order to increase relevance.\nOriginality/value: - The paper suggests that business schools should change their central concerns to issues of central relevance to society and to policy. A wide range of such topics, ranging from climate change to exogenous events, is suggested.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Fostering organizational learning through leadership and knowledge sharing	[ "Organizational learning", "Transformational leadership", "Interpersonal trust", "Knowledge sharing behavior", "Knowledge sharing climate" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Organizational learning has been recognized as a critical intervention to gain and maintain a sustainable competitive advantage for organizations in a business environment (Guinot et al., 2016). In other words, organizational learning can play a significant role in acquiring, disseminating and using knowledge to adapt to a changing external environment (Hoe and McShane, 2010). Through a process of cognitive and behavioral changes, organizational learning leads to expected outcomes in the current value system (e.g. trial-and-error; Argyris and Schon, 1996). This process also includes reflection on values/norms and social structures to examine the appropriateness of the final desired outcomes (e.g. innovation).\nLiterature review and hypotheses: Transformational leadership\nMethods: Data collection and sample demographics\nResults: To test the relationships among the variables, basic reliability and validity tests were performed including item-internal consistency estimates and model-data fit analyses. Structural equation modeling followed, and the results of the hypothesis testing were addressed. Before testing the hypotheses, correlations among the different variables were analyzed, as shown in Table I. The analysis demonstrated that no case showed a level of correlation high enough to jeopardize the fitness of the model. To check whether the correlation would cause a major bias, we examined the variance inflation factors (VIF). All VIFs were below the critical value of 10 (Hair et al., 1998). The VIFs appeared to suggest that there was no serious multicollinearity problem. In terms of data distribution and normality, the results showed that the collected data had a normal distribution range according to the values of skewness and kurtosis among the variables used in the data (see Table I).\nDiscussion and implications: This study was undertaken to enhance our understanding of the relationships among transformational leadership, interpersonal trust, a knowledge-sharing climate and behavior and organizational learning in a manufacturing company context. Detailed discussion and implications of the findings are provided below.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this study is to examine the relationships among transformational leadership, knowledge sharing climate and behavior, interpersonal trust and organizational learning.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Data from 209 participants from a manufacturing company in Korea were analyzed using the structural equation modeling method.\nFindings: The findings of the study indicated that transformational leadership directly affected the knowledge sharing climate and behavior, interpersonal trust and organizational learning of an organization. Transformational leadership also indirectly affected organizational learning through knowledge climate and behavior, and interpersonal trust. In addition, a knowledge sharing climate directly affected interpersonal trust and knowledge sharing behavior and indirectly affected organizational learning through interpersonal trust and knowledge behavior. Interpersonal trust directly affected knowledge sharing behavior and indirectly affected organizational learning through knowledge sharing behavior. Finally, knowledge sharing behavior positively affected organizational learning.\nResearch limitations/implications: The results highlight the important role of transformational leadership to enhance the knowledge sharing climate and behavior of employees, interpersonal trust and organizational learning. This study also indicated that transformational leadership, interpersonal trust and knowledge sharing behavior are antecedents of organizational learning.\nPractical implications: The study's findings could motivate practitioners to place more emphasis on leadership support, knowledge sharing and organizational learning in the manufacturing sector.\nOriginality/value: The study provided diverse paths indicating how transformational leadership can impact organizational learning by examining both the direct and indirect paths between transformational leadership, multiple mediators and organizational learning. It also suggested a research framework for supporting transformational leadership, knowledge sharing and organizational learning, as well as their relationships by examining the three variables in one research model.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Lean healthcare from a change management perspective: The role of leadership and workforce flexibility in an operating theatre	[ "Transformational leadership", "Team leadership", "Change capacity", "Lean healthcare", "Change Competence Model", "Workforce flexibility" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Healthcare organizations are increasingly forced to adapt to developments in medical information, technologies and relationships with other (healthcare) systems (Brandao de Souza and Pidd, 2011). In consequence, the healthcare sector is subject to continuous change (Adler et al., 2003; Dahlgaard et al., 2011). Simultaneously with these changes, healthcare organizations are forced to maintain and improve performance, quality of care and patient satisfaction (Brandao de Souza and Pidd, 2011). Patient safety is also a focal point, as is clear from one of the most influential reports in healthcare of the last two decades: \"To err is human: building a safer health system\" (Kohn et al., 2000). This report by the Institute of Medicine ensured that patient safety became a primary concern in the healthcare sector.\n2. Conceptual framework: Transformational leadership\n3. Method: Case description and participants\n4. Findings: Test of hypotheses\n5. Discussion: Healthcare organizations have difficulties in successfully implementing lean healthcare and achieving sustainable change results by improving quality and safety while simultaneously lowering costs (Adler et al., 2003; Dahlgaard et al., 2011; Doss and Orr, 2007; Joosten et al., 2009; Kaplan et al., 2014; Samuel and Novak-Weekley, 2014). Current literature argues that instead of implementing merely technical lean tools, an organizational transformation based on lean principles is required for sustainable change success (Kaplan et al., 2014). Specific attention should thus be given to socio-technical aspects concerning the throughput that enhance the complete change process and diminish the implementation gap which occurs between an organization's change strategy and the actual implementation (Floyd and Woodridge, 1992; Joosten et al., 2009; Mankins and Steele, 2005; Sull, 2007). From a change management perspective, we argue that appropriate leadership styles and workforce flexibility are success factors in the transition from technical \"lean tools\" to the required transformation defined as a hospital culture characterized by increased patient and other stakeholder satisfaction through continuous improvement. In more detail, we hypothesized that transformational leadership at senior management level, team leadership and workforce flexibility at all levels contribute to the implementation of lean healthcare, seen as the actual organizational transformation based on lean principles.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Lean healthcare is used in a growing number of hospitals to increase efficiency and quality of care. However, healthcare organizations encounter problems with the implementation of change initiatives due to an implementation gap: the gap between strategy and execution. From a change management perspective, the purpose of this paper is to increase scientific knowledge regarding factors that diminish the implementation gap and make the transition from the \"toolbox lean\" toward an actual transformation to lean healthcare.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A cross-sectional study was executed in an operating theatre of a Dutch University Medical Centre. Transformational leadership was expected to ensure the required top-down commitment, whereas team leadership creates the required active, bottom-up behavior of employees. Furthermore, professional and functional silos and a hierarchical structure were expected to impede the workforce flexibility in adapting organizational elements and optimize the entire process flow.\nFindings: The correlation and regression analyses showed positive relations between the transformational leadership and team leadership styles and lean healthcare implementation. The results also indicated a strong relation between workforce flexibility and the implementation of lean healthcare.\nOriginality/value: With the use of a recently developed change management model, the Change Competence Model, the authors suggest leadership and workforce flexibility to be part of an organization's change capacity as crucial success factor for a sustainable transformation to lean healthcare.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Determination of histamine levels in commonly consumed fish in the region of Fez: The effect of heating and enzymatic treatments	[ "Heating", "Competitive ELISA", "Enzymatic treatments", "Fish samples", "Histamine levels" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Fish play an important role in human nutrition and public health. They are essential sources of animal protein for the Moroccan population, while their consumption varies notably between coastal and inland regions. According to Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations, estimated per capita seafood consumption in Morocco was 16.6 kg in 2015. In addition, Morocco has an important stock of fish living along the 3,500 Km of Mediterranean and Atlantic coasts, with sardine as the most abundant species (Mohamed Lamlili et al., 2015). This latter species is the most widely consumed fish species in Moroccan population and is characterized by its richness in omega-3 fatty acid.\n2. Material and methods: 2.1 Chemicals\n3. Results and discussion: Histamine levels in fish samples obtained from different local markets in Fez and surrounding are shown in Table I. Results revealed that 16 positive samples (20 percent) of the 80 analyzed fresh fish samples had histamine level higher than the tolerance limit of 200 mg/kg established by Moroccan and International regulations. The maximum level of histamine was found in horse mackerel at a level of 7,331 mg/kg. A similar study in Ethiopia by Berjia and Brimer (2013) showed that 21 percent of the samples (11/52) analyzed were above the limit of histamine contents accepted by European countries, mostly contributed by tilapia species (2,900 mg/kg). Furthermore, histamine levels higher than 200 mg/kg in fresh fish samples have been also reported in numerous countries: Italy, South Africa, Egypt and New Zealand (Shalaby, 1996; Fletcher et al., 1998; Auerswald et al., 2006; Muscarella et al., 2013).\n4. Conclusion: Our results have shown that the majority of fish samples (80 percent) are in compliance with international and Moroccan standards for histamine content in fish, indicating good quality of products and, therefore, can be considered to be safe for human consumption. However, 20 percent of samples are non-compliant and exceed the tolerance limit established by the standard. The permanent control of the histamine presence in fish samples and the maintenance of adequate refrigeration during handling and storage are recommended. On the other hand, our study demonstrated a low reduction in histamine contents in the majority of fish samples under heating and enzymatic treatments.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is, first, to evaluate the quality of commonly consumed fish species in Fez region (Morocco) by quantifying the levels of histamine in fresh fish samples using competitive enzyme-linked immune sorbent assay (ELISA), and then to study the effect of heating and enzymatic digestion on the level of fish-histamine.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Histamine content was tested on 80 fresh fish samples of 11 species collected from various local stores in Fez region, from February to March 2016. The analyses were performed using a competitive ELISA assay to measure histamine in fish samples.\nFindings: ELISA results showed that 80 percent of 80 fish samples analyzed was found to contain much lower levels of histamine (<1 mg/kg) and can be considered to be safe for human consumption. However, 20 percent of the samples (16/80) had histamine level higher than the tolerance limit of 200 mg/kg established by Moroccan and International regulations, which the maximum level reached up to 7,331 mg/kg in horse mackerel. Concerning the effect of heating and enzymatic treatments on fish-histamine levels, results have shown a low reduction in histamine contents in the majority of fish samples under these treatments.\nOriginality/value: In conclusion, good quality of the fish product, demonstrated by histamine levels, was found in the most of fish samples analyzed, while 20 percent of the samples are non-compliant and exceed the tolerance limit established by the national and international regulatory limit.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Organizational communications in Hong Kong: a cultural approach to groupthink	[ "Group thinking", "Organizations", "Communication processes", "Hong Kong" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction to this study: The purpose of this study is to explore common Chinese cultural characteristics that could lead to patterns of groupthink within the Hong Kong organizational environment. In the early 1970s, Irving Janis developed a theory based on participant-observation, which he defined as \"Groupthink\" (Griffin, 1997), a phenomenon dealing with the over-cohesiveness of a group leading to defective decision making. Janis (1983) referred to groupthink as a concurrence-seeking tendency where group members strive for unanimity and override their motivation to consider realistic alternatives.Very few articles on organizational management refer to this theory (Eaton, 2001). Eaton (2001, p. 183) says, \"It is a pity that Janis' theory of Groupthink is now history of slight relevance\".Groupthink is a communication barrier because group members try to minimize conflict and reach consensus without analytically testing and evaluating ideas, resulting in a false sense of agreement (Beebe and Masterson, 2003). It is highly probable that groupthink is a serious hurdle towards cultural communication. By understanding the patterns that trigger groupthink within Hong Kong culture, one can minimize the occurrences of the phenomenon within this important financial metropolis.\nThe significance of Hong Kong as a key financial center: Hong Kong is the second largest stock market in Asia and it is the eighth largest in the world (Hong Kong Development Council, 2004). It is a major financial center because it is maintained by a strict supervisory system, which is supported by a set of strict banking ordinances (Hong Kong Monetary Authority, 2004). It is also the second largest foreign direct investment recipient in Asia (Hong Kong Development Council, 2004). Therefore, by gaining an understanding of the Chinese cultural factors that trigger groupthink, this might provide essential knowledge when conducting business within the region.\nGroupthink: a source of defective decision making: Janis' \"groupthink\" argued against the idea that strong group cohesion is equal to strong team performance (Eaton, 2001). Janis (1983) defined \"groupthink\" as a concurrence-seeking tendency, where group members strive for unanimity and blind themselves to realistic, alternative means of action. According to Janis' observational research, there are three main kinds of group behavior that slip into a groupthink mentality. The group will be overconfident in its abilities; it will view problems with tunnel vision or closed mindedness; and there will be strong peer pressure to conform to the group's decisions (Griffin, 1997). Derived from the three main kinds of behavior, Janis listed eight groupthink symptoms. They are as follows:1. Type I. Overconfidence in the group's abilities (Manz and Neck, 1997):* Illusion of invulnerability - a false belief that the group is invincible.* Belief in inherent morality of the group.2. Type II. Closed mindedness (Manz and Neck, 1997):* Collective rationalizations - a collective effort in making sense out of the group's decisions, no matter how ridiculous the decisions might be.* Stereotypes of out-groups - stereotyped views on competitors and enemies as inferior.3. Type III. Pressure towards conformity (Manz and Neck, 1997):* Self-censorship - group members' repression of their own thoughts or concerns that deviate from the group consensus.* Illusion of unanimity/harmony.* Direct pressure on dissenters - direct social pressure will be placed on members who challenge the group's shared beliefs.* Self-appointed mind guards - which are designed to filter out problems and protect the group leader from assault by challenging ideas.\nA brief contemporary historical review of groupthink: Eaton (2001) conducted two case studies of possible groupthink in British corporate management, British Airways (BA) and Marks & Spencer (M & S). The author conducted a content analysis, which suggested that Groupthink was present, resulting in the blockage of vital communications and leading to a plunge in reputation. The study found that there was a major feature of Groupthink (which has a tendency to occur in conditions of over-cohesiveness within a group) within the two British organizations. Both companies had earned good profits and illusions of invulnerability transpired. The feeling of invincibility moved stealthily into the style of management. As a result, during 1998 to 1999, the stock value of M & S dropped from 590 to less than 300 and BA dropped from 740 to 300 (Eaton, 2001). These cases revealed that groupthink is still a major communication hurdle to modern organizations.\nMethodology: Groupthink will persist as a major internal cultural/communication hurdle in today's modern organizations (Eaton, 2001; Ko, 2003). The small to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Hong Kong will not be immune from the negative effects of groupthink. Therefore, there is a clear need to gain an accurate understanding of the patterns that cause this phenomenon within Hong Kong SMEs. In the case of this study, a phenomenological paradigm/qualitative research approach will be a suitable choice, especially since in the phenomenological paradigm the main concern is to generate theories (Hussey and Hussey, 1997).To gain an understanding of the specific Chinese cultural patterns that trigger groupthink within a Hong Kong/Chinese culture, a set of predefined Chinese cultural values was chosen for this study. Woo and Prud'homme (1999) undertook a study of the common cultural characteristics inherent in the skills of negotiation with individuals in China. Within his study a set of cultural factors that are considered as important toward the art of communications within the Chinese culture were established. These factors are listed as follows:* Status. This is the cultural characteristic that places a high degree of importance on the respect of hierarchy (Woo and Prud'homme, 1999).* The concept of \"Face\". This is the mark of personal dignity, which means having high stature in the eyes of one's peers. It is viewed as a prized commodity, which can be earned, taken away, or lost (Woo and Prud'homme, 1999).* Trust. This is defined as a person's integrity on both a professional and personal level (Woo and Prud'homme, 1999). For example, a Chinese person will be hesitant about entering a business without getting to know his partners on a personal level. Woo indicated that this process is considered as the information gathering phase.* Friendship. This is defined as the cultivation process of personal-level relationships. As the friendship cultivates, so does the amount of trust (Woo and Prud'homme, 1999).* Guanxi (networks). This is connection. It is the idea of the importance of whom an individual knows. In other words, it is an informal channel that is not bureaucratic, which allows things to be done quickly and smoothly (Woo and Prud'homme, 1999).