48,636 research outputs found
E-democracy: exploring the current stage of e-government
Governments around the world have been pressured to implement e-Government programs in order to improve the government-citizen dialogue. The authors of this article review prior literature on such efforts to find if they lead to increased democratic participation ("e-Democracy") for the affected citizens, with a focus on the key concepts of transparency, openness, and engagement. The authors find that such efforts are a starting point toward e-Democracy, but the journey is far from complete
REVIEWING OUTSOURCING CONTROVERSY IN INDONESIA (An Exploratory Study of Human Resources Outsourcing Practice in Semarang City)
Outsourcing in Indonesia is still a controversy. The different concept of outsourcing
between employers (vendors and users), employees/outsourced workers, and
government makes another problem in outsourcing implementation, especially in
industrial relationship either in enterprise and macro level. This study aims to
determine the concept of outsourcing of each element of the tripartite, the problems
that arise in the implementation, and solutions from each party, in dealing with the
practice of the working system. The problems under study, based on specific issues
related to industrial relations, including: wages, welfare programs, health and safety,
discrimination, job security, and dispute resolution, and termination of employment.
This qualitative research is an exploratory, with the data collection methods:
focus group discussions, observations, interviews, and study documentation. The data
collected from employers (vendors and users), the national unions, worker
outsourcing, and government within the scope of Semarang city.
The results showed that the problems that arise due to differences in each
party's conception of the tripartite elements. Uncertainty rules of outsourcing is a
major problem, giving rise to labor flexibility in the implementation, which implies
profitable for each party, especially the workers of outsourcing. In the end, the
regulation enforcement related to the implementation of the outsourcing firm is badly
needed, to compromise the disputes of workers and employer interests
Business for Sustainable Society Project
This three-year project's main objective was: "How can business/industry realise a sustainable society?" The two goals for achieving the main objective were: (1) to identify promising business models for realising a sustainable society and develop relevant methods to quantify their potential while proposing measures to promote such businesses, and (2) to clarify the conditions of business/industry activities and a direction of local development that are suitable for sustainable local society. "Research on Environmentally-Sound Business Models (BM Research)" and the "Research on Environmentally-Sound Local Industry System (LIS Research)" were implemented with these two goals in mind. They were reinforced with associated research to accomplish the goals based on the results of a progress review that was made on completion of the first half of the Third Phase
Power Struggle in the Food Chain? Lessons from Empirical Studies on Power Influences in Chains and Marketing Channels
Power plays a key role in any chain relationship. In the past large manufacturers such as Unilever and Nestle were the most dominant players in the chain. However, as a result of consolidation among retailers, power has shifted towards retailers. Nowadays such retailers as Wal-Mart, Carrefour, and Tesco are seen as powerful gatekeepers controlling the access to the end consumer. Moreover, branded manufacturers and large multinational retailers become increasingly dependent on fewer and larger suppliers who can deliver high quality products at competitive prices. Since many decades there is discussion going on about the role of power in chains and marketing channels. In order to understand how power and its interactions with other constructs in the chain can be used beneficially for management of the whole chain, it is of great importance to investigate the influences and effects of power. Some of the phenomena which are said to be influenced by power include performance, satisfaction, commitment, relationship quality, conflict, compliance, problem solving, chain integration and collaboration. In this context, the aim of our work is to analyze and systemize existing empirical studies, which measure the influences of power on other phenomena, and discuss the strengths and weaknesses of existing conceptualizations of power, in order to add clarity to the existing turmoil in the literature and contribute to the understanding of the role of power in chains and marketing channels for managerial purposes.Power, Power Conceptualization, Supply Chain, Supply Chain Network, Marketing,
Entrepreneurial Finance: Insights from English Language Training Market in Vietnam
Entrepreneurship plays an indispensable role in the economic development and poverty reduction of emerging economies like Vietnam. The rapid development of technologies during the Fourth Industrial Revolution (Industry 4.0) has a significant impact on business in every field, especially in the innovation-focused area of entrepreneurship. However, the topic of entrepreneurial activities with technology applications in Vietnam is under-researched. In addition, the body of literature regarding entrepreneurial finance tends to focus on advanced economies, while mostly neglecting the contextual differences in developing nations. Therefore, this research contributes to these topics by investigating the main characteristics of a high potential market for entrepreneurs in Vietnam, which is the English language training market (ELTM). It also aims at indicating the impacts of technology on the entrepreneurial firms within this market, with an emphasis on financing sources. To answer the research questions, this study employs a qualitative analysis and conducts 12 in-depth, semi-structured interviews with entrepreneurs and researchers in the field. The key findings in our study highlight the main contributing factors to the growth of the market, both universally and context-specific for a developing nation like Vietnam. It also lists the leaders in each market segment and the industryâs potential profit margin. The results also show that most entrepreneurs in the ELTM utilized private sources of finance rather than external ones, such as bank loans. It again confirms the idea from previous works that even with the rapid development of the economic and technological landscape, entrepreneurial activities in general barely benefit from additional sources of funding. However, it also points out the distinct characteristics of the ELTM that may influence these financing issues; for example, English training services usually collect revenues from customers before delivering their classes. This is of advantage for entrepreneurs in this area and helps significantly reduce the financial barriers. These findings, which are among the first attempts to contribute to a better understanding of entrepreneurial opportunities in the Industry 4.0 in Vietnam, provide valuable insights for policymakers and entrepreneurs, as well as investors
Methodology for Designing Decision Support Systems for Visualising and Mitigating Supply Chain Cyber Risk from IoT Technologies
This paper proposes a methodology for designing decision support systems for
