Support of Risk Management Through Careful Selection of Anti-corruption Measures – a Critical Evaluation of Compliance Management Activities

Purpose of the article: Organizations tend to apply Compliance Management System (CMS) as means to reduce risk. The fraud or corruption risk can be reduced by applying anti-corruption measures. The usefulness of these anti-corruption measures is not always questioned. Therefore measures might be applied which have little or no value in reality. Compliance Management Systems might be enhanced if hints can be found which measures are helpful for the organizations. Methodology/methods: In a laboratory experiment possible cause-effect relations for anti-corruption measures were tested in an international setting. Populations from different countries were selected to test also differences in the national settings. Scientific aim: The research aims at finding most effective anti corruption mechanisms and makes suggestions which kind of measures have a positive impact and which are negligible. This research presents the results of an experimental approach to further strengthen activity in the area of CMS. It highlights the use of CMS in order to conduct business through persons which are ethically sensitized. Findings: The research highlights that not all applied measures do have a positive impact on decisions which have to be taken in ethical dilemma situations. Furthermore for single areas it became obvious that only specific measures do have an impact, general measures do not have an impact. Conclusions: The effectiveness of CMS depends on a careful selection of the right activities. Nevertheless elements could be identified which are likely to have a stronger impact on the decision making than others. These should be in the focus when designing, evaluating and/or implementing a CMS. The approach should be embedded in an overall risk analysis to make sure that the relevant compliance risks are covered

Public Libraries – Facilitators of Information Society and e- Inclusion in Latvia

AbstractThe economic growth and national competitiveness is closely correlated with the development of information society. In the last few years the role of public libraries has significantly increased and libraries have greatly contributed to the improvement of information society in Latvia. The usage of library services had never been as high as they were in 2011 – 42% of the population were active library users and 90% of them used the Internet. Nowadays, the public library network in Latvia provides a powerful network of information, knowledge and community centres and they are highly demanded by society

Electronic procurement system – instrument for implementing green public procurement: analysis of the Latvia’s expierence

Green public procurement (GPP) is a mean of saving up finances for public institutions, especially taking into consideration not only procurement price but also total expenses of the contract lifecycle. In Latvia the first Electronic Procurement System (EPS) was established in 2005 and was the first such procurement system in the Baltic States. Initially, it only acted as an e-Procurement system in which public institutions can purchase standard goods and services. This paper analyzes the success of the implementation methodology for evaluating e-Procurement in public procurement. The aim of the paper is to explore the proportion of applied GPP of total procurement in EPS in Latvia in the period from 2015 to 2017, and to analyze how the aims of the proportion of GPP are achieved. In order to investigate the share of GPPs in the EPS, data on purchases made by EPS was collected and analyzed. An analysis was made of the percentage of GPP and the most important groups for which GPP was appropriate, and it was assessed whether the objectives set by the GPP have been achieved. GPP proportion in procurement made within the EPS in 2015 was 9%, 2016 - 8%, but in 2017 - 19.10%, which means that GPP a substantial increase. As the calculations made in the study prove a complete transition to e-Procurement will reduce both administrative costs and significant savings for the state budget in the Latvia

The demand of Public Administration management’s staff competences in the future

The development of the competences of the staff of the Latvian Public Administration has been drawing more and more attention. The aim of the development of the human resources is a professional, motivated, advanced and honest staff of the Public Administration. It means that it is necessary to evaluate the competences of the staff in order to upgrade them and understand what is in demand nowadays. Improved personal and professional competences are regularly needed to improve the quality, efficiency, development of creative thinking, knowledge and adaptation to the trends and demands of the 21 st century. It is therefore important to understand whether employees are in line with a specialised profession in order to improve and maintain the skills of employees, who have played an important role in the work process as a result of the rapid development of technology today. It is therefore important to find out what competencies will become an integral part of human work. The aim of the research is to understand, what kind of competences in the future are going to be in demand for Public Administration staff. The methods used in the research work are going to be the analysis of the documents and data analysis. The results of the research are going to be used in practice by evaluating and upgrading the competences of the Public Administration staff

DEVELOPMENT OF ECONOMIC THEORY – FROM THEORIES OF ECONOMIC GROWTH AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT TO THE PARADIGM OF SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT

Rapid economic growth is a relatively recent phenomenon, which has been examined since the end of the 18th century. In the scientific literature researchers use the concept of “economic growth” and “economic development” when analyzing economic processes. “Economic growth”, as defined by Paul M. Romer occurs whenever people use resources and rearrange them in more valuable ways. Thus, economic growth means an increase in a real national income / national output. In contrast, economic development is an improvement of the quality of life and living standards, e.g. improvement of literacy, life expectancy, and approach to environmental issues. Economic development encircles a wider range of metrics than just gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita, it is about actual standard of living, level of environmental standards, availability and quality of housing and other aspects. The article analyzes, compares and evaluates theories of economic growth and economic development in the context of sustainable development