\nImplementing the quality function deployment to measure the relationships between groupthink and the Chinese cultural characteristics that are considered as important factors toward the art of communications within the Hong Kong culture: In order to examine the relationship between the Chinese cultural factors (predefined by Woo and Prud'homme, 1999) and the symptoms of groupthink; the quality function deployment (QFD) methodology was chosen. It was used to measure the relationships between groupthink and the Chinese cultural characteristics that are considered as important factors toward the art of communications within the Hong Kong culture.QFD was originally developed for Mitsubishi's Kobe shipyards in Japan. It was designed to help Mitsubishi meet the customers' needs by paying detailed attention to the design and manufacturing process. The foundation of QFD is the House of Quality (HOQ) matrix, which contains the \"whats\" (horizontal portion) and the \"hows\" (vertical portion) (Tan et al., 1998). In this study, the \"whats\" describe the symptoms of groupthink, and the \"hows\" describe the common Chinese cultural characteristics, which were predefined by Woo and Prud'homme's (1999) study.\nData gathering methods: A focus group, which consisted of senior partners and managers from \"Hero Creator Limited\" was formed. The participants were chosen specifically because of their experiences in Chinese cultural communications, especially since the participants had vast dealings in complex business deals in Hong Kong. The QFD matrix (Appendix, Figure A1) was presented and the participants were asked to analyze the specific relevancy of each category within the matrix. This was followed by an in-depth discussion of the results.\nThe findings of this study: According to the empirical data via the focus group (Appendix, Figure A2), among all the Chinese cultural factors, the aspect of status has a strong relationship with the symptoms of Groupthink. However, the other cultural factors scored as weak relationships.During the discussion that followed, the participants indicated that status is the most important characteristic within the Chinese (Hong Kong) culture, which is the key factor that causes a group to become trapped by groupthink. The other four cultural factors: face, trust, friendship, and Guanxi (networks) are associated with status. In general, an individual with high status is expected to have earned a vast amount of the other four cultural factors. The higher the person's status, the more sensitive one can be toward the loss of face, trust, friendship, and Guanxi (networks).A self-governing group with members of high social status is more likely to be trapped by groupthink. It is possible that in order to avoid any loss of face colleagues are exceedingly hesitant about challenging each other, for the sake of showing respect to the other members. Therefore, within the field of communications, Groupthink can be hazardous to not just SMEs, but to many other organizations in Hong Kong.\nConclusion and recommendation for further research: With reference to the findings of this study, theoretically, a self-governing group with members of high social status needs to be well aware of the hidden danger of groupthink. A possible suggestion to reduce groupthink is to employ an outside consultant to take up the role as the devil's advocate.There are numerous literatures on various methods to reduce the negative effects of groupthink. Owing to the differences in cultural communications within the Hong Kong region, a close examination to determine which countermeasures are most effective will be essential.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The term, groupthink, refers to group over-cohesiveness that causes defective decision making. The purpose of this theoretical paper is to explore common Chinese cultural characteristics which have the potential to lead to symptoms of groupthink within the Hong Kong organizational environment.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The methodology called \"quality function deployment\" was applied to measure the relationships between a set of predefined Chinese cultural factors and the groupthink symptoms.\nFindings: - This research found that among all the Chinese cultural factors, the aspect of status has a strong relationship with the symptoms of groupthink.\nOriginality/value: - This paper provides useful insights into aspects of groupthink and Chinese cultural characteristics.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Nutritional supplement-usage associated characteristics of high-performing athletes	[ "Age", "Sport", "Health", "Food" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The consumption of nutritional supplements (NS) is highly prevalent among athletes, with some studies reporting up to 90 per cent of athletes using NS (De Silva et al., 2010). Although a virtually uncountable number of supplements exist, only a few are supported by scientific evidence for health or performance positive effect (Maughan et al., 2011). Yet, the use of NS among athletes is widespread, and appears to be increasing with time (Huang et al., 2006). Additionally, some studies (Sousa et al., 2013; PetroCzi et al., 2007) have been denoting that athletes' choices are probably not based on scientific evidence. Moreover, the possible contamination of NS with prohibited substances in sport, which can result in inadvertent doping and health issues, is a current matter of high concern (Geyer et al., 2008).\nMethods: Participants and study design\nResults: From the 304 athletes screened, 44 were excluded due to incomplete information, and 19 due to under- or over-reporting. Therefore, the final sample comprised 241 athletes (66 per cent males, 13-37 years, 71.5+-13.0 kg, 178+-11 cm).\nDiscussion: The primary aim of the present study was to analyse differences in sociodemographic and sporting characteristics, health-behaviours, and food intake of athletes using and not using NS. We found that some sociodemographic and sporting characteristics, namely, athletes' sex, age and BMI, parents' education, type of sport, hours of training/week, hours of gym/week, and a range of foods, were related to NS usage. The use of NS is highly prevalent among athletes (Maughan et al., 2011) and our results showed that Portuguese athletes are not an exception. Athletes seem to believe that the use of NS is almost mandatory for achieving maximal performance. Dietz et al. (2014) recently concluded that young athletes with the aim to enhance performance in order to become an Olympic or World Champion had 3.7 times more odds to be a NS user. The widespread belief on NS among athletes has been being fuelled by the multi-billion-dollar industry of supplements, with aggressive advertisement campaigns on their products and promises of performance enhancing, which are frequently not based on scientific evidence (Bishop, 2010). In fact, media has been recently associated with NS usage in adolescent boys (Frison et al., 2013).\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to analyse differences in sociodemographic and sporting characteristics, health-behaviours, and food intake of athletes using and not using nutritional supplements (NS).\nDesign/methodology/approach: High-performance Portuguese athletes from 13 sports completed a NS usage questionnaire, assessing information on sociodemographic (sex, age, height, weight, athlete's, and parental education level), health-related (smoking, daily time of sleeping, walking, and sitting), and sporting (type, number of international performances, weekly hours of training and weekly hours of gym) characteristics; and a semi-quantitative food-frequency questionnaire (86 items), regarding the previous 12 months.\nFindings: From the 241 athletes (66 per cent males, 13-37 years), 64 per cent reported NS use. Supplement usage was associated with age 18 years (odds ratio (OR) 2.57, 95 per cent; confidence interval (CI) 1.17-5.65), performing individual sports (OR 5.45, 95 per cent; CI 2.49-11.93) and\nOriginality/value: Athletes using NS had different characteristics from non-users, and seemed to have healthier and more sports-oriented food choices. Our findings may help sport and health professionals to identify an alleged or future NS user, enabling the development of a timely and self-directed supplement scheme.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Future shape of the responsive manufacturing enterprise	[ "Agile production", "Adaptability", "Supply and demand", "Network operating systems", "Flexibility" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1 Introduction: Some of the established trends influencing today's manufacturing environments are already apparent: global competition; shortened product life cycle; increasing requirements for quality and reliability; increasing need for product customisation; faster paced advances in increasingly complex technology; and rapidly expanding options in materials and processes. Global competition and the increased unpredictability of surroundings are relatively new pressures that most companies believe are not only going to endure, but also perhaps accelerate. The ability of an enterprise to take advantage of rather than be destroyed by these forces is a key ingredient of any successful manufacturing strategy.In addition to the (now mature) manufacturing paradigms of flexible and lean manufacturing, many new ideas and concepts have been recently proposed for shaping the next generation manufacturing systems in order to deal with such complicated trends and diverse influences. Examples are: the fractal company (Warnecke, 1993; Saad and Lassila, 2004), holonic manufacturing (Markus et al., 1996), random manufacturing (Iwata and Onosato, 1994), sustainable manufacturing (Alting and Jorgensen, 1993), biological manufacturing (Ueda et al., 1997) and agile manufacturing (Goldman et al., 1995). Many of these concepts are advocated as the new paradigms for post-lean production in response to increased unpredictability in market conditions and the need to reorganize the total activities of enterprises such that they can thrive in an environment of continuous change. Speed of response, continuous and unpredictable change, opportunistic customers, adaptable producers, virtual organizations, ceaseless technology, innovation management and visionary leadership are but some of the phrases that appear frequently in the literature when describing future manufacturing paradigms. A major theme running through much of the work in this area is that future manufacturing enterprises will be based on networks of autonomous or semi-autonomous resource groupings organized as physical or virtual supply networks. It is no longer necessary for an enterprise to physically own all the resources needed to develop, manufacture, sell and support its product and services. What is necessary, however, is that an enterprise can work together with other enterprises at every level to successfully exploit market potential.In spite of attracting much attention recently from practitioners and researchers alike, many of the new manufacturing paradigms are still in the process of being defined and a more robust foundation to aid the transformation to the \"Manufacturing Enterprise of the Future\" is still to be defined.The overriding goal of the Manufacturing Enterprise of the Future remains essentially unchanged. It has to achieve rapid, flexible and integrated development and manufacture of innovative products at a price the customer is prepared to pay. To thrive in the emerging market conditions it has to be capable of rapidly responding to market trends and operating as an efficient member of an extended and increasingly global supply network.This paper reports on some of the preliminary results of an ongoing Innovative Manufacturing Initiative (IMI) scoping study (RAMANA, 1996). Over the last 18 months, the research team conducted a review of literature relating to agile, lean and world class manufacturing and visited companies both in the UK and USA (DTI OSTEMS mission) in order to gain insights into the shape of the manufacturing enterprise of the future.The main objectives of the work are: the development of an overall framework for capturing what are considered to be the main attributes of the responsive enterprise; to gain an insight to the means by which the transformation to responsive manufacturing can be achieved; and to help identify future research directions in order to improve the competitiveness of the UK aerospace sector.\n2 Responsive manufacturing: A fundamental dilemma of strategy making is the need to reconcile the forces for stability and for change - to focus efforts and gain operating efficiencies on the one hand, yet adapt and maintain currency with a changing external environment on the other. Organizations tend to resolve these opposing forces by attending first to one, then to the other (Mintzberg, 1987).New generation manufacturing concepts normally evolve slowly from best manufacturing practices and experience. The wealth of research, industrial practice and experience relating to the manufacturing paradigms such as flexible manufacturing systems and lean production principles will, therefore, continue to be relevant and critically influential in shaping up any new thinking regarding the organization of manufacturing systems. It must be recognized, however, that in order to create the kind of radical, transformational change that is required to respond to today's market challenges and trends, a new strategic re-orientation is needed.Manufacturing responsiveness relates to the ability of manufacturing systems to make a rapid and balanced response to the predictable and unpredictable changes that characterize today's manufacturing environments (Gnidy and Saad, 1997). The \"Responsive Manufacturing Enterprise,\" the enterprise that is able to thrive in the future, the world-class competitor, has to encompass new principals and modes of operation.The strategic focus of the responsive manufacturing enterprise is based on setting courses of action designed to achieve balance between stability under conditions of uncertainty, and responsiveness to change. This critical balance must be designed to allow the manufacturing enterprise to use its distinctive, core competencies to achieve continuous improvement, profitability and growth, and to ensure enterprise success in coping with disturbances in its environment through its adaptability and change proficiency.The responsive manufacturing enterprise has organizational characteristics which allows it to out perform competitors by excelling simultaneously in five domains: product and process development; the adaptability of the enterprise to changes in its environment; ability to deal with continuous change; the balance of its response under conditions of uncertainty; and efficiency in operating as a smart partner in an extended and increasingly global supply network. Workforce capabilities; the flexibility and intelligence of technology and re-configurability of manufacturing systems; seamless integration of knowledge internally between the functions within an enterprise, as well as between an enterprise and its partners in a supply network; and the utilization of communications technologies are critical enablers towards achieving responsiveness.\n3 Model development: The Responsive Manufacturing Model (RMM) reported in this paper shares many of the underlying principles of \"The Lean Enterprise Model\" developed at MIT (LEM, 1996). It evolved through a combination of literature review, focused group discussions, interviews and a questionnaire survey of six aerospace companies. During the initial phase of model development, the main responsiveness domains (at the first level in the hierarchy) and an initial set of attributes for the second hierarchical level were identified. Group discussions and industrial interviews led to several changes and refinements to clarify definitions and group elements logically under sub-goals. As the model \"firmed-up\" and became sufficiently stable, a questionnaire was designed to establish the relative importance associated with the various model elements.After explaining the various model elements, industrialists were asked to complete a questionnaire to indicate the relative importance attached to the model elements in their organizations. In the questionnaire, pair-wise comparisons were used to rank the relative importance of one element against another in the same hierarchical level. The process starts with the top level and progresses sequentially through the lower levels. The relative importance was recorded on a scale of 1 to 9, with 1 meaning equal importance and 9 indicating the extreme limit of relative importance between the pairs of elements being compared.A multi-criteria decision support tool based on the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) was used for data analysis. AHP, a mathematically based theory developed at the Wharton Business School of the University of Pennsylvania (Saaty, 1995), has been used in numerous application since its development in the mid-1970s to effectively draw out and assist with the subjectivity that is inherent in many decisions. It assists the decision-making process by allowing decision makers to evaluate the significance of the objectives (criteria) and solution alternatives. The process of structuring an objective into a hierarchical model and then pair-wise comparing its elements can lead to an insight into the best overall course of action. The inconsistency of pair-wise comparisons is measured automatically by the system after calculating the priority of each model element. The system also allows a \"what-if\" or graphical sensitivity analysis to quickly determine how a change in the importance of one objective may influence other choices.The proposed model shown in Figure 1 is developed primarily to act as a framework for attempting to identify the attributes and characteristics of the responsive enterprise with particular reference to the UK aerospace sector. In general, the aerospace environment can be characterized by the development and manufacture of complex, technologically advanced, assembled products made in a complex supply network. Job shop or continuous flow production is the predominant method of product manufacture, where products are made in small volume and complicated process flows.The results of a wide ranging survey of European industry on the factory of the future (DTI, 1994) showed that companies agree that each enterprise needs to have a total, consistent view (model) of its activities in order to give consistency to its various strategies and policies. However, it must also be recognised that even within the boundary of an industrial sector it may not be possible to develop a single model that applies to all companies in that sector. Company-based, detailed models have to be developed to cater for specific company issues, requirements and external pressures. The value of a generalised model lies in identifying the general principles and structuring the debate towards continuous improvement. The basic elements of the proposed model are shown in Figure 1. The top level of the hierarchy represents the main domains identified as central to achieving responsiveness.3.1 Product development process\n4 Results and discussion: Figure 2 shows the relative importance associated with the top level domains (sub-goals) of the model towards achieving manufacturing responsiveness (the main goal). Figures 3-8 show detailed analysis of the contribution of the various model elements towards achieving each sub-goal.Overall, the four most significant domains towards achieving responsiveness were the product development process, supply network efficiency, adaptability and change proficiency. It is perhaps not surprising that the product development process attracted the highest score (30 percent). In the aerospace environment product development is normally considered paramount. The high priority associated with the efficiency of the supply network (21 percent) also reflects the importance that the industry attaches to supply chain issues after almost a decade of rationalization, streamlining and concentration on core competencies. Adaptability and change proficiency attracted almost equal priorities (18 and 16 percent, respectively) but not far behind, supply network at 21 percent. This reflects the importance that is attached within the aerospace sector to the various facets of flexibility, ability to implement new technology and the ability to forecast demand and trends. What is perhaps a surprising outcome from the results is the relative importance associated with the balance of enterprise response and the importance of organizational characteristics towards achieving manufacturing responsiveness (8 and 6 percent, respectively). Many of the main practices associated with lean manufacturing (waste minimization, process capability and maturity, resource utilization) have attracted little priority. This may be a reflection that the industry has made great strides in these directions in the last decade and their focus has changed. On the other hand, it could be interpreted as representing an industry that still lives in the days of \"cost plus\" contracts, that does not recognize the importance of lean manufacturing practices!Figure 9 shows an overall synthesis of the results derived from adding global priorities at each level of the hierarchy. It shows that the most significant elements in achieving manufacturing responsiveness (above 4 percent global score) are: customer driven product development, supply chain design, intelligent and flexible technology, producibility analysis, integrated product and process development, concurrency of the extended manufacturing enterprise, cost effectiveness, ability to implement new technology and systems and supply chain management and logistics. As expected, this confirms that the product development process, the efficiency of the supply network and adaptability as the three most significant domains of manufacturing responsiveness. The majority of the most significant elements (above 5 percent global score) are \"technological\": intelligent and flexible technology; producibility analysis; and integrated product and process development. This is perhaps a reflection on the technological focus of the aerospace industry.