Personal Document Management System

In definition, a document management system (DMS) is a computer system (or set of computer programs) used to track and store electronic documents and/or images of paper documents As people nowadays are constantly on the move and the wide spread availability of internet access, the usage of web based systems are increasing by leaps and bounds. And the amount of data and information that is being created and stored is getting bigger by the moment. Sometimes, people who are constantly on the move might forget to bring along their files and documents and there might be a situation when they will need those files and documents urgently. Most of the people might not even be aware of a system available online that would help them organize their files and documents. This might be caused by the fact that these systems are more oriented towards enterprises and businesses. Seeing this situation, the author has initiated a web based system project that is more oriented towards a more personal version of a document management system. This personal document management system will enable users to manage and organize their files easily .Files and documents will be stored centrally on a server and this centralization enables users to access them anytime anywhere through a web based portal. This personal management system is designed as an online system that is install on individual computers where it allows user to upload, retrieve, view, edit, delete, share and even send files to other users that uses the system. In the process of developing this system, the author has done online researches on similar systems and for information that are related to the development of the system. Along with a user intuitive interface with heavy emphasis on usage of icons and graphics, it makes it easier for users to understand the system and ultimately find it as a useful tool to make their everyday life easier

The Ethiopian Human Rights commission and its contribution to the protection of Human Rights and building of good governance: challenges and prospectp

The nature of the environment in which national human rights institutions (NHRIs) operate determines their effectiveness in building a human rights culture. NHRIs operating in a non-democratic tradition reflect the system itself since the nature of the social, political and legal environment in such system contains informal constraints affecting their overall activities. The Ethiopian Human Rights Commission (Commission) was set up as part of democratic institutions following regime change in the early 1990s. It embarked on discharging functions vested in it in a framework that is not favorable for such institution to be effective. Lack of democratic tradition and good governance, poor culture of respect for human rights, weak institutions, and financial constraints are among the major hurdles limiting the effectiveness of the Commission. Against the prevailing environment, the article examines the effectiveness of the Commission in meeting its objectives on the basis of the evaluation of the practice of the Commission since it started its operation in 2004. Specifically, the performance of the Commission so far in the areas of promotion (sensitization and education) and protection (complaint-handling), and monitoring of human rights are reviewed to see if the institution is effective in defending human rights and thereby building good governance. After highlighting its success story, the major worrying trends and setbacks in developing a culture of respect for human rights and building good governance are explored. Before doing so, the article offers an overview of the establishment, structure, mandate and power of the Commission. Also, a concise statement on the linkage between the overall objectives of NHRIs in general and of the Commission in particular and good governance is offered to indicate that the institution is meant to serve as one of the institutional mechanisms to bring about good governance in the nation

Costs and benefits of superfast broadband in the UK

This paper was commissioned from LSE Enterprise by Convergys Smart Revenue Solutions to stimulate an open and constructive debate among the main stakeholders about the balance between the costs, the revenues, and the societal benefits of ‘superfast’ broadband. The intent has been to analyse the available facts and to propose wider perspectives on economic and social interactions. The paper has two parts: one concentrates on superfast broadband deployment and the associated economic and social implications (for the UK and its service providers), and the other considers alternative social science approaches to these implications. Both parts consider the potential contribution of smart solutions to superfast broadband provision and use. Whereas Part I takes the “national perspective” and the “service provider perspective”, which deal with the implications of superfast broadband for the UK and for service providers, Part II views matters in other ways, particularly by looking at how to realise values beyond the market economy, such as those inherent in neighbourliness, trust and democrac

Serviços omni-canal na indústria de serviços bancários: investigação qualitativa multi-método

