Determinants of firm-size

Overzicht van theoretische factoren die belangrijk zijn bij het verklaren van schaalgrootte van bedrijven en verschillen in schaalgrootte tussen vergelijkbare bedrijven. Naast de theoretische factoren worden enkele relevante trends beschreven en wordt gekeken naar de impact van deze trends op de mechanismen die schaalgrootte beïnvloeden. Terwijl het aantal overnames en fusies de laatste jaren sterk is toegenomen, is ook het aantal startende bedrijven sterk gegroeid. Per saldo is het gemiddelde bedrijf in Nederland licht in omvang afgenomen. De mechanismen die schaalgrootte en verdeling van schaalgrootte beïnvloeden, zijn bekeken op het niveau van de bedrijven zelf en op het niveau van sectoren. Bij het bedrijfsniveau gaat het bijvoorbeeld om schaal- en scopevoordelen, transactiekosten, ?agency-costs? en de levenscyclus van bedrijven. Mechanismen die belangrijk zijn op het niveau van sectoren of clusters zijn bijvoorbeeld externe schaal- en scope-effecten en netwerkeffecten. Overigens is er veel overlap tussen al deze mechanismen. Trends die belangrijk zijn voor schaalgrootte zijn met name globalisering, technologische ontwikkeling en deregulering.

Going for Growth; a Theoretical and Policy Framework

This paper introduces scenario planning as a tool to explore plausible developments for SMEs in the Netherlands until 2040. Globalization has resulted in the emergence of an increasingly borderless society with greater unrestricted movement of information, travel, and currency between countries. As policy and technological developments in the past few decades have spurred increases in cross-border trade, investment, and migration, new policy approaches in the economic, political, environmental, and social sphere will be necessary. On the national level, SMEs are acknowledged to play an important role in the economy serving as agent of change by their entrepreneurial activity, being the source of considerable innovative activity, stimulating industry evolution and creating an important share of the newly generated jobs. Entrepreneurship should therefore be promoted, but on a national level, since global development takes places in stages. Government policy, it is believed, can play a considerable role in facilitating entrepreneurship on a national scale. There is however great uncertainty on the scale of future bottlenecks and the economic conditions under which SMEs will need to develop. Scenarios can help map out possible changes and what effect they may have on national welfare.DYNREG

E-exchange and the Boundary between Households and Organizations

The new information and communication technology, ICT, induces households to take over tasks from firms and government agencies, using tools and systems provided by these very same organizations. The result is often joint production activities. We argue that the importance of ICT for the exchange process between households and organizations is underestimated by only considering the consequences for the last stage of the process, i.e., the final purchase of goods and services. Our analysis of household behavior utilizes a modified version of Gary Becker’s model of the household as a combined producer-consumer.internet information, e-exchange, household production, co-production, household power, exit/voice

The Problems and Prospects of New Public Sphere for Global Civil Society

Information and communication technologies (ICTS) have revolutionized almost every aspect of life particularly it has created a new global public sphere by providing endless list of tools for global communication thereby establishing a new global society with novel norms and mundane issues. This paper is an effort to review the state of affairs in new public sphere with a focus on the digital tools under use, their role in creating the global society and the threats and opportunities available for the international citizens for behaving effectively to utilize the opportunities and manage threats to the maximum. The paper explores interlinks between the digital gadgets, emerging global public sphere and the mundane issues emanating from this situation. The paper ends with a theoretical model constructed out of the themes floating across the review and analysis

Perceived Competence of Nigerian Secondary Schools Teachers in the Use of Information and Communication Technology (ICT).

One of the numerous goals of Nigeria as a nation is to aggressively promote ICT as an instrument of mass education, growth and development (NEEDS, 2004). There is no doubt that teachers are indispensable for successful teaching and learning with ICT and their competence in the use of ICT is crucial to successful implementation of contemporary school curriculum. This study therefore examined teachers’ perceived competence in the use of ICTs with respect to computer basics, use of the internet, and their ability to use simple softwares. A research question and three hypotheses were raised for the descriptive survey study. The instrument used for the study was the ICT Competence Questionnaire (ICTCQ). Simple random sampling technique was used to select 300 public secondary school teachers in the four geo-political zones in Ogun State. Frequency count and percentages were used for the research question while chi square was used in analyzing the hypotheses at 0.05 alpha level. Findings indicated that; Most teachers in Ogun State secondary schools do not have the required competence in ICT.Those teachers in the humanities have more competence in ICT than teachers in the sciences. Academic qualification of a teacher does not have any effect on teacher’s competence in ICT. Teachers’ competence in the use of ICT is not influenced by their teaching experience. It is then evident that the present crop of teachers needs to be retrained to improve their competence in ICT usage. Consequently training of teachers in ICT through seminars and workshops organized by state government should be regulated to termly schedule as against occasional exercise that is prevalent presently. The government should increase the supply of computer system to schools and also make provisions for their maintenance. Internet facilities should also be put in place for schools by the government and credit facilities can also be provided for teachers by the government to encourage individual teacher to have personal computer. KEYWORDS: ICT Competence, Subject Specialization, Educational Qualification, Teaching Experience