\n5 Conclusions: The RMM reported in this paper is at an early state of development and the work is ongoing to refine it further. The development of appropriate measures and methods of assessment for the various facets and attributes of manufacturing responsiveness is an important step towards full model development which is still to be addressed.The model is primarily an attempt to provide a broad framework for synthesizing some of the information generally available as a contribution to the current debate regarding future manufacturing systems. It focuses mainly on product development and manufacture, some aspects of supply chain and organizational characteristics but not on other activities such as marketing administration and customer relations.The process of structuring the various elements influencing manufacturing responsiveness into logical groups in a hierarchical model has proved very useful during model development. It proved a significant aid during the focused group discussions and interviews that preceded completion of the questionnaire. The results to date are very encouraging and provide several interesting insights into the domains and elements of manufacturing responsiveness and the relative importance attached to them in the UK aerospace sector. In descending order of importance, the product development process and supply network efficiency are the two most significant domains influencing manufacturing responsiveness, contributing more than 50 percent towards achieving the goal. Customer driven product development, supply chain design, intelligent and flexible technology, producibility analysis, integrated product and process development and the concurrency of the extended manufacturing enterprise are considered to be the most significant elements overall, contributing, 40 percent towards achieving manufacturing responsiveness.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The paper seeks to report on some of the preliminary results of an ongoing scoping study into the shape of the manufacturing enterprise of the future.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - This paper evolved through a combination of literature review, focused group discussions, interviews and a questionnaire survey of six aerospace companies in the UK. It is primarily an attempt to provide a broad framework for synthesizing some of the information generally available as a contribution to the current debate regarding the future of manufacturing systems.\nFindings: - The results to date show that the product development process and supply network efficiency are the two most significant domains influencing manufacturing responsiveness. Within those domains, customer driven product development and supply chain design, intelligent and flexible technology, producibility analysis, integrated product and process development and the concurrency of the extended manufacturing enterprise are considered as the most significant elements towards achieving responsiveness. In addition a Responsive Manufacturing Model (RMM) is provided.\nResearch limitations/implications: - The RMM reported in the paper is at an early state of development and the work is ongoing to refine it further. The development of appropriate measures and methods of assessment for the various facets and attributes of manufacturing responsiveness is an important step towards full model development which is still to be addressed.\nPractical implications: - The process of structuring the various elements influencing manufacturing responsiveness into logical groups in a hierarchical model has proved very useful during model development. It proved a significant aid during the focused group discussions and interviews that preceded completion of the questionnaire. The results to date are very encouraging and provide several interesting insights into the domains and elements of manufacturing responsiveness and the relative importance attached to them in the UK aerospace sector.\nOriginality/value: - The work was funded by EPSRC (IMI) research grant as it was the first attempt in this field over within the UK. The proposed model and the obtained results have led to another research project funded by EPSRC over three years to further investigate the proposed model and the implication of its implementation.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Patients' expectations and solutions for improving primary diabetes care	[ "User involvement", "Organizational change", "Continuous quality improvement", "Empowerment", "Patient expectation" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Developed in the late 1990s, the Chronic Care Model (CCM) is a coherent integrated approach to improving the quality of services offered to people with chronic diseases and a model designed to generate proactive organised care teams interacting with active informed patients (Wagner, 1998; Ham, 2010; Wagner et al., 2001; Murcko et al., 2006). The CCM focusses on the development of productive interactions between professionals and patients and emphasises the importance of identifying problems from the patients' perspective, eliciting patients' preferences about their options for increasing their involvement in health decisions and recognising patients as an expert source of information for assessing health care quality (Cramm et al., 2015; Fradgley et al., 2014).\nMethodology: This study used a participatory approach because it is an effective method to examine problems by those concerned by the issue and to develop knowledge that can support social and system change (Baum et al., 2006; Parry et al., 2009). It consists of exploring a common problem in collaboration with partners to gain understanding of a problematic situation, find solutions and develop knowledge that can help improve practices (Baum et al., 2006; Parry et al., 2009). An advisory committee composed of various partners - patients, clinicians, decision makers and researchers - was involved in the different stages of the study. The purpose of the participatory approach was to promote patient empowerment by improving their knowledge of their community-based services and helping them better understand their needs (St-Cyr Tribble et al., 2008). An indirect goal was also to improve links between local health networks and local diabetes associations. The study was approved by the Ethics Committee of the Centre de la sante et des services sociaux Champlain-Charles-LeMoyne. Each participant signed a consent form prior to taking part in this study.\nResults: A total of 79 individuals attended six workshops and eight of them were caregivers or family members of people living with diabetes. In total, 59 per cent were women, mean age was 63-year-old (SD=10) and 72 per cent were living with someone. Participants had been living with diabetes for an average of 13 years (SD=9).\nDiscussion: The results of this study concur with those of other studies documenting the needs of diabetic clienteles in other countries and elsewhere in Canada (Manns et al., 2013). As described by Wong et al. (2011) and Stiffler et al. (2014), there are gaps between the needs of people living with diabetes and the health services offered. These needs concern different aspects of care such as accessibility, organisation, coordination, and better dissemination and visibility of services. Even if patients are generally satisfied with services provided (Coulter et al., 2014), they appear to repeatedly report the same problems, such as difficulty obtaining appropriate information about prognosis and treatment, insufficient involvement in decisions, lack of support for self-care, lack of communication and psychological support and lack of services coordination (Coulter et al., 2014; Nagelkerk et al., 2006; Wong et al., 2011; Stiffler et al., 2014). The originality of our results is that they provide evidence that PC services should be better adapted to the transformation process experienced by people with chronic conditions. As reported by Dubouloz et al. (2010), these patients go through different phases (initial response, embracing the challenge and integrating new ways of being) and the role of professionals is to support and facilitate this transformation. The linearity of services delivery and lack of identification of patients' personal challenges limits the ability of the actual care continuum to make a real difference in the patients' capacity to self-manage their diabetes.\nConclusion: The workshop format used in this study offers decision makers and health care professionals an interesting tool for consulting and actively engaging patients in the continuous improvement of the quality of health care and services. This type of workshop can be held periodically and for different chronic diseases to improve the alignment of services with patient needs.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to document health care needs expressed by people living with diabetes, describe the solutions they envisaged for improving the quality of primary care (PC) services and empower them to make better use of PC services.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A participatory research approach was used. Six workshops were organised to provide diabetes patients with knowledge on available services and to engage them in sharing their experience. Group discussions were recorded. Data were analysed using the thematic analysis method.\nFindings: In total, 79 persons living with diabetes for a mean of 13 years participated. Needs expressed were grouped under seven themes: assurance of satisfactory follow-up by a family physician, continuous access to services adapted to evolving needs, motivation to adopt and maintain healthy behaviours, maintenance of knowledge about diabetes, psychological support, financial constraints, and collaboration with secondary-level services. Patients proposed solutions for improving services that were grouped under five themes: facilitating access to services, disseminating information about available services, centralising diabetes information on the internet, offering personalised services and improving interprofessional collaboration.\nPractical implications: Needs expressed by diabetic patients concern different aspects of care such as accessibility, organisation, coordination, and better dissemination and visibility of services. The solutions proposed by patients focussed on better access to information and interprofessional services.\nOriginality/value: The workshop format used in this study offers an original and interesting approach and tool for actively engaging patients in quality improvement of services.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Swedish successful schools revisited	[ "Education", "Leadership", "Communication", "Trust", "Teachers", "Sweden" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nLooking back five years: Mountain and River schools are both secondary schools. Both were, according to statistics, performing well, but also by informants considered them to be good schools. They all had improved their results during four consecutive years prior to our first visit in 2003. The schools were located in small towns. Our model of analysis is based on the relation between the concepts of culture, structure and leadership as prerequisites for success. Five years ago both leaders were working with aligning the schools' culture and structure with the local society. Most of the teachers supported these changes and so did the parents. The teachers believed that the focus on the local society contributed to both students social and academic development. The two principals considered good relations with the surrounding community a necessary resource in the improvement process of the school outcomes (Hoog et al., 2005).The principals we met at our two schools were very self-confident and outspoken, convinced of their capacity to implement higher efficiency and school improvement through changes in structure and culture of the school. They showed high self-esteem and an internal locus of control which helped them to challenges problems. They knew that they had to act, being the ones setting limits and coming to crucial decisions after consultations with co-workers. To be able to exercise their leadership effectively, they developed professional authenticity in their role through democratic dialogues with their staff.Our principals did work for improvement in both academic and social goals for all their students. They showed an awareness of the relation between structure and culture of their school and they worked hard to bring those parts together to achieve success. For both principals it was very important to work closely with the teachers. Not challenging their ideas but cooperating around important common visions and goals and in that way creating trust through dialogues and credibility for their decisions.Five years ago we found that the concept of successful leadership in our two schools was closely related to the notion of school performance in the catchment context of the school. It was obvious that success must be qualified and analyzed in accordance to how the mission of schools are defined by the local school community which may in some respect deviate from national school improvement policy! The school and local community relation is even stronger today than before.Since 2004 the political discussion about schools in Sweden has been very influenced by the international comparisons of student outcomes in different countries. This debate has been intensive on national and local political level but has not reached the schools. In a Swedish study 24 principals were interviewed during the period when the debate was very intense but none of them mentioned the PISA studies or made any reference to Finland's good school results (Hoog et al., 2007).This debate is mentioned as one reason for the election turnout in 2006 and the following shift in government. The new government have made important changes in the system and also focused more on successful student outcomes. They have changed the agency structure, introduced a Swedish State School Inspection and closed down the agency for school improvement and strengthened the old National Agency for Schools. A new teacher's education and a new principal education shall start shortly and we will also get a new school law and new national curriculum and syllabus.This characterizes the school climate in Sweden when revisiting the schools. Both River and Mountain schools had maintained high academic standards. The country mean for students when leaving grade 9 in the compulsory school system in Sweden has varied around 205 all 5 years. Table I shows the mean marks between 2005 and 2008.The Mountain and River schools has been above average all four years. For the River school we can see a dip in the results 2008. This were explained to us as due to a shift in leadership. But the incoming principal is focused on increasing the mean marks.The Mountain school was revisited in December 2008 and the River School in February 2009. The principal was interviewed twice and interviews were conducted with old and new teachers and students that had been there at our first visit and new students. Structure culture and leadership are tools for the analysis of the interview data from the two schools (Hoog and Johansson, 2009).\nThe River School: The school is beautifully located between the coast and the mountains beneath a river. It is a 7-9 school with 300 students and 40 teachers.Constant change and a balancing of structure and culture under the pressure from the surrounding world characterize the situation that must be managed by the principal. This means exercising a leadership in the school that from time to time adjusts to new demands and policy initiatives.Structure\nThe Mountain School: This K-9 school with 175 students and 30 teachers is located in a mountain area. During the first visit we met a self confident and successful female principal. She succeeded in collaborating with the local community and the school, including teachers, students and parents. The students' outcomes were well above national average. She left the school 2006 for a position in the school district administration and a new principal is leading the school at our visit.Structure\nDiscussion: It is obvious that as researcher you are more attentive to the changes in school policies than our stakeholders in school. The new, more outcomes driven national policy, was never mentioned during our interviews. One explanation might be that both schools are better than average and not too concerned to improve their results. Another is that the school has a good reputation among stakeholders and the public. The schools result is better than expected in relation to the SES of the parents. This is interesting because the teachers say that the results could be even better, they then need support from the parents, but the parents do not want their children to study harder. For both the schools the important mission was to have a school that could produce both good social and academic outcomes and happy students that liked to go to school.Principals and teachers at both places communicated well with the parents and the local community. Interesting is also that the local culture consider the school important but at the same time parents made it clear for the children that they do not expect them to take the home-work too serious. This creates a \"good is good enough\" culture at both schools. At both schools there are teachers that support this culture but also teachers that think the students could do much better. Now we have to remind our self that these two schools are performing well over national average, both if assessed with the mean grades or with the number of students that fail different subjects.What was most interesting at both schools was that the principals succeeding the first very proficient principal were not fully accepted. In both cases the first principal had created a culture of very strong collaboration between the principal and different teacher teams. This was based on trust, dialogue and knowledge, but also a great deal of social competence. The new principals could not live up to the demands from the teacher teams and was not sensitive enough to understand how to approach the existing structures when changes were needed. It might always be a problem to replace a popular leader and than live up to high expectations and perhaps also handle the sorrow people can feel loosing a leader meaning more to them and just an administrator.One observation is that we often talk in Sweden about challenging leadership but our two examples rather gives evidence of a leadership based on trust, dialogue and collaboration. We saw in our first visits to these schools a lot of collaboration between the principal and the teacher teams but that was missing this second time. In the Mountain school the teachers said that they expected their incoming principal to have a leadership based on thrust, dialogue and collaboration. From research we also know that teachers emphasize the importance of trust and collaboration for being a good teacher (Blase and Blase, 2003; Arlestig, 2008).It is obvious that both schools had sustained success in relation to social and academic national objectives. The success had been created by the first principals in both cases. They had been able to reform the structure and culture of the schools. The reformulation of the schools purpose had also been accepted by teachers, students and parents and in line with the ideal of the local community. But it is also clear that the new principals could not live up to the expectations from the teachers and the students of being authentic in style and present as a person in all relations. We find it very interesting that the culture based on trust, dialogue and collaboration that was in place demanded such a high quality leadership, that the new principals in both schools were unable to match these expectations.Finally, we found at both schools, a strong relationship between structure, culture and leadership. And if one of these factors changes the balance between them can affect the outcomes of the school. We also found that principal leadership can be substituted with a teacher team leadership strong enough to uphold the relation between structure and culture. We conclude that our first two principals were successful and created two successful schools that were able to survive and produce very good student outcomes even with less proficient principals, as long as the teacher culture was intact (Hoog et al., 2005). We also consider the fact that the relations with the local community is of importance for the teachers opportunity to maintain high outcomes, is a result of a sustainable culture with positive attitudes to education among parents and students.