The Quality of Work Life: An Empirical Study

Merged with duplicate record (10026.1/2769) on 03.01.2017 by CS (TIS)This research examines the quality of work life in a selection of pharmaceutical companies in Egypt. It aims to test the relationships between the employees' perceptions of their quality of work life and; their perceptions of the degree of participation in decisionmaking available to them, their perceptions of their level of job satisfaction, their perceptions of their level of affective, continuance, and normative commitment, and the ownership form of the company. It uses a sample of 1270 employees in three different ownership forms; public, private, and multinational pharmaceutical companies in Egypt. The total sample size is proportionately distributed (i. e. the actual 'sample size has been distributed between the three ownership forms based on the percentage of employees in each ownership form to the total size of the population) among' , the three, forms Of ownership (public companies 889, private companies = 165, and multinational companies = 216 employee). The number of employees surveyed in each company has also been proportionately distributed. The perceptions of the targeted employees are surveyed using a questionnaire that contains 81 items. The collected data are analysed using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) programme. The findings of the study indicate that there is a significant positive relationship between the employees' perceptions of their quality of work life and; their perceptions of the degree of participation in decision-making available to them, and their perceptions of their level of job satisfaction. A significant positive and partial relationship is found between the employees' perceptions of their quality of work life and their perceptions of III their level of affective, continuance, and normative commitment, as it is expected, by the researcher, that the employees' perceptions of their quality of work life may positively affect their perceptions of their level of affective, continuance, and normative commitment through affecting their perceptions of their level of job satisfaction. A significant relationship is found between the employees' perceptions of their quality of work life and the ownership form of the company. The results also indicate that employees perceive their quality of work life to be greater or better in the multinational pharmaceutical companies than are the employees' perceptions of their quality of work life in both the private and public pharmaceutical companies in Egypt. Furthermore, the results indicate that the employees' perceptions of their quality of work life in the private phan-naceutical companies are better than the employees' perceptions of their quality of work life in the public phan-naceutical companies in Egypt. A set of quality of work life criteria that seems important to employees in the pharmaceutical companies in Egypt, and which might therefore be productively addressed by employers/organisations has been identified. In addition, some implications for HR practices in Egypt have been raised and discussed. Finally, a set of models that could clarify the interactive relationship between the variables that have been investigated in this research in the Egyptian context has been developed. It is suggested that the set of quality of work life criteria as well as the models might fon-n the basis for future researches of this type

Law & Technology - E.Tec Yearbook

This inaugural volume is dedicated to an area of current relevance with undisputable economic, social and legal importance: Law and Technology. The texts now published have in common the exploitation of legal problems arising from technological innovations - in particular digital transformation, artificial intelligence and robotics - by discussing and presenting solutions for the challenges posed in different areas of law, explored in E.Tec research strands: industry 4.0, artificial intelligence and robotics, Health Law and Governance.Esta publicação inaugural está dedicada a uma área de relevância atual com importância económica, social e jurídica incontestável: o Direito e a Tecnologia. Os textos agora publicados exploram os problemas jurídicos decorrentes das inovações tecnológicas, especialmente a transformação digital, a inteligência artificial e a robótica, discutindo e apresentando soluções para os desafios impostos nos diferentes domínios do Direito, explorados nos eixos temáticos do E.Tec: indústria 4.0, inteligência artificial e robótica, Direito da saúde e governação

Contemporary global challenges in geopolitics, security policy and world economy

This is the second time that the International PhD Conference has been organized by the International Relations Multidisciplinary Doctoral School of Corvinus University of Budapest. We hope this is a sign that we have created a tradition, and that the conference will be organized in the future as well. As in the previous year, most of the presentations given at this year’s conference will again be published in a collected volume in the form of edited studies, with the aim of promoting the publication performance of PhD students.The comprehensive profile of the Doctoral School, the diversity of its three subprograms – International and Security Studies, World Economy and Geopolitics – is reflected in the various topics of the studies in this volume. These include e.g. security and defence policy, challenges the world economy is facing nowadays, the institutions and policies of the European Union, the emerging powers of Asia, as well as sustainability and other important, highly relevant issues. The regions examined in the studies range from the EU through the Arab world to Latin America and Asia, and countries such as the United States, Russia, Ukraine, China, India, Jordan and Tunisia are analysed, to name just a few.The multidisciplinary nature of the Doctoral School has long been expressed in its name, mainly due to the fact that it is entitled to award degrees in two disciplines (economics and political science). Multidisciplinarity is also manifested in the diversity of the topics of this volume. Not only multidisciplinarity, but also interdisciplinarity, the presence of “frontiers” in the field of mutually interdependent disciplines can be traced in the articles, as the authors refer to e.g. law, history, security policy as well as theories of international relations