visualising and mitigating the Internet of Things cyber risks. Digital
technologies present new cyber risk in the supply chain which are often not
visible to companies participating in the supply chains. This study
investigates how the Internet of Things cyber risks can be visualised and
mitigated in the process of designing business and supply chain strategies. The
emerging DSS methodology present new findings on how digital technologies
affect business and supply chain systems. Through epistemological analysis, the
article derives with a decision support system for visualising supply chain
cyber risk from Internet of Things digital technologies. Such methods do not
exist at present and this represents the first attempt to devise a decision
support system that would enable practitioners to develop a step by step
process for visualising, assessing and mitigating the emerging cyber risk from
IoT technologies on shared infrastructure in legacy supply chain systems
Towards a taxonomy of innovation systems
The concept of National Innovation System (NIS) has been recently applied in the context of developing nations even tough it was originally developed in relation to the more developed economies (Japan, Scandinavian countries, US etc.). This raises the methodological problem of knowing whether what was learnt in the study of more advanced NISs is relevant for all sorts of economies regardless the maturity of their actual innovation systems. With this question in mind an exploratory exercise is implemented. First a technique for mapping different NIS is put forward and next based on such mapping a taxonomy of NISs is proposed. The technique although simple in the steps it requires shows analytical potential. The cartography it generates allows one to compare directly different countries, by visualizing in bi-dimensional space the graphic pattern of the relevant dimensions of their respective NISs. This technique is applied to 69 countries (87.4% of the world population) and a set of 29 indicators is used to examine these NISs along eight major dimensions. With the resulting data, and with the help of cluster analysis, a taxonomy of innovation systems is proposed. That taxonomy which contains 6 major types of NISs indicates that what differentiates most the individual systems is their performance in three critical dimensions: innovation, diffusion and basic and applied knowledge. Country size and the natural resources endowment of the economies also emerge as important contingency factors underlying the overall dynamics of different NISs.innovation; national innovation systems; economic development.
An Exploratory Study of Online Information Regarding Colony Collapse Disorder
The cause or causes of Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) are uncertain. CCD defines specific characteristics of the nationwide deaths of honey bee colonies in the last decade. Adult bees often disappear from the hive and die, leaving the colony weak and vulnerable to disease. Environmental scientists and agriculturalists have developed many different theories about CCD and its origins. The different theories create challenges regarding the effective dissemination of information about CCD to the different realms of public information seekers. There is a need for an exploration of the online communication of CCD information using federal environmental agency web resources. CCD research information dissemination practices are one example of the trans-disciplinary complexity surrounding many current environmental issues. The study addresses different information âpackagesâ offered or not offered for different types of CCD information seekers. The goal of the study is to inform future research addressing the comprehensive construction of federal e-government science information by finding strengths and weaknesses in the current information landscape of CCD resources on the web
Giving the customer a voice: A study of market research methods and their perceived effectiveness in NPD
There is a widely held view that a lack of, ââŠcustomer understanding,â is one of the
main reasons for product failure (Eliashberg et al., 1997, p. 219). This is despite the
fact that new product development (NPD) is a crucial business process for many
companies. The importance of integrating the voice of the customer (VoC) through
market research is well documented (Davis, 1993; Mullins and Sutherland, 1998;
Cooper et al., 2002; Flint, 2002; Davilla et al., 2006; Cooper and Edgett, 2008;
Cooper and Dreher, 2010; Goffin and Mitchell, 2010).
However, not all research methods are well received, for example there are
studies that have strongly criticized focus groups, interviews and surveys (e.g.
Ulwick, 2002; Goffin et al, 2010; Sandberg, 2002). In particular, a point is made that,
ââŠtraditional market research and development approaches proved to be particularly
ill-suited to breakthrough productsâ (Deszca et al, 2010, p613). Therefore, in
situations where traditional techniquesâinterviews and focus groupsâare
ineffective, the question is which market research techniques are appropriate,
particularly for developing breakthrough products? To investigate this, an attempt was
made to access the knowledge of market research practitioners from agencies with a
reputation for their work on breakthrough NPD. We were surprised to find that this
research had not been conducted previously.
In order to make it possible for the sample of 24 market research experts
identified for this study to share their knowledge, repertory grid technique was used.
This psychology based method particularly seeks out tacit knowledge by using indepth
interviews. In this case the interviews were conducted with professionals from
leading market research agencies in two countries. The resulting data provided two
unique insights: they highlighted the attributes of market research methods which
made them effective at identifying customersâ needs and they showed how different
methods were perceived against these attributes.
This article starts with a review of the literature on different methods for
conducting market research to identify customer needs. The conclusions from the
literature are then used to define the research question. We explain our choice of
methodology, including the data collection and analysis approach. Next the key
results are presented. Finally, the discussion section identifies the key insights,
clarifies the limitations of the research, suggests areas for future research, and draws
implications for managers.
We conclude that existing research is not aligned with regard to which
methods (or combination of methods) are best suited to the various stages of the NPD
process. We have set out the challenges and our own intended work in this regard in
our section on âfurther researchâ. Also, the existing literature does not explicitly seek
the perceptions of practitioner experts based in market research agencies. This we
have started to address, and we acknowledge that further work is required.
Although our research in ongoing, it has already yielded the first view of a
model of the perceptions of 24 expert market researchers in the UK and Denmark.
Based on the explanation of these experts, the model situates a derived set of
categories in a manner that reflects the way in which they are inter-linked. We believe
that our model begins to deal with the gaps and anomalies in the existing research into
VoC methods
- âŠ