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to describe the results of a follow-up study of two Swedish schools in which, five years previously, the principals had been successful leaders. Had this success been maintained?\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Two schools were revisited to enable the authors to interview principals and teachers as well as conducting observations of the schools in operation.\nFindings: - The identification of sustained leadership success was compromised because the original principals were no longer at the schools, their replacements had also left and their (\"third generation\") replacements had just arrived. Strong teacher teams had served to maintain school standards.\nOriginality/value: - The paper adds to the literature on the vital role of the principal in determining a school's success and also points to the value of strong, cohesive teacher teams.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Does culture affect the relationships among utilitarian and non-utilitarian values, satisfaction and loyalty to shopping centres? Evidence from two Maghreb countries	[ "Loyalty", "Culture", "Perceived value", "Satisfaction", "Shopping centre", "Maghreb countries" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Shopping experiences are central to the lives of most consumers, enabling people to obtain both utilitarian and hedonic value (Babin et al., 1994; El-Adly and Eid, 2017; Lucia-Palacios et al., 2016). For example, the perceived spatial crowding affects customer satisfaction in shopping malls (Jones et al., 2010). Therefore, when shopping centre managers design spaces that provide consumers with entertainment facilities, atmospheric cues, and diverse products and prices, shoppers may increase the mall patronage (Chebat et al., 2010). Shopping centres are often conceived as innovative in the sense that they induce systemic social changes (Christensen et al., 2006), and shifts in consumer behaviours in particular. However, while investments in shopping centres that target the growing middle class in emerging and specifically Maghreb countries continue to grow exponentially, some questions arise about the models used to manage shopping centres and their applications around the world. In particular, many new shopping centres in Maghreb countries often enjoy popular grand openings but then suffer low patronage rates over time. Such observation raises questions about the local specificities that may affect behavioural outcomes in malls in Maghreb and other Muslim countries. For instance, El-Adly and Eid (2017) showed that Muslims who shop in malls assess their shopping experience through the Islamic value of the mall among other cognitive and affective values.\n2. Conceptual framework and literature review: 2.1 Shopping value\n3. Hypotheses development: 3.1 Effects of utilitarian value on customer satisfaction and loyalty\n4. Methodology: The design of the research methodology reflects careful consideration of various issues related to cross-cultural research, especially in emerging countries (Lages et al., 2015).\n5. Analyses and results: 5.1 Assessment of measurement models\n6. Conclusion, discussion and implications: 6.1 Discussion and theoretical implications\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to investigate the factors influencing customer loyalty to shopping centres across different emerging countries. Specifically, it seeks to determine how the cultural context moderates the direct effects of shopping centre perceived value and customer satisfaction on customer loyalty.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A shopping centre-intercept survey was conducted among 244 consumers in Morocco and 203 consumers in Tunisia. The proposed model was analysed using partial least squares path modelling.\nFindings: The results demonstrate the impacts of perceived utilitarian and non-utilitarian value on customer satisfaction with a shopping centre, both moderated by the cultural context. Specifically, utilitarian, hedonic and relaxation values exert stronger influences on satisfaction in Tunisia than in Morocco; but socialisation value has a stronger impact on it in Morocco than in Tunisia. The influences of value dimensions on customer loyalty to the shopping centre do not vary between Tunisia and Morocco.\nPractical implications: With these results shopping centre developers and retailers can develop more efficient strategies to target Maghreb emerging countries. For example, they should focus on factors that may increase the utilitarian, hedonic and relaxation values offered by shopping centres in Tunisia but address factors that facilitate socialisation value in Morocco.\nOriginality/value: By using a cross-culture perspective, this paper extends and enriches knowledge on shopping centre patronage in Maghreb countries. Also, it considers two non-utilitarian values (socialisation and relaxation), which are relevant in Maghreb countries.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Management style and school violence: South African perspectives	[ "Principals", "Democracy", "Authoritarian schools", "Critical pragmatism", "School management teams" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The phenomenon of school-based violence is international in both its scope and scale. A substantial body of evidence indicates that increases in violent school-based crime have been critically noted in various regions of the world (Mendez et al., 1999; Mayer, 2008; Leggett, 2005).\nLiterature review: School management and school violence\nMethodology: Research approach\nDescription of the context: Schools\nResearch findings and discussion: As mentioned in the discussion of relevant literature, a poorly run and badly organised school is more prone to various forms of violence than a well-run school. Moreover, researchers have confirmed that pupils' hostility can be caused by the absence of control or authority, a lack of supervision (Spaulding, 2005). The majority of participants commented on incidents of violence in schools. Learners expressed that they had been victims of violence in schools including, corporal punishment, bullying, sexual abuse and other forms of violence.\nConclusion: The findings suggested that some schools investigated in this study were still run in an authoritarian manner. It emerged that the actions instituted by the school management teams to reduce violence through codes of conduct, security and consistency of application of rules or responding to learner needs and issues were not adequate.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the reduction of school violence from the management point of view. It reflects on the utterances by teachers, principals, learners and members of school governing bodies (SGBs) to establish the influence that school management practices can have on the prevalence of school violence.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This was a qualitative case study. Thus, semi-structured interviews with teachers, principals, learners and members of SGBs were conducted. In addition, focus group interviews with pupils and observations were used to collect data.\nFindings: Findings suggest that most schools were still run in an authoritarian manner. Resultantly, it was also found that an authoritarian school management style practiced seemed to encourage the persistence of violence in schools.\nPractical implications: Policies should incorporate and emphasise the use of pragmatic, critical democratic style of management to address school violence. This is important because a well-run, inclusive and more democratic school can help to reduce external and internal forms of violence. The results from this study further indicate that a poorly run and badly organised school is more prone to various forms of violence.\nOriginality/value: The paper adds to the growing body of knowledge in the field of educational management and offers a reference point for further research in the pursuit to eliminate violence in schools. The findings may also be a useful resource for school principals, teachers, policy-makers and other stakeholders who are seeking to eliminate violence in schools.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Do principal preparation and teacher qualifications influence different types of school growth trajectories in Illinois? : A growth mixture model analysis	[ "Organizational change", "Accountability", "Multivariate analysis", "School leadership", "School administration", "Principal preparation", "School proficiency", "Principal experience", "Assistant principal", "Teacher qualifications", "Growth mixture modeling", "Standardized test scores" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The purpose of this study is to examine the extent to which principal preparation and professional experience and teacher qualifications affect different types of school growth trajectories, using a data set containing all public elementary and middle schools in Illinois from 2000 to 2001 through 2005-2006. A growing body of recent research has begun to focus on the extent to which principals influence student achievement. However, much of this research domain has had to acknowledge the long history of problems with examining direct effects models of principal impact on achievement (Hallinger and Heck, 1996, 2011a, b). Recent studies have shifted to examining principal effects on student growth in achievement over time, as well as principal effects on teacher professional development, job satisfaction, hiring, retention and academic climate (Beteille et al., 2009; Boyd et al., 2011; Brewer, 1993; Grissom and Loeb, 2011; Horng et al., 2010; Leithwood and Jantzi, 2008; Leithwood et al., 2010; Printy et al., 2009; Shen et al., 2012; Urick and Bowers, 2011, 2014a, b; White and Bowers, 2011). Nevertheless, all of the studies to date have viewed these significant variables associated with schools and student achievement gains as having consistent effects across all schools. This has resulted in statistical models that fit all schools and school gains over time to single trajectories, and subsequently examining the associated influence of variables of interest on the fitted trajectory. Fitting all schools to a single best fit line, such as through OLS or HLM regression, ignores the point that there may be different types of schools that react in different ways to the same variables, dependent upon context and the organization. Thus, there may be different types of trajectories of school growth in achievement through time that vary in significantly different ways (Hallinger and Heck, 2011b).\nLiterature and background: In a complex, dynamic, and internationally conscious world, a search for general patterns of change requires even more focus on temporal and spatial context (Pettigrew et al., 2001, p. 697).\nMethods: Data\nResults: The purpose of this study was to examine the principal preparation and teacher qualification factors that are most associated with different trajectories of school state standardized proficiency growth in Illinois from 2000 to 2001 through 2005-2006. In this section we first present the GMM fit information. We then describe each of the different significant trajectory subgroups for non-Chicago and Chicago schools and present the results of the growth model. We end this section by examining the significant coefficients in the model and how they differ across the subgroups. We then turn to a discussion of the results.\nDiscussion: The purpose of this study is to examine the principal experiences, training and teacher qualification factors most associated with different trajectories of growth in state standardized test score proficiency of elementary and middle schools in Illinois. By extending the hierarchical linear growth modeling framework into a GMM, as one of the first examples in the education leadership literature, we are able to estimate and examine statistically significantly different trajectory groups of schools across a large longitudinal policy domain. Our findings suggest that while there are multiple student, teacher and principal factors that are associated with the initial proficiency levels of schools, controlling for these prior achievement factors allowed us to identify multiple principal and teacher experience variables that appear to independently influence school proficiency trajectories. In addition, our strategy to separate non-Chicago Illinois schools from Chicago schools helped to identify important differences between the two school contexts. Indeed, our results suggest that for non-Chicago schools, principal tenure, experience as an assistant principal, and attending a selective graduate degree institution are important factors that are significantly related to the rate of ISAT proficiency growth through the time period. For Chicago schools, controlling for the different context demonstrated that teacher-related variables as well as principals' previous experience as an assistant principal in their school, if the principal previously taught in their school, and the selectivity of the principal's undergraduate degree program appear to be related to ISAT proficiency growth.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the independent effects of principal background, training and experience as well as teacher academic qualifications on school proficiency growth through time.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The authors analyzed the entire population of all elementary and middle schools in the state of Illinois, n=3,154 schools, from 2000 to 2001 through 2005-2006 using growth mixture modeling. The authors examined growth at the school level in the percentage of students meeting or exceeding standards on the Illinois Standard Achievement Test, analyzing separate models for Chicago and non-Chicago schools.\nFindings: The results suggest that there are two statistically significantly different latent school proficiency trajectory subgroups through the six-year time period, one high and one low, for both Chicago and non-Chicago schools. In addition, the models suggest that teacher academic qualifications, principal training, principal experience as a principal and an assistant principal, and experience of the principal as a teacher previously in their schools are significantly related to school proficiency growth over time, dependent upon school context.\nPractical implications: Recent studies on the independent effects of principal experience, training and teacher academic qualifications have shown inconsistent results on school achievement growth. The authors demonstrate that principal training and background may have an effect on school-level proficiency score growth.\nOriginality/value: This study is one of the first to examine statistically different proficiency growth trajectories using an entire state-wide data set over a long-term, six-year timeframe.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Tattoos and unfavorable treatment among employees in the hospitality industry	[ "Tattoos", "Workplace discrimination", "Hospitality employees", "Fair interpersonal treatment" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Without question, tattoos on individuals are no longer anomalies and are increasingly commonplace in today's society. In a 2019 poll, it has been estimated that approximately 29% of Americans have at least one tattoo, which represents an increase from 21% in 2012 (Jackson, 2019). It has also been estimated that since 2007, the number of individuals with two or more tattoos has increased by 50% (STAPAW, 2020). While tattoos are increasingly popular in the USA, individuals in Italy and Sweden have been found to be even more heavily adorned with body art (Tennent, 2018). Given these statistics, tattoos appear more and more to be a central component of self-expression for many individuals. Tattoos are especially prevalent among employees in the hospitality industry. In fact, hospitality employees are estimated to be the most heavily adorned with body art, along with those in the military and those working in agriculture (Statista, 2013).\nPrevious research on tattoos and workplace prejudice and discrimination: Previous research on tattoos and workplace prejudice and discrimination has adopted three methodological approaches and associated lines of inquiry. Qualitative research has addressed others' perceptions of tattooed employees. Quantitative experimental research has assessed whether respondents perceive tattooed employees differently by having them evaluate photographs of tattooed and non-tattooed hypothetical job candidates or employees. In addition, quantitative survey research has examined relationships between tattoos and objective workplace outcomes. These three areas of research are discussed in detail below.\nTheoretical background and hypotheses: The social psychology of stigma provides a theoretical lens through which to understand why tattooed individuals could be subject to unfavorable treatment in employment settings (Link and Phelan, 2001). A stigma is an attribute on someone that is perceived as \"deeply disconcerting,\" that relegates one \"from a whole and usual person to a tainted, discounted one\" (Goffman, 1963, p. 3). Historically in Western cultures, tattoos have been considered a stigma (Larsen et al., 2014). In fact, the word stigma is derived from the ancient Greek word stizein, meaning to tattoo (Stigma, 2020).\nMethod: Sample and procedure\nResults: Table 1 includes means, standard deviations and correlation coefficients. Table 2 includes the results from the logistic regression analysis examining perceived discrimination. The main entries are unstandardized logistic coefficients (b), standard errors (se) and exponentiated logistic coefficients (expb). Logistic coefficients represent the change in the log of the odds of discrimination for a one-unit increase in the explanatory variable. To facilitate interpreting logistic coefficients, exponentiated logistic coefficients were also included. An expb greater than one indicates that the probability of perceived discrimination increased, and an expb less than one indicates that the probability declined. Table 3 includes results from the regression analyses examining annual earnings, fair interpersonal treatment and perceived overqualification. The main entries are unstandardized regression coefficients (b) and standard errors (se).These regression coefficients represent the amount of change in the dependent variable per unit change in the explanatory variable. The variance inflation factors (VIFs) among the explanatory variables ranged from 1.06 to 1.28. Because VIFs were much less than 10, high multicollinearity was not an issue (Cohen et al., 2003). For perceived discrimination, the R2 was 0.02 and 0.15 in Models 1 and 2, respectively, and the DR2 of 0.13 was significant (kh2D = 12.29, p < 0.05). For annual earnings, the R2 was 0.29 and 0.31 in Models 1 and 2, respectively, but the DR2 of 0.02 was non-significant (FD = 1.10, p > 0.05). For perceived overqualification, the R2 was 0.02 and 0.11 in Models 1 and 2, respectively, and the DR2 of 0.09 was significant (FD = 3.76, p < 0.01). For fair interpersonal treatment, the R2 was 0.04 and 0.10 in Models 1 and 2, respectively, and the DR2 of 0.06 was significant (FD = 2.51, p < 0.05).\nDiscussion: Conclusions\nLimitations and opportunities for future research: The findings from the current research should be considered in the context of its limitations. The first limitation is the cross-sectional nature of the data collection. While the nature of the relationships is most likely correct, an analysis of data collected longitudinally would potentially provide more definitive tests of cause and effect. Another limitation was only focusing on number of tattoos as a measure of breadth of tattoo coverage. Future study could focus on other measures of tattoo coverage on workplace outcomes, such as percentage of the body covered by tattoos and specific tattoo size. A final limitation is that it only examined characteristics among the tattooed. Thus, these results should be interpreted as differences in effects among tattooed employees. To extend these findings, future research could compare workplace maltreatment between employees with and without tattoos.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: As employers are purportedly becoming more receptive to tattoos, the question arises whether tattooed employees are nonetheless subject to unfavorable treatment. In this light, the purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of different tattoo characteristics on four outcomes: annual earnings, fair interpersonal treatment from supervisors, perceived discrimination and perceived overqualification. The specific tattoo characteristics were tattoo number, visibility and content.