Coursework and coursework assessment in the GCSE : a multi-case ethnography

This thesis is an empirical examination of coursework and coursework assessment in the General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE). The research was conducted using the condensed fieldwork methods of multi-site case study, and fits broadly within the ethnographic research tradition. Case studies of the effects of coursework were made in six schools, across three different counties and two metropolitan districts. Examination texts, it is argued in the thesis, are open to interpretation and re-interpretation at different moments of use. Textual reading, moreover, is only part of the policy process - construction, reading, meaning formulation, meaning re-formulation and implementation. Texts allow multiple readings, although some texts are more 'readerly' than 'writerly'. These sources of meaning compete with previous examination technologies and with other discursive forms. They are practical documents and they are guided by specific sets of ideological meaning. They seek to provide apparatus for differentiating between candidates, and they play their part in the creation of individual subjectivities. A typology of teachers' attitudes towards GCSE coursework is developed, and these are classified as conformist, adaptive, oppositional, ritualistic, transformative and non-conformist. Teachers' initial reading of GCSE texts or their initial confrontation with the ideas behind the new examination draws upon both those internalized rules which actors reproduce in their day to day working lives and those structural resources which position actors within set frameworks. Those elements of structure that are relevant to the matter in hand condition, but do not determine, actors' responses. Initial textual readings give way to subsequent interpretations and reinterpretations of coursework processes, and all the various readings are implicated in the implementation and reimplementation of coursework strategies. This cycle of activity at different moments and in different guises influences actual practice. An account is given of the way those structural and interactional influences impact upon initial textual readings within one of the case-study schools. Curriculum policy and curriculum practice within specific sites is always the result of contestation. Within institutions that devolve power and decision-making, outcomes are never all the same; that contestation will have different outcomes at different moments and at different places. Further to this, five sets of polarized concepts - weak/strong knowledge framing, formative/summative modes of assessment, the production of reliable/unreliable assessment data, limited/extended amounts and types of teacher interventions in coursework processes and normal/irregular classroom practices - are developed to help analyse issues such as the influence of the GCSE on classroom practice, integration of assessment and curriculum, pupil-teacher relations, pedagogy and pupil motivation. Finally the threads of the argument that has been developed in this thesis are drawn together to show how dislocated relationships between examination policy texts and realisation have consequences for examination comparability, educational disadvantage, and the production and reproduction of educational knowledge in schools

Work in progress?: 14-16 year old boys' experience of vocational education

This research arose from my professional concern, as a teacher, in boys’ underachievement in secondary schools, an issue that has occupied a central position in educational debate in recent years. My study focused on how the 14-19 curriculum changes, introduced by the last Labour Government, might have some enduring relevance to the debate on boys and achievement. The first two research questions considered perspectives on achievement and interventions aiming to benefit boys while the final question related to experiences of the 14-19 curriculum. Review of the literature led me to employ a critical theoretical framework The methodology used was qualitative in nature in which I adopted a post-modern interpretivist perspective. Data was collected through semi-structured interviews with young people and with their teachers in a number of English schools and colleges with some accompanying policy document review. Semiotic analysis was also employed to examine the use and implications of language and how this can alter perspectives of all those involved in education. Analysis of the data related to the key categories underpinning the research questions and using a methodology informed by grounded theory. Key issues arising related to the concepts of ‘choice’, ‘practicality’ and ‘being treated as adults’. In conducting the research I was most interested in finding out whether and how policy intentions can translate into practical outcomes and how the needs and voices of young people can be articulated for their benefit and for that of the wider society. My findings suggest that the issue of underachievement is systemic within the mainstream educational curriculum with a gap existing between what young people think they need and what policy makers perceive to be required. I propose that there is need for renewed attention specific to learners aged 14-16 which will enable the development of skills and enhance life choices so that achievement is better understood, inclusive and accessible

Critical Alliances

Critical Alliances argues that late-Victorian and modernist feminist authors saw in literary representations of female collaboration an opportunity to produce new gender and economic roles for women. It is not often that one thinks of female allegiances – such as kinship networks, cultural inheritance, or lesbian marriage – as influencing the marketplace; nor does one often think of economic models when theorizing feminist cooperation. S. Brooke Cameron suggest that, through their representations of female partnership, feminist authors such as Virginia Woolf, Olive Schreiner, George Egerton, Amy Levy, and Michael Field redefined the gendered marketplace and, with it, women’s professional opportunities. Interdisciplinary at its core and using a contextual approach, Critical Alliances selects cultural texts and theories relevant to each writer’s particular intervention in the marketplace. Chapters look at how different forms of feminist collaboration enabled women to stake their claim to one of the many, emergent professions at the turn of the century

Animals in Our Midst: The Challenges of Co-existing with Animals in the Anthropocene

This Open Access book brings together authoritative voices in animal and environmental ethics, who address the many different facets of changing human-animal relationships in the Anthropocene. As we are living in complex times, the issue of how to establish meaningful relationships with other animals under Anthropocene conditions needs to be approached from a multitude of angles. This book offers the reader insight into the different discussions that exist around the topics of how we should understand animal agency, how we could take animal agency seriously in farms, urban areas and the wild, and what technologies are appropriate and morally desirable to use regarding animals. This book is of interest to both animal studies scholars and environmental ethics scholars, as well as to practitioners working with animals, such as wildlife managers, zookeepers, and conservation biologists

Critical Alliances

Critical Alliances argues that late-Victorian and modernist feminist authors saw in literary representations of female collaboration an opportunity to produce new gender and economic roles for women. It is not often that one thinks of female allegiances – such as kinship networks, cultural inheritance, or lesbian marriage – as influencing the marketplace; nor does one often think of economic models when theorizing feminist cooperation. S. Brooke Cameron suggest that, through their representations of female partnership, feminist authors such as Virginia Woolf, Olive Schreiner, George Egerton, Amy Levy, and Michael Field redefined the gendered marketplace and, with it, women’s professional opportunities. Interdisciplinary at its core and using a contextual approach, Critical Alliances selects cultural texts and theories relevant to each writer’s particular intervention in the marketplace. Chapters look at how different forms of feminist collaboration enabled women to stake their claim to one of the many, emergent professions at the turn of the century

Religious Individualisation

This volume brings together key findings of the research project ‘Religious Individualisation in Historical Perspective’ at the Max Weber Centre for Advanced Cultural and Social Studies. Combining a wide range of disciplinary approaches, methods and theories, the volume assembles over 50 contributions that explore and compare processes of religious individualisation in Asia, the Mediterranean, and Europe from antiquity to the recent past