Transparency in the Pork Supply Chain: Comparing China and The Netherlands

We present a research plan to assess the value of transparency by comparing pork supply chains in The Netherlands and China.We assume that chain performance depends on chain configuration, which depends on societal context and its associated quality control institutions. We define chain configuration in terms of structure and transparency. In order to be able to assess the influence of societal context and its quality control institutions on chain configuration and performance, we compare two countries that have very different societies. Ultimately, our goal is to be able to indicate whether a certain chain configuration suits all, or whether chain configuration should be tailored to societal context.Pork supply chain, societal context, transparency, information exchange, chain configuration, Agribusiness, Industrial Organization,

Toolbox value creation final report (WP-101)

This document contains the deliverables of TransForum project WP-101, Toolbox Value Creation. Its contents allow users to use a summary analysis toolbox made for charting and improving value chains in the areas of People, Planet and Profit. Features of the toolbox are: Guidance in organizing a quick scan and change process. Create summary graphic overview of the materials balance of a production network. Model People and Planet and Profit separately but in conjunction. Allow flexible inclusion or omission of actors, processes and products. Analyze value of improvements

Toolbox Value Creation Handbook : Charting People, Planet and Profit in Value Chains

To create a sustainable society companies need new data and information regarding e.g. environmental and societal impacts of new products or processes are necessary, but these are often missing. Information systems can play an important role here and many tools are already developed. It became clear that one crucial tool was lacking: One that (a) integrates People, Planet, and Profit value (b) focuses on the whole production chains and (c) allows flexible data input. A new tool, QChain, was born. QChain is meant for anybody who works on sustainability issues, aiming to create a sustainable production chain. In practice this will often be policy makers, champions, consultants and network coordinators that work on a sustainability problem or valorisation issues. The tool is especially useful in organizations that feel the need or want to create the need to not only focus on profit, but also reckon with people and planet value – their licence to produce. QChain is a drawing tool that supports shared value creation for sustainable production chains

Employee Stock Ownership and Financial Performance in European Countries: The Moderating Effects of Uncertainty Avoidance and Social Trust

This study investigates how the effect of employee stock ownership on financial performance may hinge on the diverse cultural and societal contexts of European countries. Based on agency and national culture theories, we hypothesize that the positive relationship between employee stock ownership and return on assets (ROA) is stronger in those nations with lower uncertainty avoidance and higher social trust. Using a multisource, time‐lagged, large‐scale dataset of 1,741 firms from 21 countries in Europe, our multilevel, random coefficient modeling analysis found evidence for these hypotheses, suggesting that uncertainty avoidance and social trust serve as important contextual cues in predicting the linkage between employee stock ownership and financial performance. Our supplemental analysis with distinction between the managerial and nonmanagerial employee stock ownership further indicates managerial employee stock ownership has a direct positive effect on ROA. Although nonmanagerial employee stock ownership had a nonsignificant association with ROA, the relationship was positive and significant when uncertainty avoidance was low and social trust was high. This research contributes to the existing literature by illuminating some of the contextual influences altering the effectiveness of employee stock ownership. Our findings also offer practical suggestions for effectively using employee stock ownership

The Role of Relapse Prevention and Goal Setting in Training Transfer Enhancement

This article reviews the effect of two post-training transfer interventions (relapse prevention [RP] and goal setting [GS]) on trainees’ ability to apply skills gained in a training context to the workplace. Through a review of post-training transfer interventions literature, the article identifies a number of key issues that remain unresolved or underexplored, for example, the inconsistent results on the impact of RP on transfer of training, the lack of agreement on which GS types are more efficient to improve transfer performance, the lack of clarity about the distinction between RP and GS, and the underlying process through which these two post-training transfer interventions influence transfer of training. We offer some recommendations to overcome these problems and also provide guidance for future research on transfer of training

Cross‐cultural differences in eyewitness memory reports

Increasingly, investigators conduct interviews with eyewitnesses from different cultures. The culture in which people have been socialised can impact the way they encode, remember, and report information about their experiences. We examined whether eyewitness memory reports of mock witnesses from collectivistic (sub-Saharan Africa) and individualistic (Northern Europe) cultures differed regarding quantity and quality of central and background details reported. Mock witnesses (total N = 200) from rural Ghana, urban Ghana, and the Netherlands were shown stimuli scenes of crimes in Dutch and Ghanaian settings and provided free and cued recalls. Individualistic culture mock witnesses reported the most details, irrespective of detail type. For each cultural group, mock witnesses reported more correct central details when crime was witnessed in their own native setting than a non-native setting, though for different recall domains. The findings provide insight for legal and investigative professionals as well as immigration officials eliciting memory reports in cross-cultural contexts

The influence of the cultural climate of the training environment on physicians' self-perception of competence and preparedness for practice

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>In current supervisory practice, the learning environment in which the training of specialist registrars (SpRs) takes place is important. Examples of such learning environments are the hospital settings and/or geographical locations where training occurs. Our objective was to investigate whether the cultural climate of different learning environments influences physicians' perceived level of competence and preparedness for practice.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>An electronic questionnaire was sent to an equal group of paediatricians who had trained in clinical settings located in Europe and the Caribbean. 30 items (Likert scale 1–4 = totally disagree-totally agree) were used to measure the level of preparedness of the respondents in 7 physician competencies.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>42 participants were included for analysis. The distribution of participants in both groups was comparable. The overall perception of preparedness in the Caribbean group was 2.93 (SD = 0.47) and 2.86 (SD = 0.72) in the European group. The European group felt less prepared in the competency as manager 1.81 (SD = 1.06) compared to their Caribbean counterparts 2.72 (SD = 0.66). The difference was significant (p = 0.006).</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>The training in the different environments was perceived as adequate and comparable in effect. The learning environment's cultural climate appeared to influence the physician's perception of their competencies and preparedness for clinical practice.</p

Examining the moderating effect of individual-level cultural values on users’ acceptance of E-learning in developing countries: a structural equation modeling of an extended technology acceptance model

In this study, we examine the effects of individual-level culture on the adoption and acceptance of e-learning tools by students in Lebanon using a theoretical framework based on the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM). To overcome possible limitations of using TAM in developing countries, we extend TAM to include subjective norms (SN) and quality of work life constructs as additional constructs and a number of cultural variables as moderators. The four cultural dimensions of masculinity/femininity (MF), individualism/collectivism, power distance and uncertainty avoidance were measured at the individual level to enable them to be integrated into the extended TAM as moderators and a research model was developed based on previous literature. To test the hypothesised model, data were collected from 569 undergraduate and postgraduate students using e-learning tools in Lebanon via questionnaire. The collected data were analysed using the structural equation modelling technique in conjunction with multi-group analysis. As hypothesised, the results of the study revealed perceived usefulness (PU), perceived ease of use (PEOU), SN and quality of work life to be significant determinants of students’ behavioural intention (BI) towards e-learning. The empirical results also demonstrated that the relationship between SN and BI was particularly sensitive to differences in individual-cultural values, with significant moderating effects observed for all four of the cultural dimensions studied. Some moderating effects of culture were also found for both PU and PEOU, however, contrary to expectations the effect of quality of work life was not found to be moderated by MF as some previous authors have predicted. The implications of these results to both theory and practice are explored in the paper