Using a Public Safety Radio Network for Information Negotiation between the Three-Tiered Command and Control Structure

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Using a Public Safety Radio Network for Information Negotiation between the Three-Tiered Command and Control Structure

Multi-organizational emergency operations require effective information sharing. Existing information management tools supporting a common operational picture mainly convey factual information. However, a growing body of literature recognizes the importance of sharing interpretations and implications among the involved stakeholders for building a common situational understanding. This study aims to identify information that must be negotiated across the strategic, tactical, and operational command and control structures (C2S) for developing common situational understanding. Based on 33 interviews and a survey of emergency management stakeholders, information elements on the semantic and pragmatic levels are identified. Further, the results suggest how to use a secure radio network for facilitating information sharing so that the involved organizations can monitor and negotiate important information. These insights provide important lessons for improving information sharing in the emergency management domain

Global communication part 2: the use of apparel product data management technology

Improving IT communication systems, through the evolution of future PDM applications, is a theme that has received attention due to its perceived benefits in developing global supply chain success factors. This paper discusses the developments and capabilities of such systems, found within global fashion supply chain relationships and environments. Major characteristics identified within the data suggest that PDM technology appears to be improving the speed of data transfer; however, evidence also suggest that the technologies are evolving quicker than consumer understanding, and arguably cost more to implement, train staff and maintain. Nevertheless, PDM technology increases communication efficiency and helps to enhance social economic and corporate development. The article discusses the findings and also presents the issues regarding human interaction; iconography, infrastructure necessity and individual communication enhancements using a variety of technology processes. PDM technology adoption is still a prevalent topic for the long-term developments of global strategy and communication amalgamation

E-learning-based competence development in logistics

Die Logistik ist ein hochgradig interdisziplinäres, komplexes Wissensgebiet und Kompetenzfeld, das sich kontinuierlich und sehr dynamisch weiterentwickelt. Dies erfordert nicht nur eine fortgesetzte Anpassung von Ausbildungsangeboten, sondern auch die systematische Weiterbildung von Logistikern, um Defizite in der beruflichen Handlungskompetenz zu vermeiden oder abzubauen. Lernen am Arbeitsplatz, eventuell in Verbindung mit E-Learning, erscheint als geeigneter Weg, die Entwicklung von beruflicher Handlungskompetenz auch in der Logistik zu unterstützen. Der Beitrag stellt verschiedene Ansätze für die Kompetenzermittlung und –entwicklung speziell in der Logistik dar und leitet Schlussfolgerungen zu den heutigen Kompetenzanforderungen bei Logistikpraktikern ab. Dies bildet die Basis für einen Handlungsrahmen, der im EU-geförderten Projekt lot4eng.com entstanden ist und hilft, das logistische Kompetenzniveau einer Person zu spezifizieren, geeignete Lerneinheiten zu seiner Steigerung vorzuschlagen und die individuelle Kompetenzentwicklung zu unterstützen. Im Weiteren wird die Gestaltung von E-Learning zum Füllen der lot4eng.com-Plattform diskutiert, bevor Erfahrungen aus der Projektarbeit und Schlussfolgerungen für die weitere Arbeit abgeleitet werden. Damit möchte der Beitrag die laufende Forschung dazu, wie lebenslanges Lernen unterstützt werden kann, anreichern.The logistics field of knowledge and professional competence is highly multidisciplinary and complex but also continuously and very dynamically developing. This does not only require constant updating of educational programmes but also systematic training of logistics professionals in order to avoid or reduce professional competence gaps. Workplace learning amongst others in combination with e-learning methodology seems to be an appropriate way to support professional competence development in logistics, too. The paper presents some research aspects particularly related to logistics competence profiling and development and derives conclusions on nowadays competence requirements with logistics professionals. This forms the basis for introducing a framework to help in specifying a person’s level of logistics competence, recommending suitable learning units and supporting individual competence development as it results from the EU-funded lot4eng.com project. E-learning design to populate the lot4eng.com portal is discussed before lessons learned and conclusions on further work are derived. With this the paper wants to contribute to ongoing research on how to foster lifelong learning