O art.º 64 (modalidade alternativa à tese) do regulamento de estudos da Universidade de Aveiro contempla a possibilidade de apresentação de uma modalidade alternativa para teses de doutoramento. Esta modalidade assinala que “caso a tese seja substituída por um conjunto de trabalhos científicos já publicados, estes terão de formar um conjunto coerente e relevante para a área cientifica do doutoramento (...)”. Neste contexto, esta tese é baseada em 8 publicações científicas, já publicadas, ou aceites para publicação, onde estão incluídas: comunicações orais em conferências internacionais, artigos em revistas científicas e capítulos de livros. O interesse pelo tema foi aliado ao crescente desenvolvimento da estratégia omni-canal na indústria de serviços onde a banca tem sido pioneira. O objetivo é contribuir para a caracterização e compreensão das implicações decorrentes de diferentes estratégias e configurações de canal de serviço para a gestão de operações e, consequentemente para a qualidade dos serviços e satisfação dos clientes. A tese está dividida em seis capítulos. Inicia-se com duas revisões sistemáticas da literatura, para analisar as oportunidades de investigação e divulgar os caminhos de pesquisa para os serviços multicanal. Seguidamente, explicam-se as opções metodológicas e o relacionamento que existe entre a engenharia e gestão industrial e as ciências sociais. A partir desse momento, entramos na fase empírica e, analisamos os serviços omni-canal à lente das redes de negócio baseadas em tecnologia e da gestão de reclamações. Terminamos a tese com uma breve conclusão, limitações e perspetivas de investigação futura. Com maior detalhe, a revisão da literatura sugeriu que à data, os estudos existentes estavam predominantemente formulados sob a perspetiva do marketing, sendo notória uma menor representatividade de estudos focados na gestão de processos e operações de serviço. Neste contexto, o trabalho desenvolvido vem oferecer algumas contribuições ao nível da gestão de operações de serviços com recurso a múltiplos canais, permitindo nomeadamente identificar, caraterizar e consolidar diferentes estratégias de múltiplos canais, e discutir princípios para o alinhamento entre estratégias de front-office de múltiplos canais e níveis operacionais da organização. O trabalho adotou uma metodologia qualitativa multi-método (i.e., revisão sistemática e estudo de caso) recorrendo a diferentes métodos e fontes para a recolha de dados (e.g., entrevistas), bem como para a sua análise. O trabalho permitiu também ilustrar como a estratégia multi-método oferece múltiplas possibilidades de investigação que conduzem a resultados fiáveis para estudos na área da engenharia. É geralmente equilibrada e integra estudos teóricos e empíricos, o que dá maior enfase às dimensões de desenvolvimento, triangulação e complementaridade. A evidência empírica analisada no âmbito deste trabalho sugere que a prestação de serviços através de múltiplos canais potencia novas sinergias organizacionais, e cria novos desafios operacionais, ao permitir a configuração de novos sistemas de serviço que oferecem aos clientes a integração de serviços e canais de diferentes prestadores, numa experiência única. As operações de serviços omni-canal estão agora a basear-se em redes de negócio com base tecnológica, já que as empresas estão a mudar a forma como competem entre si. As empresas estão a adotar processos e canais de modo a poderem colaborar em redes heterogéneas. Essas redes de empresas geralmente combinam mais de um canal e serviços. O que origina uma experiência multimarca, que ultrapassa claramente a experiência típica omnicanal. Nesta perspetiva, a rede heterogénea de empresas é uma experiência que envolve a combinação de uma tríade de diferentes elementos canaisserviços- organizações. O que está implícito é que as redes de negócios baseadas em tecnologia estão a revolucionar a indústria de serviços, embora pouco se tenha investigado. Porém, o movimento para estratégias omni-canal e de rede de negócios está longe de ser linear. Embora indesejáveis, as falhas de serviço omni-canal são inevitáveis, nesse sentido, a gestão de reclamações sempre foi considerada como uma ferramenta essencial para os gestores. Por esse facto, o trabalho incluiu ainda uma abordagem às falhas e recuperação de serviços num contexto omni-canal, bem como as debilidades da prestação de serviços associadas às novas redes baseadas em tecnologia, no contexto dos serviços financeiros. O estudo sugeriu que os clientes geralmente não estão conscientes dos atributos de recuperação de cada canal e são muitas vezes obrigados a procurar ajuda dos colaboradores de primeira linha, em particular quando a resposta nos canais virtuais não estão a reagir de acordo com as expectativas. Os clientes também já não estão dispostos a interagir com um grande número de canais, o que implica um elevado número de interações. Em alternativa, estão dispostos a aguardar por uma recuperação personalizada quando percebem que uma falha específica pode exigir um elevado nível de tomada de decisão. Essa tolerância ocorre quando os clientes percebem que uma empresa está a realizar todos os esforços necessários para a recuperação do serviço, de modo a garantir que a falha não se volte a repetir. Os resultados evidenciaram a importância da recuperação de soluções permanentes e da gestão de operações, para permitir processos de recuperação efetivos no contexto dos serviços omni-canal e de rede de negócio. No que diz respeito às redes de negócios baseadas em tecnologia, encontrámos quatro tipos de debilidades: a) barreiras à estratégia de migração de canais; b) barreiras à entrega automatizada de serviços; c) barreiras baseadas na integração do serviço; d) barreiras à padronização de operações em contextos de rede. Os gestores devem estar cientes das debilidades das redes de negócio baseadas em tecnologia, porque a sua (in)atividade pode afetar positivamente ou negativamente a imagem da marca de rede. A resolução das debilidades Tb2N permite que as organizações sejam mais sincronizadas e competitivas. Os resultados apresentados nesta tese revelam que as estratégias de canais múltiplos estão longe de estar ultrapassadas. Esta área de estudo requer atenção permanente da comunidade académica de modo a compreender a sua evolução, o aparecimento de novas estratégias e avançar a sua base de conhecimento. Para terminar, estimulamos o desenvolvimento