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Survey data from a sample of 162 tattooed hospitality employees were obtained from a Qualtrics research panel and analyzed using regression.\nFindings: The results demonstrated that employees with a greater degree of dark tattoo content (content of a more threatening and intimidating nature) received less favorable treatment, as demonstrated by significant relationships with fair interpersonal treatment, perceived discrimination and perceived overqualification. Tattoo number was related to increased perceived discrimination and perceived overqualification. At the same time, tattoo number was related to increased annual earnings, signaling a benefit.\nResearch limitations/implications: Measures of tattoo characteristics and workplace outcomes were collected in a single survey. An analysis of data collected at different points would potentially provide a more definitive test of cause and effect.\nPractical implications: On one front, organizations should establish grooming policies that specify what is acceptable with respect to tattoos. To help minimize personality-related tattoo stereotypes from influencing hiring decisions, organizations could use personality assessments to make the hiring process more objective. Moreover, diversity training could address tattoo-related stereotypes, bias and prejudice.\nOriginality/value: Even though prior studies have demonstrated that tattooed people are viewed as less suitable for employment, research focused on the relationship between tattoos and actual discrimination has been limited. The results from this study highlight that employees with tattoos may still be subject to maltreatment, despite the mainstreaming of tattoos.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Variant simulation in design and risk estimation of manufacturing system	[ "Production methods", "Simulation", "Modelling", "Risk assessment" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The main problem companies face nowadays is highly competitive market. The success is determined by product delivery time to the market, its price and quality. These goals are easier to reach for large corporations operating on global market than for single companies. Therefore, companies tend to consolidate into international conglomerates and focus on specialization. On the other hand the consolidation forces small companies to undertake the effort of changes leading to improved performance. This often requires capital investments, modification of profile and production programmes and increase in efficiency and productivity (Burduk and Chlebus, 2003).This kind of changes took place in a company where the project was conducted. The project aimed at analysis, design and risk evaluation of a manufacturing system. In 2001 the company was taken over by an international consortium. The programme of modification and adjustment to the consortium requirements led to changes in the production programme. The new production programme for the years 2004-2005 assumed increase of production from 400 to 1,500 of nine various products per year. Owing to specific manufacturing process of those products the set-up of the production line is relatively long. Hence, to meet required production capacity the company had to expand the plant and build additional new production lines.Modelling and simulation of a manufacturing system allows to conduct verification of different solutions in the area of production planning, before they are started. This is impossible with traditional methods of designing (Benson, 1997). Reliable results of simulation research can be obtained only if they are based on integrated model of company, that covers all components of the manufacturing process (i.e. cubic infrastructure, production means, material and human resources, processes and their topology), including its organization and risk in production processes. The most important components of the integrated model of a company used in simulation are, among others:* plannistic models of the company, describing its organizational structure (centralised, spread, multi-branch, specialized, etc.);* competence and decision flow structure in the areas of marketing, production preparation, logistics (with stores) and service;* flow structure and kinds of documents in individual stages of product development and life cycle;* principles of planning and production management;* structure and features of diagnostic systems that supervise machines and production facilities;* principles and tools of monitoring the course of design, logistic, production and service orders;* geometrical, technological and other models generated by CAx systems that can make ground for data generation for simulation models;* simulators and editors of models for repeatable modification analyses (modifications of current processes or their courses resulting from immediate needs or failures); and* data banks being sources of necessary data and making ground for simulation analyses.In actual conditions of companies operation, they should be treated as the most important components of company management, describing actual conditions of the processes executed in the company (Chlebus, 2000). Basic components of a manufacturing process are schematically shown in Figure 1.Although the risk of economic activities is equally high on production, service and financial market, there is a difference in the amount of literature, trainings and scientific conferences as far as each of those areas are concerned. That situation results in poorly developed methods of planning, analysis and risk evaluation in the production area, where planning and assessment of risk is considered as unimportant. On the other hand there are plenty of materials on management, analysis and assessment of credit, insurance, trade, information risk.Risk term ambiguity and lack of a consistent definition is a reason why in the literature can be found different approaches to this concept. However, the most popular are German and American.The German approach limits the term of \"risk\" to gaining a negative outcome of the decision which was made and treats risk as \"the danger of unfulfilled aim assigned at the moment of making the decision\" (Bizon-Gorecka, 2001). The unfulfilled aim means losses as well as a result which is smaller than the assigned. In this paper a German approach is used.The American approach is wider than the German as it treats the concept of risk not only in terms of losses but also possible profit (Bizon-Gorecka, 2001). The differences in the mentioned above approaches are shown in Figure 2.Actually, it seems to be better to treat risk in the context of probability of unexecuted production goals and unreliability of production system (the German approach).\nRelationship between reliability and risk: The issue of the reliability is traditionally connected with operations and functioning of technical objects and this term very rarely relates to economic systems. In economic literature, on the other hand, there is a great interest in the idea of risk. As according to the system theory both technical as well as economic objects can be treaded like a system, it seems to be justified to transfer the general reliability theory and its application in risk planning and evaluation to the area of the economy. Specially susceptible to this transfer seems to be production systems for which the specific technology makes it impossible to treat the risk according to the American approach. The risk in this kind of systems can be considered only as a possibility of gaining effects (profits) smaller than the expected (so-called the German approach).The transfer of the general reliability theory into the area of production systems can be accomplished if an unreliability (Z) - the reliability opposition - is treated as a synonym of the risk (R) (Bizon-Gorecka, 2001): Equation 1 The risk (unreliability) of the system (e.g. production system) interpreted in that way is a probability of the situation that the system will be unable to fulfill its functions, for which it was designed, or it will represent the probability of losses in that system. For this interpretation the following equation should be valid: Equation 2 The above equation represents that the probability of a situation the system is reliable or unreliable is equal to 1. For this reason it is also true, that: Equation 3 Equation 4 Hence, the risk analysis and evaluation will allow to specify unreliability of system functioning and inversely.Unreliable approach to risk planning and evaluation, although it delivers more possibilities, do not locate risk factors in a system. Thus, in the process of risk evaluation it is necessary to take into consideration the unreliability structure of the production system.\nDescription of the project: The company analyzed in the project manufactures freight and passenger trains as well as complete transportation systems. Wroclaw plant of the company consists of three divisions: Locomotives, Bogies and Service. Project presented in this paper was conducted in Bogies Division, where bogies frames for locomotives and for passenger trains are produced.Manufacturing of individual frame types is executed on separated production lines. With respect to specialized tooling and sizes of assembly stands, retooling of the line is a very time-consuming process. The manufacturing process is mainly composed of welding operations of individual components that make the product structure.Production is controlled by the so-called kits, i.e. ready sets of components supplied from the warehouse to separate places in the production shop. The number of kits differs, depending on a product complexity level. Material flow in the production shop is performed by overhead cranes and outside the shop - by trucks. During the manufacturing process, the components are several times taken away from the shop to be subject to external operations at subcontractors and for quality inspection.The program of the company reorganization and adaptation to the Bombardier consortium requirements required switching from bogie production to bogie frame production and increasing the production capacities. The annual production volume of 1,500 frames in seven versions was assumed for the years 2004 and 2005. The project was aimed at development, analysis and optimization of layout, productivity and machine stock, as well as risk evaluation for the bogie frame production program. A complex analysis of the problem was necessary with the use of computer tools, especially software for computer simulation and optimization of manufacturing systems.The project was conducted in three stages, as follows:1. Building the simulation model of the layout of production line for a selected product and its optimization with respect to the length of transport routes as well as estimated productivity required in 2005. A representative product was chosen for analysis.2. Determining the risk of realization of production programme regarding the representative product. The stage (1) involved only technological and organizational data, so the real risk factors of analyzed production line with the probability of their occurrence were used to determine the risk.3. Building the layout simulation model and its optimization with respect to the length of transport routes considering total flow of materials inside and outside the plant.Depending on the actual stage of the project there were analyzed various areas of the manufacturing process and attributed to them data. These individual areas and analyzed data are shown in Figure 3.\nResults and benefits of the project - stage (1): Results of the simulation model from stage (1) determine workstation loads what helps identify bottlenecks in production processes. The research involved building several versions of layout models for the selected product their simulations and analysis of the results obtained. In all the models, the following was considered: real dimensions of the production shop, real dimensions workplaces, position of construction supports.Analyses of the simulation results made it possible to determine, among others, a complete frame production time with the attainable productivities and the flow time for the first piece of the new product. Results of the analysis also permitted determination of loads of the work-stands that appeared to be bottlenecks precluding fulfillment of the 2005 sales plan. In order to carry out the sales plan, it was necessary to reach the assumed productivity of one piece of product per shift, and twice as much for the parts of the product structure, i.e. two pieces per shift. Productivity of eight work-stands of the 17 present in the line was high enough. Simulation of the production line revealed also the problem of too long and crossing transport routes in the production shop and too low capacity factor of overhead cranes belonging to the vertical transport.In order to eliminate the bottlenecks, organizational changes were suggested, consisting, among others, introducing the third shift for the selected workstations, employing new workers or purchasing further instruments and equipment, depending on the expected investment costs. A new distribution of operations between workstations was introduced and quality inspection so far performed in the main production line was relocated. The final version of the layout with the accepted organizational changes is shown in Figure 4.The productivity of selected workstations before and after changes is shown in Figure 5.\nResults and benefits of the project - stage (2): The objective of this stage was to determine the influence degree of individual risk factors on selected parameters of the production process. The following definitions of risk and reliability of the production system were accepted in the project:Risk (Rc) of a manufacturing system means its sensitivity degree to disturbances, expressed by non-achievement of the assumed results in the assumed time interval and in the specified conditions.Reliability (N) of a system means its ability to achieve the assumed aim (or to perform a task) for that it was designed. Reliability degree of a system means the degree to that the aim (or task) was achieved by the system in the specified conditions and time interval.It was established that the analyzed production system in Bombardier Transportation has serial reliability structure with seven objects (areas).For this kind of structures the system reliability is a product of reliability of all system's objects. Hence, along with the increase of the number of objects within the system the reliability of the whole system decreases.The reliability of the system revealing the serial structure (NS) is described as (Migdalski, 1992): Equation 5 where N1,N2,Nn - reliability of individual system's objects.Using equations (4) and (5) the total risk (RC) of the system will be equal to: Equation 6 where R1,R2, ... ,R7 - the risk individual areas of production system /objects of the system.For individual areas the risk Ri is calculated as follows: Equation 7 Equation 8 Equation 9 where Si - determines the loss in an i object due to risk factors ri appearing in that object, and Wteoret specifies a certain level of analyzed in the production system indicator (e.g. productivity) which value is theoretically possible to reach in the production system.There were used seven simulations models for risk evaluation of representative product production process. Seven simulation models were used for risk evaluation. Each of the subsequent models was built by introducing next risk factors to the base model, with their probability of occurrence. This was aimed at demonstration of growing effect of disturbances on the production process. The following models for risk evaluation were created:* Base model. That considers the suggested changes accepted in the stage (1) of the project but does not include any risk factors.* DB model. For analysis of disturbances caused by specific customer's requirements.* Delivery model. That includes real delays and shortages of the sheets deliveries.* Co-operation model. That analyses risk factors for missing deliveries and defective components from co-operating parties.* Production model. Production model with real operation times (different from the technological times).* Failure model. Failure model with statistical down-times of the production line caused by the equipment failures.* QI model. That considers statistical production rejects and technological times of their correction, as well as the risk related to planning of quality inspection.Figure 6 shows general structure of risk evaluation and disturbance factors.Productivity in individual models and production times are shown in Table I.Losses of time (Dti) in individual models caused by risk factors are shown in Figure 7.For known quantity of losses in individual areas of production system there can be calculated the quantity of risk in individual areas of this production system. The equations (7) to (9) are used: Equation 10 In the next step, using equation (6) the total risk (RC) for the representative product in the analyzed production system can be calculated: Equation 11 The received value of the total risk (RC) means that with the probability of 0.73 it is not possible to reach the determined goal in the production system, which is production of 138 pieces per 12 weeks (compare with the productivity for the period of 12 weeks in Base model from Table I).Figure 8 shows the increases of risk's level in individual simulations models. The level of the risk regarding the QI model is equivalent with the total risk (RC) of the whole production system, as it includes all risk factors.\nConclusion: The risk increases analyzed in simulation models prove that the highest increase of risk is caused by risk factors appearing in production, co-operation and quality control areas.In order to minimize the total risk level (Rc) it is advisable to undertake the effort of the risk reduction in the mentioned above three areas.In the last part of the project there were used the results gained at stage (1) and (2). In order to build simulation model of the layout of the whole plant, there were used conversions factors. These factors describe technological similarities of a single product to the representative product. This allowed, quite similarly as at the first stage of the project, to apply the same organizational changes for all production lines and evaluate the risk for the entire manufacturing system (Burduk, 2004).\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - To show necessity of risk evaluation during modelling and simulation of production systems. To show an approach to risk evaluation of manufacturing system which has serial reliability structure.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Modelling and simulation of a manufacturing system allows one to conduct verification of different solutions in the area of production planning, before they are started. This is impossible with traditional methods.\nFindings: - Reliable results of simulation research can be obtained only if they are based on an integrated model of the company, that covers all components of the manufacturing process including also its organization and risk in production processes.\nPractical implications: - The paper describes the stages and results of a project carried out in 2002 in an international company. The proposed method of risk evaluation may be helpful to determine the risk level in the chosen production line and eventually for the whole enterprise manufacturing systems.\nOriginality/value: - The risk concept was treated as a synonym of unreliability. This kind of approach enabled decomposition of the production system into several areas and determination of the reliability structure.