Mass customization of teaching and learning in organizations

In search of methods that improve the efficiency of teaching and training in organizations, several authors point out that mass customization (MC) is a principle that covers individual needs of knowledge and skills and, at the same time, limits the development costs of customized training to those of mass training. MC is proven and established in the economic sector, and shows high potential for continuing education, too. The paper explores this potential and proposes a multidisciplinary, pragmatic approach to teaching and training in organizations. The first section of the paper formulates four design principles of MC deduced from an examination of economics literature. The second section presents amit™, a frame for mass customized training, designed according to the principles presented in the first section. The evaluation results encourage the further development and use of mass customized training in continuing education, and offer suggestions for future research

Trading Virtual Legacies (Management of Tradition from Alexandria to Internet)

Will the reconstructed library of Alexandria prevent a forthcoming clash of civilizations? Inventing and re-inventing traditions requires total quality management and multiple networking in shifting alliances in the information space. Stock exchange of cultural forms has long abandoned the golden standards of Enlightenment and follows a theory of cultural relativity and an international political economy of attention.Virtual legacies;cultural relativity;detraditionalization;political economy of attention;re-enchantment

Learners in a Changing Learning Landscape: Reflections from an Instructional Design Perspective

Van Merriënboer, J. J. G., & Stoyanov, S. (2008). Learners in a changing learning landscape: Reflections from an instructional design perspective. In J. Visser & M. Visser-Valfrey (Eds.), Learners in a changing learning landscape: Reflections from a dialogue on new roles and expectations (pp. 69-90). Dordrecht, The Netherlands: Springer.Both learners and teachers find themselves in a learning landscape that is rapidly changing, along with fast societal and technological developments. This paper discusses the new learning landscape from an instructional design perspective. First, with regard to what is learned, people more than ever need flexible problem-solving and reasoning skills allowing them to deal with new, unfamiliar problem situations in their professional and everyday life. Second, with regard to the context in which learning takes place, learning in technology-rich, informal and professional 24/7 settings is becoming general practice. And third, with regard to the learners themselves, they can more often be characterized as lifelong learners who are mature, bring relevant prior knowledge, and have very heterogeneous expectations and perceptions of learning. High-quality instructional design research should focus on the question which instructional methods and media-method combinations are effective, efficient and appealing in this new learning landscape. Some innovative instructional methods that meet this requirement are discussed

GETsoft: am Anfang eines "Bildungsnetzwerks der Zukunft"?

Der vorliegende Artikel stellt die Einsatzmöglichkeiten von neuen Medien in der elektrotechnischen Grundlagenausbildung vor. Es werden allgemeine Lösungsansätze für ingenieurtechnische Herausforderungen beim Einsatz von E-Learning in der Lehre in konkreten Konzepten und Produkten präsentiert. Es werden nachhaltige Entwicklungen und die Anwendungsmöglichkeiten von Kooperationen in einem transnationalen Netzwerk gezeigt. Beispiele aus dem Hochschulalltag veranschaulichen die umgesetzten Konzepte und Ideen und geben neue Impulse für Verbesserungen des Lernens und Lehrens entsprechend den technischen Möglichkeiten. Didaktische und organisatorische Überlegungen bei der Nutzung von kooperativen Lernumgebungen und wieder verwendbaren Lernobjekten spiegeln das aktuelle Bild der E-Learning Diskussion wieder. Im praktischen Einsatz spielen die Entwicklungen im Community Building, von webbasierten Testen und Auswerten sowie der intelligenten Lernerunterstützung eine bedeutende Rolle. (DIPF/Orig.