Brokering between heads and hearts: an analysis of designing for social change

This paper describes a fluid and responsive design process identified among certain practitioners involved in solving social problems or inspiring social change. Their practice is both user-centred and participative in its approach and addresses the shortcomings of many top-down initiatives. These people work tactically to weave together policy knowledge, funding opportunities, local initiative and ideas for improving social and environmental conditions, acting as connectors, activists and facilitators in different contexts at different times. Although their activities are recognisably related to more conventional designing practices, the materials they use in finding solutions are unusual in that they may include the beneficiaries themselves and other features of the social structure in which they are effecting change. We present an ethnographic study of practices in designing that focuses on social initiatives rather than the tangible products or systems that might support them. We explore the how design practices map to the process of winning local people's commitment to projects with a social flavour. To situate the discussion in a political context we draw on de Certeau’s distinction between strategic and tactical behaviour and look at how our informants occupy a space as mediators between groups with power and a sense of agency and those without. Keywords: Social Change; Ethnographic Action Research; Discourse Analysis; Designing In The Wild</p

Performing Graffiti: The Use of Electronically and Digitally Modified Graffiti in Activist Art Practices

The role of the artist has expanded. Artworks increasingly occupy spaces not traditionally allocated for artistic practice. The materials and methods used for creative expression, along with the use of new spaces for the production, exhibition, and distribution of artistic activity work together to break down previous notions of the function of art. An example of a new mode for art practice may be seen in an increased use of technology by artists. Although artists have addressed technology and mechanization as subjects of their work since at least the Industrial Revolution, new artworks employ technology not only as a theme within their practice, but take advantage of technology increasingly ubiquitous presence. Digital and mechanical materials are incorporated into works that seek to encourage audience participation and promote community oriented interaction. Likewise, scientists and engineers are increasingly employing design strategies in the display and organization of data and in the construction of engaging models and mockups. An increasing number of artist are including technology within their artistic practice to address larger social and political issues, using technology as both a material and a symbol. This paper seeks to illustrate these new trends in art-making, focusing on works that meld graffiti with electronic and digital media as a means to initiate public interaction. The specific projects discussed, Laser Tag,\u27 by the Graffiti Research Lab, \u27Graffiti Writer,\u27 by the Institute for Applied Autonomy, and \u27Grafedia,\u27 by John Geraci, all uniquely combine graffiti and technology in works aimed at facilitating the artists\u27 social activist goals. Each project provides an example of artists and collectives working within the tradition of political art but by means of new methods and a variety of mediums. Laser Tag\u27s use of laser and projection technology, Graffiti Writer\u27s robotics, and Grafedia\u27s employment of the Internet illustrate the variety of methods explored in this form of art activism. These artists use graffiti and electronic and digital technologies both as materials and symbols of the powerful and the powerless to critique institutional, corporate, and governmental control. Due to the transformation of graffiti and technology, combined with an interest in initiating interaction as a means for social activism, the works discussed inhabit a unique realm that is not wholly dictated by art, technology, or activist practices, but rather they occupy a space that is an amalgamation of these distinct areas akin to performance art.\u2

Smart machines in day-to-day financial management: a launch strategy for a personal financial adviser App in the UK Millennials market

Starting from Novabase’s challenge to launch in the UK Millennials a personal financial advisor mobile application, this work project aims to build a planning model to frame a business side of a launch strategy for mobile application in similar market and category. This study culminates on the design of SPOSTAC planning model. The created framework is intended to effectively and efficiently plan a launch strategy, being structured based on seven sequential elements: Situation, Product, Objectives, Strategy, Tactics, Action, and Control

The City is the Factory: New Solidarities and Spatial Strategies in an Urban Age

[Excerpt] Urban public spaces, from the streets and squares of Buenos Aires to Zuccotti Park in New York City, have become the emblematic sites of contentious politics in the twenty-first century. As the contributors to The City Is the Factory argue, this resurgent politics of the square is itself part of a broader shift in the primary locations and targets of popular protest from the workplace to the city. This shift is due to an array of intersecting developments: the concentration of people, profit, and social inequality in growing urban areas; the attacks on and precarity faced by unions and workers\u27 movements; and the sense of possibility and actual leverage afforded by local politics and the tactical use of urban space. Thus, the city —from the town square to the banlieu—is becoming like the factory of old: a site of production and profit-making as well as new forms of solidarity, resistance, and social reimagining.We see examples of the city as factory in new place-based political alliances, as workers and the unemployed find common cause with right to the city struggles. Demands for jobs with justice are linked with demands for the urban commons—from affordable housing to a healthy environment, from immigrant rights to urban citizenship and the right to streets free from both violence and racially biased policing. The case studies and essays in The City Is the Factory provide descriptions and analysis of the form, substance, limits, and possibilities of these timely struggles