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Labor force participation of married women in Punjab (Pakistan)	[ "Women workers", "Employment", "Poverty", "Pakistan", "Developing countries" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1 Introduction: Labor force participation of women in Pakistan is very low as they suffer from a paucity of opportunities. In particular, women' access to the labor market is determined by rigid gender role ideologies, social and cultural restrictions on women' mobility and integration in the work place, segmented labor markets, lack of skill and employers' gender biases that attach a lower value to female labor due to their family responsibilities. The female labor force participation rate in Pakistan is exceptionally low at just 14.4 percent, as compared to 70.3 percent for males[1], while the unemployment rate is 16.5 percent for females and 6.7 percent for males (FBS, 2003, pp. 15, 30). The share of women's earnings in earned income of household is 26 percent of male earnings while their economic activity rate as a percentage of that of males is 40 percent (MHDC, 2000). The incidence of poverty among women is higher as compared to men and it is characterized by unemployment, discrimination in the labor market, and limited access to economic opportunities, among others. Women are largely neglected in the social, economic, political, and legal sphere. They have gained disproportionately from the development process. Pakistan needs to go a long way to achieve a balanced and sustainable development scenario (Mahmood and Durr-e-Nayab, 1998). For women, the access to money-earning activities, amongst others is one of the important means to improve their position (Polachek and Robst, 1997). Furthermore, employment is the main bridge between economic growth and the opportunities for human development (UNDP, 1996). One of the factors that boosted growth rates in the Asian tigers was the rapidly rising rate of female labor force participation (Young, 1995). Mother's access to income-generating opportunities impacts positively on the well-being of children, particularly female ones, indicating that parents' relative bargaining position affects children's gender equity (Thomas, 1990; Haddad and Haddinott, 1995). Female mortality is inversely related to female labor force participation (Rosenzweig and Schultz, 1982; Kishore, 1993). Higher female labor force participation lessens the gender bias in child survival (Murthi et al., 1995). This draws attention to the analysis of women's work which is generally more variable than men's and is also disadvantaged.1.1 Implications of women labor force participation\n2 Objectives: The principal features of the study are the following questions that we seek to answer:1. To what extent is married women's labor force participation sensitive to their age, education, and headship of the household?2. To what extent do ownership of assets by the household, household per capita income, and household poverty impact the work decision of married women?3. What is the likelihood of labor force participation of married women affected by the household size, and its composition (number of infants, school-age children, and prime-age siblings)?4. In what way do the characteristics of head of household like age, education, employment, and income affect the married women's labor force participation?5. Are urban married women or rural married women more likely to work?\n3 Data collection and estimation model: Primary data exclusively collected for the study[2] by the cluster sample technique has been used. A survey of 4,000 households having at least one ever-married woman in the working age group of 16-60 years made the information valid. For the decision of these women to participate in the labor force, we estimated a regression model in which the decision of married women's labor force participation (MLFP) was a function of several explanatory variables. The dependent variable could take on only two binary values: 1 if the married woman participated in the labor force and 0 if she did not. The labor force participation of married women was defined as the activities done for at least one hour during the reference periods[3] (one week) as paid-employment, self-employment, or in a family enterprise[4]. Some studies (Pangestu and Hendytio, 1997) have defined working women as women who are working for other people or legal entities and are compensated in financial terms or payment in kind. They have ignored the self-employed and women involved in family enterprises. In Pakistan, specifically in the informal sector and rural areas, a number of women are involved in these two kinds of employment. So we have considered these women as labor force participating women. Sultana et al. (1994) have analyzed the determinants of female time allocation between market and housework of females in rural Pakistan applying ordinary least square and the Tobit model on the International Food Program Research Institute survey data. They analyzed the effect of women's age, education, household per-capita income, number of dependents in the household, and predicted male and female wages on the time allocation of women. They found that home-time allocation for participating women is significantly and negatively dependent upon her age, education, and the predicted wages of the males in the household. Another significant variable is the distance of the main market from the home because this increases the transportation cost and travelling difficulties as well as the cost of market goods for which substitutes can be produced at home. An increase in the distance means a decrease in time to work in the market. Naqvi and Shahnaz (2002) have estimated women's participation in economic activities by using the multinomial logit model and probit model on data by the Pakistan Integrated Household Survey 1998-1999. The results indicated that the women who are older, better educated, head the household, or come from smaller, better off urban families are more empowered to take employment decisions on their own. Glick and Sahn (2005) have used two distinct methodologies applicable to a short-period panel. A multi-period multinomial logit model with random effects provides evidence of unobserved individual heterogeneity as a factor strongly affecting labor market sector choices over time. Results from simpler single period models that condition on prior sector choice are consistent with either heterogeneity or state dependence. Both approaches perform equally well in predicting the individual labor market behavior conditional on past choices. Hartog and Theevwes' (1986) econometric analysis is based on Heckman's (1974) participation-cum-hour model to estimate the integrated labor force participation and hours of work. By using the maximum likelihood model, they integrated the distribution of the parts of hours. They have compared the results with estimates of the probit model to identify the possible biases. Duncan et al. (1993) have used the probit model to explore the probability of working by women.We have estimated the non-linear maximum likelihood of labor force participation of married women for the normal probability (probit model). The function is: Equation 1 X1... X2 are the exogenous socio-economic variables influencing the female's decision of labor force participation. The definitions of dependent and explanatory variables are presented in Table I.\n4 Results and discussion: The summary statistics and probit results are given in Table II. It is found that 75 percent of the variation in labor force participation is accounted for by the explanatory variables. The major part of the results is consistent with the theoretical implications of labor force participation of women.The following features of the results are worth noting.4.1 Woman's age\n5 Conclusions: The model and estimation we presented above allows us to analyze the labor force participation of married women. The main finding is that poverty pushes the married women into labor force participation. It reflects that the majority of married women work in the informal sector. So increasing the income and productivity of working mothers, specifically in the informal sector may have trickle down effects on the reduction of household poverty. On the same lines, if more mothers are involved in the labor force national poverty may decrease substantially. These conclusions have important economic and policy implications:* To enhance the labor force participation of married women, the policy regarding women's employment is to be carefully planned. As poverty is the main cause of labor force participation of married women, the minimum wage legislation should be rationalized in the changing economic conditions. If minimum wage legislation is maintained, it should be further ensured that the increases in wages be realistic.* The government must establish educational and vocational training institutions for adult women, so that they can increase their skill productivity and labor force participation.* As rural women are more likely to be involved in productive activities, it is needed to recognize their income contributions in the household. In the rural areas, informal sector activities are prevalent and agro-based industries hardly exist in Pakistan. It is necessary to organize the informal sector and encourage the private sector to establish agro-based industries. The training facilities for such industries are also emphasized.* The government should also ensure the provision of family planning and subsidized child-care facilities. In this way, mothers are freed from child-care duties and can more easily participate in economic activities.* Mothers as heads of households are found to be more likely to be involved in economic activity. As female-headed households are more vulnerable to poverty due to low income and high expenditure, the policy formation must target such women to raise their income and wages.* The life cycles of married women show that labor force participation increases by increase in their age and then it deceases. The decrease in labor force participation of mothers may be restricted by providing them social security benefits, standard wages, benefits of annual increments, and benefits such as pension and employee's old age benefits.* The subsidized child-care facilities would not only increase maternal labor force participation, but girls' school participation would also increase, as the estimates show that girls in the school-age group manage household chores and free their mothers for work.* As the increase in household per capita income has shown a declining effect on the labor force participation of married women, a relaxed tax system may be introduced to favor the earning spouse of the household to stop the decreasing tendency of mother's economic activity.* The greater probability of married women's labor force participation from rural households, poor households, households with a larger number of children, and belonging to poorly educated, illiterate, unemployed, and low-income husbands reflects the informal structure of the economy absorbing the female labor force.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to highlight the factors that influence the decision of married women (in the age group of 16-60 years) to participate in labor force activities.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - This is an empirical study employing the non-linear maximum likelihood probability (probit) function on primary data (3,911 observations).\nFindings: - Besides other variables it has been observed that poverty remains an important determinant of female labor participation.\nResearch limitations/implications: - On the basis of this paper, a socio-economic policy can be formulated for a developing country like Pakistan.\nPractical implications: - A development policy (especially considering the gender aspects) can be formulated on the basis of this research for the enhancement of human resource development for a developing and an orthodox economy like Pakistan.\nOriginality/value: - This paper is beneficial to researchers, policy makers, and social scientists for the enhancement of the level of social welfare and equity through its findings.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
A re-examination of B2B sales performance	[ "Qualitative research", "Business‐to‐business marketing", "Sales management", "Sales force" ]	[ { "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.\nReview of research and theoretical framework: Sales performance\nQualitative studies: Sales executive focus group\nDiscussion: Comparing the results in Table I with the summary of past research and literature presented earlier, we can note some differences. First, researchers utilize efficiency measures more than practitioners. One possible reason may be the difficulty in measuring key components of sales efficiency. For example, to accurately measure time management performance, managers must agree on a set of task priorities. This could vary based on the type of sales job (e.g. outside sales, inside sales), types of account-based (e.g. small, major, complex account), and strategic organizational goals (e.g. customer retention, growth, acquisition). Furthermore, defining what constitutes a \"sales call\" could impact the measurement of performance efficiency. A lack of consensus among managers as to the definition of a \"sales call\" could stem from factors such as the medium of the call (e.g. live, phone, teleconference), the buying center member(s) involved in the call (e.g. economic, user, coach, etc.), and call context (e.g. information gathering, solution presentation, social, etc.).Second, there seems to be a lag in practitioner use of the recent research emphasis on profit management, margins, cost, account/product/service management, loyalty, and long-term relationships. Attempts to build relationship management into performance measurement are limited. One possible reason for this observation is the slow growth in the number of firms that utilize CRM systems to enable the sales organization to track customer lifetime value. In addition, sales force automation tools (such as ACT!, Salesforce.com and NetsuiteCRM.com to mention a few) used to manage customer relationships, report low adoption rates and/or high failure rates (Senecal et al., 2007).Relative to the responses collected from our sample, it is evident that a customer-focused, market-focused perspective to sales performance measurement is lacking. Concepts such as value-added services, competitive responsiveness, and long-term relationship management are not being measured. In addition, adaptive selling, flexible selling, and team behavior are not being measured and used as a part of sales performance assessment. Based on the collective observations from our sample, it is apparent that practice is lagging behind research in the area of sales performance measurement. Specifically, we can begin to better understand the gaps that exist between researchers and practitioners in the classification and utilization of sales performance measures. In addition, we can speculate the reasons for these gaps.Implications for researchers\nConclusion: As professional selling continues to migrate towards building long-term customer relationships, the need exists for managers to move beyond the traditional (outcome) measures of sales performance to measures that integrate dimensions of salesperson development that facilitate customer relationship management. The organizing framework provided in this paper provides a means to do this. Furthermore, it bridges an apparent gap between how sales researchers and practitioners view sales performance. By highlighting the importance of combining salesperson skill and competencies measures with more traditional outcome goals of performance, our hope is that this research will spark further interest in developing the area of sales performance measurement. Ultimately, the salesperson, the sales organization, and most importantly, the customer will realize the benefits of doing so.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the understanding of sales performance measurement by developing an organizing framework for classifying sales performance measures based on the various performance criteria used by researchers. Subsequently, the results of both a focus group and in-depth interviews with sales managers and salespeople will be presented using the classification framework developed. The objective is to determine whether gaps exist between how researchers and practitioners view and classify salesperson performance measures as well as to provide insights to effective sales management practices in areas such as salesperson skill development, goal attainment, resource allocation, and customer relationship management.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - A qualitative study, using in-depth interviews, explores the relationship between sales managers and salespersons and their respective views on sales performance measurement. The interview questions were developed using information derived from a sales executive focus group. In-person in-depth interviews were conducted with eight sales managers and eight salespeople from eight organizations.\nFindings: - The paper proposes a new method for organizing the types of performance measures that are used, crossing effectiveness-efficiency with internally-externally-focused measures. The findings indicate that a gap appears to remain between the attributes of performance that researchers focus on and what occurs in the world of sales.\nResearch limitations/implications: - The findings suggest that sales control theories can be used to present an organizing framework of sales performance based on sales outputs, salesperson skill/capability development, sales activities, and market indicators. Our typology might serve as a way to better understand certain research areas where there have been inconsistent findings, and should lead to new measure development for empirical research. In addition, a number of manager and salesperson recommendations for the practicing sales manager are reviewed.\nOriginality/value: - This paper helps to clarify an area that is characterized by ambiguity and an identified need to identify new performance metrics.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Cancer resource centers as third places	[ "Health services", "Cancer resource centers", "Third places", "Social support", "Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support", "QLQ-C30", "Quality of life", "Commercial friendships", "Cluster 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: Third places typically denote commercial service establishments beyond home (i.e. first place) and work (second place) in which customers meet regularly, voluntarily, easily, and pleasurably (Oldenburg, 1999; Thompson and Arsel, 2004). They are places where a sense of communitas, or community, forms between and among customers and employees - that is, settings in which people temporarily gather to engage in sociability that is not influenced by status or role (McGinnis et al., 2008). It is possible that third places even foster their customers' well-being, especially among older-aged and elderly customers, by serving as public settings in which they have the opportunity obtain life-enhancing social support from their commercial friendships (Kang and Ridgway, 1996; Rosenbaum, 2006).\nContribution: This article incorporates elements from several health and marketing domains and thus contributes to these literature streams, especially to the emerging transformative service paradigm (TSR; Anderson et al., 2013; Ostrom et al., 2010). As a research paradigm, TSR refers to \"service research that centers on creating uplifting changes and improvements in the well-being of individual consumers and employees, families, social networks, communities, cities, nations, collectives and ecosystems\" (Anderson et al., 2011). It is inspired by transformative consumer research that aims to \"solve real problems\" (Mick, 2006, p. 1) that consumers confront by applying marketing techniques to enhance people's lives. Thus, TSR encourages service researchers to focus on understanding the role of services, service providers, and service customers themselves in enhancing their well-being (Rosenbaum et al., 2011). The current work specifically explores how cancer patients may enhance their quality of life, in a relatively inexpensive and drug-free manner, by participating in cancer center activities and by interacting with center employees, staff members, volunteers, and other members. Indeed, this is the first paper that empirically links cancer center social support to a cancer patient's perceived quality of life.\nService settings as therapeutic settings: Cancer center patronage and health\nMethodology: Survey design\nResults: Number of activities and member quality of life\nConclusion: The goal of this article was to extend the third-place paradigm (Oldenburg, 2001; Rosenbaum, 2006, 2008) into the public health domain by supporting the perspective that cancer resource centers represent archetypical third places. Cancer resource centers, such as Gilda's Club and LW, are informal public gathering places where people living with cancer meet regularly, affordably, voluntarily, easily, and pleasurably beyond the domains of home or hospital. Furthermore, similar to commercial third places, such as neighborhood diners, bars, and coffee shops, home-like cancer resource centers represent consumption settings that can nourish friendships and other social bonds that exist beyond the medicinal world of cancer.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: This article aims to empirically illustrate the socially supportive role of cancer resource centers in their members' lives.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The authors employ the Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support and the QLQ-C30 to investigate the relationships between social support and respondents' quality of life. The authors also draw on internal cancer resource center data.\nFindings: The results show that the type of classes respondents engage in at the center, frequency of class/activity attendance, and member-to-member social support do not influence respondents' perceived quality of life. However, employee-to-member support does enhance a respondent's quality of life.