Human Resource Information Systems for Competitive Advantage: Interviews with Ten Leaders

[Excerpt] Increasingly, today\u27s organizations use computer technology to manage human resources (HR). Surveys confirm this trend (Richards-Carpenter, 1989; Grossman and Magnus, 1988; Human Resource Systems Professionals 1988; KPMGPeat Marwick, 1988). HR professionals and managers routinely have Personnel Computers (PCs) or computer terminals on their desks or in their departments. HR computer applications, once confined to payroll and benefit domains, now encompass incentive compensation, staffing, succession planning, and training. Five years ago, we had but a handful of PC-based software applications for HR management. Today, we find a burgeoning market of products spanning a broad spectrum of price, sophistication, and quality (Personnel Journal, 1990). Top universities now consider computer literacy a basic requirement for students of HR, and many consulting firms and universities offer classes designed to help seasoned HR professionals use computers in their work (Boudreau, 1990). Changes in computer technology offer expanding potential for HR management (Business Week, 1990; Laudon and Laudon, 1988)

Institutions for Climate Adaptation: An Inventory of Institutions in the Netherlands that are Relevant for Climate Change

One of the goals of project IC12, a research project of the Climate changes Spatial Planning programme, is to assess if the formal institutions operating in the Netherlands are improving or hampering adaptive capacity. In order to answer the research question, the most important documents referring to those institutions need to be evaluated. This document presents an initial inventory of these adaptation institutions – i.e. policy plans, laws and directives, reports and other documents that seemed relevant to the question at hand

Serbia - public sector accounting review : report on the enhancement of public sector financial reporting

The government’s public financial management (PFM) Reform Program 2016-2020 foresees the gradual transition of public sector financial reporting from a cash basis to an accrual basis of accounting and the application of International Public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSAS). This will significantly improve the quality of financial information and should enable better informed decision-making, more efficient use of public funds and resources and improved fiscal performance. This Report on the Enhancement of Public Sector Financial Reporting is one output of the Serbia Public Sector Accounting Reform Technical Assistance project funded by the Swiss State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO) through the Strengthening Accountability and Fiduciary Environment (SAFE) Trust Fund under the Public Sector Accounting and Reporting Program (PULSAR) which provides support for the development and implementation of public sector accounting standards. This report supports the development of a plan towards that goal by assessing the institutional framework for public sector accounting as well as the gap between Serbian public sector generally accepted accounting principles (PS GAAP) and IPSAS

Coping with Extreme Events: Institutional Flocking

Recent measurements in the North Atlantic confirm that the thermohaline circulation driving the Gulf Stream has come to a stand. Oceanographic monitoring over the last 50 years already showed that the circulation was weakening. Under the influence of the large inflow of melting water in Northern Atlantic waters during last summer, it has now virtually stopped. Consequently, the KNMI and the RIVM estimate the average . In this essay we will explore how such a new risk profile affects the distribution of risks among societal groups, and the way in which governing institutions need to adapt in order to be prepared for situations of rapid but unknown change. The next section will first introduce an analytical perspective, building upon the Risk Society thesis and a proposed model of ‘institutional flocking’.temperature to decrease by 3°C in the next 15 years

Human Resource Management in New Jersey State Government

In 2005, the State of New Jersey Department of Personnel commissioned the Heldrich Center to study the critical human resource management issues confronting New Jersey state government. This report highlights the study's findings including: the human resource management function must be elevated to a position of primacy in state government, the state must reengineer the Department of Personnel into an effective human resource management agency with a broader mission than overseeing transactions and compliance with statutes and regulations, and the state must support its human resource function with adequate staff resources

Partial pooling by independent firms with allocation according to contribution to pool

We consider two firms which pool some of their inventory. The pool is created by the firms' contributions, and a firm's entitlement for an allocation from the pool (if needed) is a function of its contribution. Transshipment from the pool is costly, but the firms can benefit from reduced risk through inventory sharing using the pool. We analyze the resulting non-cooperative game. We prove existence of a Nash equilibrium and compare it to a model with centralized control. An appropriate compensation cost for using the other firms contribution to the pool can induce the retailers to achieve centralized solutions. We also compare the optimal partial pooling strategy to the special cases of no pooling and complete pooling and discuss situations where it is likely that one of the special cases will be optimal. Numerical results confirm that in the prevalent practice of partial pooling the retailers can achieve higher expected profits than under no pooling or complete pooling and that there is a significant difference between a setting with independent players and a model of central control

The Country-specific Organizational and Information Architecture of ERP Systems at Globalised Enterprises

The competition on the market forces companies to adapt to the changing environment. Most recently, the economic and financial crisis has been accelerating the alteration of both business and IT models of enterprises. The forces of globalization and internationalization motivate the restructuring of business processes and consequently IT processes. To depict the changes in a unified framework, we need the concept of Enterprise Architecture as a theoretical approach that deals with various tiers, aspects and views of business processes and different layers of application, software and hardware systems. The paper outlines a wide-range theoretical background for analyzing the re-engineering and re-organization of ERP systems at international or transnational companies in the middle-sized EU member states. The research carried out up to now has unravelled the typical structural changes, the models for internal business networks and their modification that reflect the centralization, decentralization and hybrid approaches. Based on the results obtained recently, a future research program has been drawn up to deepen our understanding of the trends within the world of ERP systems.Information System; ERP; Enterprise Resource Planning; Enterprise Architecture; Globalization; Centralization; Decentralization; Hybrid

Employee Compensation and Advanced Manufacturing Technology

[Excerpt] The globalization of product markets has intensified competition in an increasingly wide array of industries, including automobiles, consumer electronics,steel, and computer chips to name just a few. In manufacturing as a whole during the last thirty years, productivity growth in the U.S. has lagged significantly behind that of Japan, Germany, Sweden, and many other industrialized countries. For example, between 1960 and 1985, the annual growth in manufacturing productivity (output per hour) was 2.7 percent in the U.S. compared with 8.0 percent in Japan. Unless this trend can be turned around, U.S. companies will find it increasingly difficult to compete in the world market