de investigações futuras que permitam a realização de estudos empíricos dentro das redes de negócio baseadas em tecnologia, e que se foquem não só na recolha de dados de uma empresa, mas de toda a rede.The 64th article of the regulation of studies of the University of Aveiro considers the possibility of presenting an alternative to the doctoral thesis. This modality emphasis that “if the thesis is replaced by a set of scientific papers already published, they will have to form a coherent and relevant set for the scientific area of the doctorate (…)”. In this context, this thesis is based on 8 scientific publications, some already published, some accepted for publication, which include: oral communications in international conferences, articles in scientific journals and book chapters. The interest in the subject is coined with the growing development of the omni-channel strategy in the service industry where the banks have been pioneers. The objective is to contribute to the characterization and understanding of the implications of different strategies and configurations of the service channel strategies for the management of operations and, consequently, for the service quality and customer satisfaction. The thesis is divided into six chapters. It begins with two systematic reviews of literature: to analyze research opportunities and to disseminate research paths for multi-channel services. From here on, the methodological options are explained and so are the existing relationship between the industrial engineering and the social sciences. The empirical phase starts at this point as well as the analysis of the omni-channel services in the lens of technology-based business networks and complaint management. The literature review suggested, that, to date, the existing studies were predominantly formulated from a marketing perspective, the studies focused on process management and service operations are less represented. In this context, the work developed offers some contributions to the management of multiple channel service operations, to identify, characterize and consolidate different multiple channel strategies, and discuss principles for the alignment between multiple channel front-office strategies and operational levels of the organization. A qualitative multi-method methodology (i.e., systematic review and case study) using different methods and sources was adopted for data collection (e.g., interviews) as well for its analysis. The work also illustrated how the multimethod strategy offers multiple research possibilities that lead to reliable results for studies in the field of engineering. This strategy is generally balanced and integrates theoretical and empirical studies, which give greater emphasis to the dimensions of development, triangulation and complementarity. The empirical evidence analyzed in this thesis suggests that service delivery through multiple channels raises new organizational synergies and creates new operational challenges, by allowing the configuration of new service systems that offer customers the integration of different service and channels from different providers in a unique experience. The omni-channel service operations are now based on technology-based business networks, as companies are changing the way they compete with each other. Companies are adopting processes and channels so they can collaborate in heterogeneous networks. These business networks generally combine more than one channel and services, which creates a multi-brand experience, clearly going beyond the typical omni-channel experience. In this perspective, the heterogeneous network of companies is an experience that involves the combination of a triad of different elements channel-service-organization. What is implicit is that, although still unexplored, technology-based business networks are revolutionizing the service industry. Nevertheless, the move to omni-channel and business network strategies is far from linear. Although undesirable, the omni-channel service failures are inevitable, thus complaint management has always been considered an essential tool for managers. As a result, this work also includes an approach to service failures and recovery in an omni-channel context, as well as the weaknesses in the service delivery concerning new technology-based networks, in the context of financial services. The study suggested that clients are generally unaware of the recovery attributes of each channel and are often forced to seek help from the frontline employees, particularly when the recovery from the virtual channels are not in agreement with the expectations. Customers are not willing to interact with a large number of channels which would lead to a high number of interactions. Alternatively, customers are willing to wait for a personalized recovery when they realize that a specific failure may require a high level of decision-making. This tolerance occurs when customers realize that a company is making all the necessary efforts over the service recovery, in order to ensure that the failure will not be repeated again. The results revealed the importance of recovering permanent solutions and operations management, in order to allow effective recovery processes in the context of omni-channel and business network services. With regard to technology-based business networks, we found four types of weaknesses: a) barriers to channel migration strategies; b) barriers to automated service delivery; c) barriers to employee-technology service integration; d) barriers to operations standardization in network contexts. Managers should be aware of the weaknesses of technology-based business networks because their (in)activity can affect either positively or negatively network brand image. Solving Tb2N weaknesses allows organizations to be more synchronized and competitive. The results presented in this thesis reveal that the multiple-channel strategies are far from being overcome. This area of study requires permanent attention from the academic community in order to understand its evolution, the emergence of new strategies and to advance its knowledge base. Finally, we encourage the development of future research that allows the conduction of empirical studies within technology-based business networks, focusing not only on collecting data from one company but from the entire network.Programa Doutoral em Engenharia e Gestão Industria