\nResearch limitations/implications: The study suggests that the activity programming at cancer resource centers is a conduit for the socially supportive relationships that form between and among employees and members. Given that the sample site was situated in a high-income, relatively stable suburban locale, the findings may not generalize to all locales.\nPractical implications: The study helps inform medical practitioners about the social supportive benefits that cancer resource centers offer cancer patients. This article discusses a cancer center's Connect-to-Care program, which joins together an oncologist and a cancer center representative at a patient's initial cancer diagnosis.\nSocial implications: Oncologists and people living with, or affected by, cancer need to be aware of the healing potential of cancer resource centers.\nOriginality/value: This article links the third-place paradigm with public health. Cancer resource centers emerge as third places where people living with cancer may obtain support from center employees, which enhances their quality of life.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Human remains as documents: implications for repatriation	[ "Repatriation", "Document theory" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: In September 2017, The Guardian newspaper ran a story about the skull of an unknown Australian soldier on display in the Mutter Museum of the College of Physicians of Philadelphia (Daley, 2017). The skull, a gruesome and tragic specimen from the First World War, showed evidence of appalling facial trauma, including a bullet lodged in the right sinus. Based on records detailing the provenance of the skull, historians were able to identify the remains. Private Thomas Hurdis, from New South Wales, died of wounds on 3 October 1917, following the Battle of Polygon Wood in Belgium. Private Hurdis was treated at an American field hospital by W.T. Shoemaker, a surgeon and ophthalmologist from Philadelphia, before dying of his wounds. Hurdis's skull was severed from his body for pathological study, \"to enable physicians to learn from the medical developments and experiences of World War One\" (Chester, 2018). After the war, Shoemaker donated the skull to the Mutter Museum. Following calls for the skull's repatriation, including requests from the Australian government, the specimen was finally interred in Hurdis's grave in Belgium, along with his substantive remains.\nThe expanding realm of documentation: There is a rich body of literature dedicated to the theory of documents and documentation (Lund, 2009). Much of this literature can be characterised as rationalist and positivist, since it is primarily concerned with devising scientific systems for managing the proliferation of information in advanced industrial societies. The need to store and organise the massive abundance of \"documents\" produced by modern science and bureaucratic administration was a practical concern for librarians and other information professionals, tasked with managing the stuff of information. The literature of documentation was therefore born of practical necessity. However, the need to classify and categorise documents also raised broad ontological questions. Efforts to manage the rising tide of documents became increasingly challenging as the document category became progressively more inclusive (Buckland, 1997). Paul Otlet, often considered the father of information science, saw no practical or theoretical reason for limiting documents to printed or written texts. The document, as Otlet conceived it:Was not restricted to what is written. A document is anything that represents or expresses an object, a fact, an impression by means of any sign whatsoever. Documents could be written or printed, pictorial or ideographic - the charts, plans, schemas, diagrams that held such a special place in Otlet's thinking. Three-dimensional objects of the kind found in museums, such as specimens, models and so on, are documents, and so are monuments in that they have representational and evidential functions.(Rayward, 2016, p. 14)\nHuman remains as documents: the legacy of racial science: Human bodily remains, conserved in museum and research collections, are documents. Human remains are collected to support teaching and research in a variety of fields, including medicine, physical anthropology, and archaeology. As documents, skeletal collections reveal information about osteological pathologies and congenital and developmental abnormalities. The study of bones can also provide direct evidence about dietary deficiency, as well as clues about demography and historical migration caused by societal and environmental pressures. Information about social structures and religious customs can also be garnered from the study of human remains and funerary practices. Human remains are treated differently to other anatomical specimens. Professional protocols such as the Guidance for the Care of Human Remains in Museums, produced by the UK Department for Culture, Media and Sport, attest to the special status accorded to human biological material (DCMP, 2005). This guideline recommends best practice for the display, use, conservation and deaccessioning of human remains in British museums. Human remains, broadly defined, include \"osteological material (whole or part skeletons, individual bones or fragments of bone or teeth), soft tissue including organs and skin, embryos and slide preparations of human tissue\" (DCMP, 2005, p. 10).\nIndividuation and the humanisation of human remains: When human remains become part of a museum or research collection, they undergo a type of transformation. Cressida Fforde describes a transitional process in which the \"the dead\" are reconceived as \"scientific objects\". Human remains, \"are transitioned from having primary standing as 'the dead' in one culture to a meaning defined by their value as 'scientific object' in another\" (Fforde, 2013, p. 709). Re-conceptualising \"the dead\" as \"scientific objects\" (or documents) raises a variety of complex philosophical questions for collecting institutions. These problems are unique to the treatment of human remains, since different standards and values apply for the treatment of animal (non-human) specimens. This distinction is based on the cultural tenets of philosophical humanism. The moral worldview, which conceptually separates human bodily remains from animal remains, is also used to enforce the separation of people and things. This argument holds that human beings are subjects, not objects.\nPersonalising anonymous bodies: from specimens to ancestors: It is possible to establish the individual identify for some human remains in museum collections. Names of bodies or body parts can be revealed by provenance research, usually by searching institutional archival records or secondary documents, including collection catalogues. A skull belonging to a young Aboriginal Tasmanian female was recently identified in the anatomical collection at the Charite in Berlin (Winkelmann and Tessmann, 2018). The skull was repatriated in 2014, following confirmation that the remains belonged to a girl named Nanny Allan. Nanny died in 1836, aged about 15 years, of meningitis. The collector, Adolph Schayer, was a German sheep breeder and botanical/zoological collector who lived in Tasmania from 1831 to 1843. In this example, identification was aided by inscriptions on the frontal bone, which provided a name (\"Nanny\"), an ancestry (\"native of Kangaroo Island\"), a collector (\"Schayer\") and a location (\"van Diemensland\", that is, Tasmania). But what if human anatomical specimens are not identified, or nominally identifiable?\nConclusion: towards a processual understanding of documentation: Since Paul Otlet, document theory has viewed the document type in progressively expanding terms, as extending beyond textual material to include all manner of things bearing signifying properties. The massive proliferation of information in modern society has enabled the document concept to become over-inclusive, and seemingly all-encompassing. Human remains, conserved in museum and research collections, are documents. They are collected, catalogued and displayed for scientific and educational purposes. When interpreted in the context of documentation, these bones and body parts can be understood as examples of information-as-thing, as objects manifesting knowledge or communicating information. However, when material of this type is repatriated and buried, its primary standing charges. Repatriated human remains, in their post-document state, become people again or at least the mortal remains of people. To quote Philippe Charlier on this point, the restitution of human bodies \"reverses the process by which they passed, years ago, from individual to scientific specimen\" (Charlier, 2014, p. 295).\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is twofold. First, to investigate the documentality of human remains in museum and research collections. Second, to provide a rationale for a processual model of documentation, which can account for their repatriation and eventual burial.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This paper uses a multidisciplinary approach to examine the repatriation issue. It considers an ethical argument developed to support claims for repatriation: the nominal identification of a body as a universal criterion for its burial. Based on Igor Kopytoff's processual model of commoditisation, it looks to cultural anthropology to help explain how objects can move between a document and non-document state.\nFindings: Human remains can be understood as examples of information-as-thing. However, while document theory can readily account for the expanding realm of documentation, it cannot adequately accommodate instances where documentality is revoked, and when something ceases to be a document. When a human biological specimen is returned, the process that made it serve as a document is effectively reversed. When remains are interred, they revert to their primary standing, as people. The process of becoming a document is therefore not unidirectional, and document status not permanent.\nResearch limitations/implications: The implications of a processual model of documentation are discussed. Such a model must be able to account for things as they move into and out of the document state, and where the characteristics of documentality change through time.\nOriginality/value: This paper explores problematic material not usually discussed in relation to document theory. The repatriation movement poses a challenge to a discourse predicated on documentation as a progressively expanding field.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Coercive pressures for the implementation of health and safety practices: are they enough?	[ "Implementation", "Health and safety", "HRM", "Coercive pressures", "Non-institutional motivations" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Occupational health and safety (OHS) has steadily gained importance in recent years. Many organisations view it as a fundamental concern, not only because of the non-evaluable cost involved when a person loses their life or health, but also because of the measurable disruption to the company caused by days away from work, the need to find temporary replacements, health care costs, penalties, firm reputation, relationship between employer and workers and loss of productivity (Tappura et al., 2014; Biron and Bamberger, 2012; Fernandez-Muniz et al., 2009; Koper et al., 2009; Ahire and Golhar, 1996). These consequences highlight the need for organisational actions (managerial policies, procedures and practices) to eliminate occupational accidents and work-related health problems and to place greater value on health promotion actions (Harris et al., 2012; Makin and Winder, 2008).\n2. Literature review and hypotheses: Health and safety can be defined as the protection and maintenance of the physical, mental and social well-being of all workers to the highest possible standards (ILO; WHO, 1950). This means protecting workers from unhealthy working conditions and workplace risks, and ensuring that the workplace is appropriate to the physiological and psychological capabilities of the workers (Flin et al., 2000). To this end, the World Health Assembly (2007) includes a Global Plan of action where it establishes that an essential first step is to develop and apply regulatory instrument. The main objective is to persuade employers of industrialised countries, through regulatory processes, to implement internal controls regarding OHS (Sinclair et al., 2013). Not many comparisons between countries can be found in the literature (see Rothstein et al., 2017), however, it is possible to find details of the implementation of the OHS in different countries (i.e. Hasle et al., 2014; Joamets and Luukas, 2018). From these studies can be seen that there are not systematic differences in the implementation of regulatory protection, because all of the countries introduce governmental laws, but this depends on the variety of capitalism that characterises the economy (Paul and Huber, 2015; Witt and Jackson, 2016).\n3. Methodology: 3.1 Population and sample\n4. Results and discussion: To detect any significant differences between the companies, we performed a cluster analysis of the scores of the identified reasons for implementing OHS. As shown in Table II, three valid clusters were obtained, and the ANOVA analysis also confirmed that the differences between groups were significant (see Table III). The three groups obtained are described in Section 5.\n5. Conclusions: OHS practices have been explored in this paper from an HRM perspective. The study has shown that institutional pressures, specifically coercive pressures, continue to be an important factor in driving implementation of HR practices, as it happens with others like training (Esteban-Lloret et al., 2014), recruitment (Holm, 2014), employee performance evaluation (Decramer et al., 2012) or work-life balance (Pasamar and Valle, 2013). Moreover, this study shows how institutional theory may shed light on employer involvement in OHS while combining with other non-institutional explanations.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine why companies are placing increasing importance on implementing occupational health and safety (OHS) practices, and to analyse their reasons for adopting these practices. Specifically, it is asked whether OHS practices are introduced as a result of coercive pressures. The different ways companies respond to these pressures is also explored.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A quantitative data analysis technique was used to analyse the relationship between the reasons for implementing OHS in a sample of 3,005 Spanish firms, using the responses to a survey from the Institute for the Prevention of Risk at Work.\nFindings: The results revealed three different groups of companies in terms of their reasons for implementing OHS practices; it was also found that employer involvement in OHS is higher when the main reason for implementing OHS practices is a real concern to improve working conditions, not simply coercive pressures.\nPractical implications: The results of the study demonstrate the importance of moving from reactive to proactive management. Practitioners should consider employees' health and safety not only in terms of an institutional pressure, but as a part of their social responsibility and integral to their business practice. Public administration should work to reward positive behaviours and not only punish noncompliance.\nOriginality/value: This paper contributes to a better understanding of the reasons to implement OHS in an early stage of institutionalisation of these practices, providing an empirical analysis of the reasons behind employer involvement. This paper is highly relevant for researchers, governments and practitioners.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
The content of selected nutrients and minerals in some cultivars of Cucurbita maxima	[ "Nutrition", "Macroelements" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Pumpkins are among the oldest cultivated vegetables. With growing consumer awareness and interest in a healthy lifestyle, pumpkin fruit is becoming very popular. Owing to the presence of numerous, easily digestible nutrients and low caloric value, pumpkin has become a valuable component of slimming diets. An exceptional feature of the fruit of this plant is its low caloric value; its pulp has an energy value of about 15-25 kcal/100 g (Nawirska-Olszanska et al., 2014). Furthermore, as a rich source of polysaccharides, p-aminobenzoic acid, vegetable oils, sterols, proteins, peptides and minerals, pumpkin is increasingly used as medicine or functional food (Caili et al., 2006). Pumpkin fruit is also rich in potassium, iron and manganese, but contains relatively little calcium and magnesium (Egbekun et al., 1998). The final composition of the plant is significantly influenced by the prevailing climate conditions, but also by storage time after harvest (Younis et al., 2000). Pumpkins grown in optimum temperature and sun exposure have the most beneficial nutrient content (Niewczas et al., 2014).\n2. Material and methods: 2.1 Pumpkin samples\n3. Results and discussion: For many years, pumpkins in Poland were mainly grown as animal feed. However, in recent years the interest in using these vegetables in food preparation has increased. Pumpkins mainly cultivar Cucurbita maxima are becoming popular not only for food producers, but also for consumers who are looking for healthy food. Pumpkins are not only a rich source of carotene, vitamins and antioxidants, but also mineral elements. Consumers are increasingly choosing a pumpkin cultivar not only for their taste but also for the nutrients it supplies.\n4. Conclusions: Our preliminary results show that the fruit of Cucurbita maxima, irrespective of cultivar, is a good means of supplementing the diet with highly beneficial fibre, as well as minerals such as potassium, calcium, phosphorus, magnesium, sulphur, silicon, iron and zinc. Pumpkins also contain small amounts of copper, chromium and nickel, whose presence in the body is essential for numerous metabolic processes. Pumpkins are low in sodium, which is particularly beneficial for the health of those suffering hypertension or osteoporosis. The pumpkins richest in minerals are those of the Australian butter cultivar (calcium, manganese and iron), Flat white boer (sodium, silicon, chromium and nickel), Hokkaido (potassium, phosphorus, zinc and chromium) and Solor (magnesium, sulphur and copper), while the Garbo, Golden Delicious and Zapallito de tronco cultivars had the lowest concentrations of minerals. The results obtained indicate that depending on the consumer's expectations, pumpkins of various cultivars can be a dietary component that corrects deficiencies in the diet.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to compare the content of nutrients and minerals in various cultivars of Cucurbita maxima.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This is preliminary study, so eight samples from each cultivar of pumpkin used in this study were obtained from local farms from Poland. The following pumpkin cultivars were used: Australian butter, Flat white boer, Garbo, Golden delicious, Golden nugget, Hokkaido, Solor and Zapallito de tronco. In pumpkins elements, dry matter, ash and crude protein were determined. All elements were determined using Inductively Coupled Plasma Optical Emission Spectrometer. Content of dry matter, ash and crude protein according to AOAC methods.\nFindings: The fruit of Cucurbita maxima, irrespective of cultivar, is a good means of supplementing the diet with highly beneficial fibre, and minerals such as potassium, calcium, phosphorus, magnesium, sulphur, silicon, iron and zinc. The pumpkins richest in minerals are those of the Australian butter cultivar (calcium, manganese, iron), Flat white boer (sodium, silicon, chromium, nickel), Hokkaido (potassium, phosphorus, zinc, chromium) and Solor (magnesium, sulphur, copper), while the Garbo, Golden Delicious and Zapallito de tronco cultivars had the lowest concentrations of minerals.\nOriginality/value: The results obtained indicate that depending on the consumer's expectations, pumpkins of various cultivars can be a dietary component that corrects deficiencies in the diet. Pumpkins grown in Poland have been characterised in terms of the content of mineral elements. These vegetables have become an important component of local food in Poland.