The scope and impact of workplace diversity in the United Arab Emirates – A preliminary study

Managing workplace diversity has become a priority concern among organizations in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) today. The UAE has one of the world's largest net migration rates, and the number of workers from India, the Philippines, Indonesia, Australia, the USA, among other countries, has increased significantly in recent decades. The UAE's cross-border mobility has resulted in the interaction of people with diverse language, customs and ethnic backgrounds. Although diversity has been shown to have a number of benefits, including enhanced employee creativity and competence, this recognition is often found more in theory than actual practice. Diversity can also lead to miscommunication, dysfunctional adaptation behaviours and the creation of barriers that reduce the benefits diversity can bring to the organization. Due to the nature of the UAE workplace, which is dominated by a foreign workforce, this study critically analyses the benefits organizations enjoy and the challenges they face in the diverse workplaces of the United Arab Emirates. The study used a multi-method approach combining survey data from 450 foreign workers with qualitative data from interviews with native officials of organizations. It is an attempt to compare the views of UAE workplace experience from two different groups—non-native workers and native officials. The research found a generally favourable view toward workplace diversity from the perspective of surveyed employees. However, when asked more detailed questions about company policy, a significant segment of respondents expressed reservations about their employer’s ability to implement successful intercultural communication and diversity practices

Fuzzification of quantitative data to predict tumour size of colorectal cancer

Regression analysis has become more popular among researchers as a standard tool in analyzing data. This paper used fuzzy linear regression model (FLRM) to predict tumour size of colorectal cancer (CRC) data in Malaysia. 180 patients with colorectal cancer received treatment in hospital were recorded by nurses and doctors. Based on the patient records, a triangular fuzzy data will be built toward the size of the tumour. Mean square error (MSE) and root mean square error (RMSE) will be measured as a part of the process for predicting the size of the tumour. The degree of fitting adjusted is set between 0 and 1 in order to find the least error. It was found that the combination of FLRM model with fuzzy data provided a better prediction compared to the FLRM model alone. Hence, this study concluded that the tumour size is directly proportional to several factors such as gender, ethnic, icd 10, TNM staging, diabetes mellitus, Crohn’s disease

Effective Virtual Teams for New Product Development

At present, the existing literature shows that the factors which influence the effectiveness of virtual teams for new product development are still ambiguous. To address this problem, a research design was developed, which includes detailed literature review, preliminary model and field survey. From literature review, the factors which influence the effectiveness of virtual teams are identified and these factors are modified using a field survey. The relationship between knowledge workers (people), process and technology in virtual teams is explored in this study. The results of the study suggest that technology and process are tightly correlated and need to be considered early in virtual teams. The use of software as a service, web solution, report generator and tracking system should be incorporated for effectiveness virtual teams

Firm’s Intangible Assets and Multinational Activity: Joint-Venture Versus FDI

This paper provides a theoretical formalisation of the joint-venture contract, as an alternative to Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), within a Dissipation of Intangible Assets framework. In a two-period, two-country equilibrium model, we discuss how the threat of knowledge spillover shapes the boundaries of a Multinational Enterprise. Similarly to the theoretical findings on the FDI-licensing trade off, we show that Foreign Direct Investment is more likely to emerge when know-how easily spills over – i.e. when firms are endowed with more intangible assets or they belong to high tech industries. Probit estimates, from an entirely new firm-level dataset, constructed by the author, show that the experience of Italian multinationals in Asia is in line with our theoretical predictions.Intangible assets, Internalisation, FDI, Joint-venture, Asia

Critical study of the managerial selection practices in Malaysian business organisations

An exploratory study was made on the managerial selection practices of Malaysian business organizations. The data for the study was provided by 62 business organizations comprising 22 Malaysian-owned small and medium enterprises, 26 large locally-owned corporation and 14 Malaysian-based multinational companies. Comparisons of the selection practices were made between the two categories of Malaysian local companies; between the Malaysian local companies and the multinationals, and between selection practices of the Malaysian organizations combined with the practices in the developed countries as revealed by management literature. Analysis of the results reveal that generally there were little differences between the selection practices of the different categories of business organizations operating in Malaysia. The Malaysian managerial selection practices resemble the practices in the Western-oriented developed countries, such as the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand. ·when compared to Japan, a developed Asian country, however, an important difference may be identified in the selection policy or strategy. While Japanese corporations seldom hire outsiders for higher level positions and prefer to train their own personnel in preparation for managerial position in the future, Malaysian organizations followed the Western practice of leaving the door open by selecting their managerial personnel from internal sources (through promotions from within the organizations) as well as by selecting and appointing from external sources by inviting applications from outside their organizations. Majority of the Malaysian organizations (both the locally owned and the multinationals) preferred the multiple hurdle approach over the multiple regression approach. A most likely reason is to save both costs and time by shortening the selection process by not proceeding to consider any further those candidates who were considered not to have fulfilled a cutoff point in the sequence of the selection stages. Management literature, however, cautions that the multiple approach might create undesired result if the validity for each predictor has not been properly established. Findings from this research indicated that there were little differences in the use of selection methods between Malaysia and the developed countries. The preferred tools used in Malaysia and developed countries are ir1terviews, resume or curricular vitae, application forms, biodata, recommendations and references. As is the case in the developed countries, the interview is the dominant method used. Malaysian organizations, however seem to use recommendations and references and job tryouts more frequently than do organizations in the developed countries. The assessment centres which have gained much higher degree of popularity and acceptance in the developed countries appear to have a relatively low frequency in Malaysia, if results of the study were to indicate an accurate picture in the country. The results show that while assessment centres were frequently of used by some companies in Malaysia, probably among the larger ones, overall its use has not been as widespread and frequent as in the developed countries. Cultural dimensions or characteristics appear to have no impact on the Malaysian selection practices. This could be due to the fact that in business management and business practices, Western influence had more influence than any indigenous cultural features. Malaysian organizations, however, recognise the importance of cultural differences within the country and between nations to business practices and strategy. This recognition is indicated by the fact that Malaysian organizations made it one of the requirements that managers and managerial candidates have skills and abilities to effectively deal with culture related issues und matters that are of importance to organizational performance. When compared to other requirements of the manager\u27s knowledge, skills and abilities, however, Malaysian organizations place a higher degree of importance to human and technical skills. This implies that the skills of the manager to perform tasks that require his expertise as well as his skill in managing the workforce is considered more important than culture-related skills. The effectiveness of the Malaysian selection practices could not be properly assessed based on an exploratory study of this nature. This would require more in depth study and research