Gender and Development: An Evaluation of World Bank Support, 2002-08

This evaluation reviews the World Bank's progress in gender integration from 2002 through 2008. Implementation of a 2001 gender strategy was initially strong, with integration into relevant projects peaking at 64% in 2003; but it declined between 2006 and 2008, due in part to the failure to implement an effective monitoring and evaluation system as outlined in the 2001 strategy

Technology management in the effective implementation of change

Organizational fitness is often achieved by making changes in business operations. These changes frequently involve the use of a new technology. The effective implementation of change is achieved by examining the benefits and challenges of technology management when making decisions. Important elements for consideration in technology management are technology evaluation, integration, planning, implementation, training, and change. A solution is proposed to combine and encompass all the elements of technology management to allow for the positive aspects and avoid the negative aspects of change implementation. The tool consists of principles to be addressed for each element

Integration of Instructional Technology by University Lecturers in Secondary School Teacher Education Programs in Zimbabwe: An Exploratory Study

In the context of continuous innovations in information and communication technology (ICT) and its impact on higher education, this descriptive study explores the state of instructional technology (IT) integration by university lecturers in pre-service secondary school teacher education programs in Zimbabwe. Specifically, the study examines how the lecturers conceptualize IT integration, how they integrate IT into their instruction, the support given by their institutions, and the constraints they face. The qualitative methodology used is basic or generic in nature (Merriam, 1998). Twenty-one lecturers in the colleges of education at 3 universities participated. The 3 data collection methods used are questionnaires, interviews and analysis of documents. Analysis of data was inductive and Miles and Huberman’s (1994) interactive data analysis model was employed. Findings show that the conceptualization of IT and its integration by the majority of the lecturers was largely as hardware in nature, with focus put on viewing technological tools as audiovisual aids. Lecturers with qualifications in educational technology (ET) viewed IT and its integration from what Schiffman (1995) calls a narrow systems view. Most of the lecturers used technological tools for illustrating key points in their lecture delivery and lecturers who used computers used these for lecture preparation. Lecturers’ computer proficiency and competencies were at the basic level in Internet usage, with little confidence shown in basic productivity software skills and in IT integration tasks and processes. The lecturers’ integration of IT was at the Entry and Adoption stages (Dwyer, Ringstaff and Sandholtz, 1991). Institutional support was characterized by poor availability and access to appropriate technological tools by both lecturers and students, and in the context of a hyper-inflationary operating environment, constraints ranged from lack of institutional funding, to the absence of an IT integration policy framework, and lack of appropriate initial and continuous staff development. This study is part of the genesis of instructional technology research in the Zimbabwean context. It is hoped that insights gleaned will influence policy, practice and future research. From a global perspective, this study will add to the limited knowledge and literature on instructional technology integration in “developing” and/or low-income countries like Zimbabwe

A review of the research literature relating to ICT and attainment

Summary of the main report, which examined current research and evidence for the impact of ICT on pupil attainment and learning in school settings and the strengths and limitations of the methodologies used in the research literature

Ontology-driven document enrichment: principles, tools and applications

In this paper, we present an approach to document enrichment, which consists of developing and integrating formal knowledge models with archives of documents, to provide intelligent knowledge retrieval and (possibly) additional knowledge-intensive services, beyond what is currently available using “standard” information retrieval and search facilities. Our approach is ontology-driven, in the sense that the construction of the knowledge model is carried out in a top-down fashion, by populating a given ontology, rather than in a bottom-up fashion, by annotating a particular document. In this paper, we give an overview of the approach and we examine the various types of issues (e.g. modelling, organizational and user interface issues) which need to be tackled to effectively deploy our approach in the workplace. In addition, we also discuss a number of technologies we have developed to support ontology-driven document enrichment and we illustrate our ideas in the domains of electronic news publishing, scholarly discourse and medical guidelines

Human factors aspects of control room design: Guidelines and annotated bibliography

A human factors analysis of the workstation design for the Earth Radiation Budget Satellite mission operation room is discussed. The relevance of anthropometry, design rules, environmental design goals, and the social-psychological environment are discussed