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Student assessment in exemplary work-based education programs	[ "Workplace learning", "Education", "Assessment", "Canada" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nAssessment in work-based education programs: One of the central purposes of work-based education (WBE) in secondary schools is to introduce adolescents to the world of work. It is hoped that, through their experiences in these programs, students will attain a variety of outcomes that help them to succeed in future careers (Haimson and Bellotti, 2001; Hutchinson et al., 2001). Much research on WBE has focussed on describing individual engagement within the workplace and on understanding the nature of learning and instruction within WBE programs (Zanibbi et al., 2006). Extant literature provides little information about the methods used by teachers and workplace supervisors or employers to assess student learning in WBE. Assessment refers to the observation and recording of the characteristics of student learning and student performance for comparison with expected WBE outcomes and for the purpose of adapting teaching to meet individual learning needs (Black and Wiliam, 1998; Edwards, 2004). The purpose of this paper is to supplement existing research by describing the assessment practices reported in a series of focus groups conducted with educators from exemplary WBE programs across Canada.Research on assessment in WBE has provided descriptions of assessment practices in tertiary level programs rather than in secondary school programs (Bragg, 1995; Williams et al., 1993) and analyses of the relationship of assessment practices in WBE to federal and state mandated high-stakes testing (Ananda and Rabinowitz, 2000; Ruhland and Brewer, 2001). Surveys of assessment practices have reported that, while non-traditional methods like portfolio assessment are beginning to be used, most WBE programs still rely on traditional paper-and-pencil assessments (Bragg, 1995). The literature on workplace learning and assessment highlights the challenges to using traditional assessment in WBE programs. These challenges include the mismatch of traditional assessment practices to current conceptions of workplace learning, the influence of assessment on pedagogy and learning, the range of types of learning that must be assessed, and the lack of policies and procedures to guide assessment of WBE.Reconceptualizing workplace learning\nMethod: Data were collected during six focus group interviews conducted across Canada. Focus groups were held in one Western province, one Central province, and one Eastern province. Four focus groups included educators involved in exemplary WBE programs, and two included workplace supervisors, sometimes referred to as employers, involved in some of the same exemplary programs. WBE programs were identified as exemplary, that is, particularly effective in facilitating student learning in the workplace, if they had been nominated to the Conference Board of Canada's \"100 Best Business Partnerships\" lists from 1996-2002, or by school-district officials for the present study. Representatives of these programs from both workplaces and schools were invited to participate, resulting in focus groups ranging in size from four to seven participants, with a total of 19 male participants and 14 female participants from across Canada.The participants represented teachers and workplace supervisors associated with traditional co-op programs (i.e. students enrolled in full-time study were involved in extended periods of time at a workplace with academic credit tied to an academic course - e.g. Biology or Accounting - and in classroom sessions related to their placements). There were also teachers and workplace supervisors associated with more specialized WBE programs. Vocational or technical education programs placed students in courses tied to specific trades in workplaces that employed workers from those trades. Other participants represented school- or board-wide programs that had developed relationships with one particular company within an industry, and that sent all of the students in their WBE program to this company for work placements. In some cases, coursework occurred at the workplace as well as at school. Finally, some participants represented award-winning programs designed to meet the needs of students with special needs or special interest groups (e.g. students with learning or physical disabilities, or at-risk students).Focus group interviews were used because they tend to produce a wider range of information and insights than individual interviews (Stewart and Shamdasani, 1990), and researchers can interact directly with respondents to obtain clarification (Morgan, 1997, 2002). The same focus group protocol was used for each group and consisted of questions that asked participants to describe how they viewed their programs as distinctive. Questions focused on a number of broad areas including: preparation, student learning, connecting school and work, and accommodations. For example, participants were asked about in-school instruction that prepared students to enter the workplace for WBE and about ongoing assistance for students' undertaking new experiences as placements unfolded. An emphasis on student learning continued with questions directed at how expectations were communicated from the school to workplaces, and at how workplace supervisors were prepared for helping students to learn. Questions about connecting school and work included: \"Some students report difficulty seeing connections between what they learn in the workplace and what they learn in the rest of their program at school. What is or was done in your program to help students make these connections?\".A high standard of reliability and validity was ensured by the research team's approach to collecting and analysing the data. The same researcher facilitated all focus group interviews, while another member of the research group took notes and monitored two tape recordings of each interview. The proceedings were transcribed verbatim, and the transcripts were checked against the notes and recordings by the facilitator. Before analysis, the identities of participants, schools, and workplaces were changed to pseudonyms. Two researchers not involved in data collection analyzed the transcribed data. Categorical and thematic analyses standard to qualitative data analysis were used (Krueger, 1998; McMillan and Schumacher, 2001; Patton, 2002). Data were analyzed for emergent categories from which themes were subsequently developed.\nFindings: The initial analysis of the focus group data suggested that assessment was an essential part of exemplary programs from the pre-placement stage through to the final evaluation of a student's participation. Subsequent analyses were conducted with specific attention to the form and purpose of assessment within the WBE programs. The follow-up analyses suggested that assessment practices were designed not only to apply in the current WBE placement, but also to enhance students' success in future WBE placements and future employment experiences. Six themes emerged from the focus groups that reflect the characteristics of assessments implemented throughout student participation in exemplary WBE programs:1. identification of student interests and abilities;2. student self-assessment;3. communication of expectations and responsibilities;4. contextualized assessment;5. collaboration between school and workplace, and6. connections between assessment and instruction.Identification of student interests and abilities\nDiscussion: The data reported in this paper arose in the context of focus groups, who were asked a series of questions that never referred to assessment. This indicates just how important these WBE educators and workplace supervisors, from outstanding programs, believed student assessment to be. They had constructivist views of workplace learning which they saw as relational (Billett et al., 2005) and requiring sensitive mentoring (Le Maistre et al., 2006), and which they adapted to student needs (Chin et al., 2004). Their views of assessment of workplace learning were consistent with current conceptualizations; they saw assessment as contextualized (Boud and Falchikov, 2006), focused on authentic tasks (Grubb and Cox, 2005), ongoing, and contributing to student learning (Geertshuis et al., 2002). Earlier in this paper, we described assessment as for the purpose of observing and recording the characteristics of student learning and student performance with respect to expected WBE outcomes, and for the purpose of adapting teaching to meet individual learning needs (Black and Wiliam, 1998; Edwards, 2004). Our focus group participants clearly emphasized assessment as serving the purpose of adapting teaching to meet individual learning needs (Black and Wiliam, 1998).Two of the six themes identified in our analysis focus primarily on students:1. identification of student interests and abilities; and2. student self-assessment.Each of these themes suggests that when assessment practices are focused on individual students, they are intended to enhance students' awareness of themselves - their interests and abilities related to workplaces, and the successes and limitations they experience once in the workplace. These assessments embody an array of informal approaches including interviews, observations, and reflections both prior to entering the workplace and while in the workplace (Keiser et al., 2004).Four of the six themes that emerged from our analyses reflect the awareness of our participants of the importance of the relational nature of workplace learning and its assessment:1. communication;2. collaboration;3. connections; and4. contextualization (Billett et al., 2005).These exemplary programs were characterized by assessment practices that explicitly helped students to link their school-based learning with their work-based learning, and reminded everyone of the value of shared understanding (Garavan and McGuire, 2001). Teachers and workplace supervisors demonstrated through their views expressed in the focus groups that they valued and respected their partners in these ventures. Although no focus group contained both teachers and employers, every focus group transcript bore witness to their mutual respect. Assessment of learning was related to the goals jointly set by students, teachers, and workplace supervisors and was practiced through the use of observations and interviews in the context of workplace demands. Again, these views of assessment emphasize the predominance of informal, interpersonal, flexible, and educative assessment practices in exemplary work-based education (Black and Wiliam, 1998).Within both sets of themes - assessment of individual students and relational understanding of assessment - it was apparent that when it was appropriate, students were given opportunities to meet the demands of workplace credentials (like the milling drill test). However, such formal assessments were used and valued sparingly and for their unique contribution to student advancement. Daily assessment practices that guided teaching and enhanced to student learning may have been less formal but they were not less rigorous. Teachers and workplace supervisors put much thought into what assessments should be conducted and into how they should be conducted, and invited students to participate in these conversations.\nConclusion: Our data suggest that in the eyes of teachers and workplace supervisors, whose WBE programs have been honoured as exemplary, assessment is an essential component even if there is little in policy or research to guide such assessment. The practices of these educators and employers parallel recent theory and research on workplace learning as relational and constructivist. And their assessment practices are consistent with theory and research that view assessment of workplace learning as educative for students, and as informative for teachers and supervisors about how to adapt teaching to meet learner needs.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to describe the assessment practices reported by Canadian educators and workplace supervisors involved in exemplary work-based education (WBE) programs for high-school students.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Six focus groups were conducted, four with teachers and coordinators and two with workplace supervisors from exemplary WBE programs, to identify the features of these exemplary programs that prepare adolescents to participate in WBE, that prepare workplace supervisors to mentor WBE students, and that characterize the day-to-day interactions in the workplace through which adolescents learn. Surprisingly, in the absence of any questions directly focused on assessment, participants spoke at length and with passion about the purpose and nature of assessment in their outstanding WBE programs.\nFindings: - Analyses of these interviews revealed six themes that describe the range of assessment practices associated with these three features of exemplary programs: identification of student interests and abilities; student self-assessment; communication of expectations and responsibilities; contextualized assessment; collaboration between school and workplace; and connections between assessment and instruction.\nOriginality/value: - The findings highlight practical assessment procedures, for teachers and workplace supervisors, which facilitate the meaningful participation and learning of students in WBE programs and of workers in the workplace.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Understanding the determinants of business intelligence system adoption stages: An empirical study of SMEs	[ "Small and medium enterprises (SMEs)", "Adoption stages", "Business intelligence systems (BISs)", "Diffusion of innovations (DOI) theory", "Information technology/Information systems (IT/IS) adoption", "Technology-organization-environment (TOE) framework" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Today's firms generally operate in a complex and extensively competitive global business environment. Such conditions force firms to set goals that include continuously competing with rivals by operating more efficiently and productively, and by reducing operating costs (Chan and Chong, 2013). The widely recognized primary driver of organizational productivity, i.e. technological innovation, will significant contribute to firms' goals, but only when widely adopted (Zhu, Dong, Xu and Kraemer, 2006). Thus, it is crucial for firms to understand the process and determinants of technology adoption (Karahanna et al., 1999).\n2. Theoretical development: 2.1 BISs\n3. Research model: We propose an integrative research model (shown in Figure 1) that encompasses the two described prominent, firm-level innovation adoption models, namely, the TOE framework and the DOI model, updated with recent findings from the literature (Puklavec et al., 2014). Coupling the TOE framework with the DOI model variables provides an improved ability to explain IT adoption (Hsu et al., 2006; Picoto et al., 2014) and creates a theoretically grounded basis to evaluate the technology, organization, and environment characteristics of an SME that affect BIS adoption. We identify constructs based on existing IT/IS research and augment them with findings from comprehensive exploratory research about the determinants of BIS adoption in SMEs (Puklavec et al., 2014).\n4. Research methodology: 4.1 Measurement\n5. Results: The data analysis is conducted through partial least squares (PLS), a variance-based structural equation modeling technique. PLS is suitable for this research since: some items in the data are not distributed normally (p<0.01 based on the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test); the conceptual model is considered as complex; and it has not been previously tested (Martins et al., 2014). To test the proposed research model, we use SmartPLS 3 (Ringle et al., 2015).\n6. Discussion: Our research makes important contributions to both research and practice and offers implications for the IT/IS literature, in particular for the field of BI and BIS.\n7. Conclusions: BISs are valuable tools for SMEs in competitive and uncertain environments. This study explores how technological, organizational, and environmental factors affect individual BIS adoption stages. Drawing on the TOE framework and IT adoption literature led to the development of research hypotheses and a conceptual framework that explicates these relationships in the BIS context. We conducted an empirical study among small and medium firms to test the research model and hypotheses.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to provide a better understanding of the determinants of business intelligence system (BIS) adoption stages. It develops and empirically tests a conceptual model for assessing the determinants of BIS diffusion on the evaluation, adoption, and use stages in the context of small and medium enterprises (SMEs).\nDesign/methodology/approach: Drawing on data from 181 SMEs the influence of technological, organizational, and environmental factors on BIS adoption stages were analyzed using the PLS-SEM method.\nFindings: The paper provides empirical insights about how technological, organizational, and environmental factors affect individual BIS adoption stages.\nPractical implications: The paper includes implications for managers and solution providers to understand the influence of various determinants to more effectively conclude the adoption process.\nOriginality/value: This study represents important progress in the theoretical understanding of the role of technological, organizational, and environmental factors across the different BIS adoption stages.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Dynamic prediction of cardiovascular disease using improved LSTM	[ "Cardiovascular disease", "Dynamic prediction", "LSTM" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is a class of diseases that involve the heart or blood vessels (Mendis et al., 2011). CVD is the chronic disease that poses the greatest threat to people, and now it has become one of the leading causes of death around the world (Gibbons et al., 1999). According to data released by the World Health Organization in May 2017, approximately 17.7 million people died of CVD in 2015, accounting for 31 per cent of the global death. Therefore, medical professionals and researchers have carried out extensive studies on the treatments and interventions for CVD (Kagashe et al., 2017; Yan et al., 2016; Zhu et al., 2017).\n2. Literature review: Machine learning algorithms have been used in various fields including disease prediction. Using logistic regression, Zhou et al. constructed a risk score model for type 2 diabetes in middle-aged male populations in rural China (Zhou et al., 2017). Lin et al. considered the problem of co-occurring diseases and constructed a Bayesian multi-task learning model for chronic diseases and their corresponding complications (Lin et al., 2017). To improve the accuracy of prediction, Long et al. proposed a hybrid heart disease prediction method, which combines rough set theory, clustering algorithm, genetic algorithm, naive Bayes and support vector machines, and the model showed obvious advantages over baseline models (Long et al., 2015). Based on electronic medical record data, Ye et al. used the xgboost algorithm to predict the risk of hypertension of patients (Ye et al., 2018).\n3. Model framework: This paper investigates how to predict the diagnosis result at time step t (YT), in the case of a given patient's records from time step 1 to time step t (X1, X2, ..., XT). Among them, the number of records per patient and the time interval between samples Xt-1, Xt, and Xt+1 could be different.\n4. Experiment analysis: 4.1 Data description\n5. Conclusion: Based on the traditional LSTM, this paper proposed a new model by improving the internal forgetting gate input. First, the irregular time interval is smoothed to obtain the time parameter vector, and then it is used as the input of the forgetting gate to overcome the prediction obstacle caused by the irregular time interval. The experimental results show that the dynamic prediction model proposed in this paper has a significant improvement in classification performance compared with the traditional LSTM model, which verifies the effectiveness of the proposed model.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Previous dynamic prediction models rarely handle multi-period data with different intervals, and the large-scale patient hospital records are not effectively used to improve the prediction performance. This paper aims to focus on the prediction of cardiovascular disease using the improved long short-term memory (LSTM) model.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A new model based on the traditional LSTM was proposed to predict cardiovascular disease. The irregular time interval is smoothed to obtain the time parameter vector, and it is used as the input of the forgetting gate of LSTM to overcome the prediction obstacle caused by the irregular time interval.\nFindings: The experimental results show that the dynamic prediction model proposed in this paper obtained a significant better classification performance compared with the traditional LSTM model.\nOriginality/value: In this paper, the authors improved the LSTM by smoothing the irregular time between different medical stages of the patient to obtain the temporal feature vector.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]

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