Global Talent Management of Multinational Companies

This study probed  the global talent management  of multinational companies . It described the implementation   and effectiveness   on the talent sourcing, employee development,   talent   assessment and employee retention. The  findings  revealed  that  global talent management  of multinational companies  are  moderately implemented   and moderately effective  on   talent sourcing  ,employee development, talent assessment and employee retention.  Using the Pearson Correlation on significant relationship on the level of   implementation and effectiveness   resulted   that there is   highly   significant   relationship on   talent sourcing , employee development  and talent assessment but not on employee retention. The Analysis of Variance (ANOVA)  showed that there is  significant  differences in the perceptions  among the respondents of the multinational  companies  on the effectiveness  on talent  assessment   but not on  talent sourcing, employee development and employee retention.  Moreover, the significance was validated    in the multiple comparisons displaying that, there is significant differences between and within the groups   of respondents on talent assessment.    It is recommended that the  multinational companies  should fully appraise  the  process  of their global talent management  in relations  to the  human  resource value  that will  create a mark in the global market place. Key words: Global talent management, multinational companies, talent sourcing, employee development, talent assessment   and employee retention.

Replacing failed private water contracts

Failed private water concessions have been terminated and replaced with public sector operations in many countries. The paper reviews the negotiating processes involved in these terminations

Gender Voice and Correlations with Peace

The statistics regarding violence in today’s society are staggering. A newly released study published by the World Health Organization, making headlines in the Wall Street Journal (Oct. 3, 2002) reports that “Violence Took 1.6 Million Lives in 2000.” Notably, this report considers only the data obtained from the seventy countries that report such statistics to the World Health Organization. It does not include reports from many countries whose violence is also high, such as Burundi, Rwanda, Iraq, Liberia and Afghanistan. This manuscript seeks to address some of these issues of violence by considering issues of gender. We pose the question whether there may be some correlation between violence and the lack meaningful involvement of women in the economy. If the countries that appear more violent are also countries where women are systematically excluded from business opportunities, perhaps one way to curb some of the societal violence would be to improve the opportunities for women in the economy. Multi-national corporations can play an important role in increasing these opportunities. As has been argued elsewhere, a reduction in poverty promotes stability and leads to a more peaceful society. Studies show that in developing countries, involving women in the economy as wage earners can reduce poverty. As the locus of production shifts away from the home, an initial decline in employment opportunities may occur. However, this eventually disappears and both women and men benefit.http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/39915/3/wp530.pd

Human Factors Influencing Contractors' Risk Attitudes: A Case Study of the Malaysian Construction Industry

Malaysia is one of the most rapidly developing countries among developing nations. The construction industry has played a major role in Malaysia’s rapid economic growth. Among the major sectors in Malaysia, the importance of the construction industry is unique regardless of the level of the country’s development. However, the attitude of the construction industry in Malaysia towards managing contractors’ risk attitudes is very weak. The introduction of the Occupational Safety and Health Act in 1994 by the Malaysian government made all industries in Malaysia to identify risks, conduct risk assessment and control risk. In addition, the Malaysian construction industry simultaneously implemented an integrated system to ensure consistency and better performance of projects. To identify the factors influencing contractors' risk attitudes, relevant literature was reviewed, and a questionnaire survey was conducted. This study focused on the G7 contractors operating in the Malaysian construction industry. One hundred and nineteen copies of a structured questionnaire were analysed with a response rate of 85%. Structural equation modelling was utilized to test the hypotheses developed for the study. Results showed that government policies played a moderating role in enhancing the relationship between human-related factors affecting contractors’ risk attitudes in the construction industry

Fair Labor Association 2006 Annual Public Report

Introduction concerns effects of globalization. Examines changes from 2005-2006 as companies are encouraged to move towards self compliance, with a concentration on corporate responsibility. Data is broken down by company