Methodological perspective of evaluation of Green public procurement

Every year the European Union (EU) Member States collectively spend around 14% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) on public procurement. In Latvia, public procurement accounts for 17% of GDP. The review of the new public procurement directives and their transposition process in Latvia plans to show new opportunities for green public procurement (GPP) application: the contracting authority will be able to reject, for example, an abnormally low bid, include environmental management system requirements in the selection criteria, use life cycle costing criteria, etc. GPP is the systematic integration of environmental criteria into all activities related to the procurement of goods or services, from the identification of needs, the development of appropriate specifications and evaluation procedures, to the monitoring of the results achieved. Solutions for the promotion of GPP proposed by the new Public procurement Law project and the Cabinet of Ministers' draft regulation "Requirements and Application of Green Public Procurement" will also be analyzed. The aim of the work is to explore the application of GPP to improve the quality of GPP

ICT industry’s challenge in Latvia

Information and communication technology (ICT) sector can be described as a high value-added industry, whose growth requires qualified workforce, well-developed infrastructure, public institution support, understanding of sectoral growth scenario and its challenges. One of the industry’s essential challenges is a shortage of high-skilled ICT professionals in job market that can be considered as impediment of industry’s further development. Thereby the aim of research is to develop possible scenarios for ensuring increase of number of ICT specialist in Latvia. As result their conclusion has been drowning that without changes in the education process in primary and secondary schools as well as without changes in higher education of ICT specialists, ICT industry in Latvia will not have potentialities to ensure its further development, create the interests of global companies to come to here, and will not be able to facilitate the growth of other industries’ productivity.peer-reviewe

Digital competence rating and economic development in the EU

Diffusion of information and communication technologies (ICT) in different areas has accelerated the growth of the global economy. It has large impact to the business by transforming processes, creating new services, industries. ICT development requires new technologies and new approaches to innovate and integrate. The European Commission stated: "The Internet and digital technologies are transforming the lives we lead, the way we work – as individuals, in business, and in our communities as they become more integrated across all sectors of our economy and society". The access to high-speed digital infrastructures, skills of the effective usage of highly developed digital technologies represents the prerequisite productivity and the social inclusion in the digital economy. Development of new technologies and applications demands respective skills and competences of the citizens. That also leads to problems related to measurement of the level of digitization of the economy. There are several institutions that evaluate digital competences. The Digital Economy and Society Index (DESI), developed by the European Commission, is a composite index that summarises relevant indicators on Europe’s digital performance and tracks the evolution of EU member states in digital competitiveness. The aim of the paper is an empirical verification of the assumption that ICT factors (measured by DESI components) affect national economic development. This study uses statistical and econometrical methods to examine the relationship between ICT factors, digital competence indicators and economic development in the EU through statistical evidence. A panel data analysis confirmed significant linkage between ICT factors (infrastructure, competence, investment and trade size) and economic growth in the EU countries. Taking into consideration the digitalization trends, could be stated that there is still a huge potential for progress and growth

Learning Content Development methodology for Mobile Devices

AbstractMobile devices are becoming increasingly popular; basically mobile devices are reaching all levels of society. Thanks to the popularity of mobile devices, mobile learning has become great tool for delivering educational resources. The continuously increasing demand for mobile technology based learning materials, renders adoption of educational resources for these requirements. Technology by itself does not contribute much to education that is why the aim of this research is to present and evaluate methodology for visualisation and production of electronic materials in mobile environments. Methodology focuses on instructional design and mobile content design and the navigation control. Findings showed that given methodology and recommendations is effective for improving m-learning design across mobile devices

Human Resource Management’s Marketing Approach and Its Contribution Towards Employee-Satisfaction

In times when organizations in Germany are confronted with a constant change-dynamic regarding their working conditions managers understand that human resources are an important driving factor for the overall company’s performance. The attractiveness of an organization towards potential and actual employees is therefore an issue which is of broad interest for general management as it plays an increasing role to reach company’s aims. Necessary for creating such an attractiveness as employer are the establishment of substantiated processes of acquiring and retaining employees. The objective of this paper is to assess whether the application of a company’s human resource management’s marketing approach has an impact on employee satisfaction. Concerning the research methods causal modelling and triangulation of research are used. Quantitative research is applied. Results show that the better a company’s human resource management’s marketing approach in terms of its quality and performance is, the higher is the employees’ perception about their employer’s organization as well as the overall employees’ satisfaction. Findings also reveal a significant positive relationship between a high quality of human resource management’s marketing approach and employee satisfaction. Furthermore, a positive relation between a high performance of human resource management’s marketing approach and the classification of a company’s brand awareness on the labor market as well as a company’s classification into an employer of choice is found. Thus, it can be concluded that human resource management’s marketing approach is a viable process in the realm of human resource management to steer a company’s success through a focus on employee satisfaction