Rebuilding the Iron Cage: Post-Failure Organizing in Newspapers and Investment Banks

Organizational failure is an incomplete process because routines and norms persist through employee careers. Qualitative interviews with former employees from four newspapers and two investment banks, all of which are bankrupt or disbanded, demonstrate ongoing utilization of routines and ongoing compliance to norms despite severed connections to the failed firm. Routines are most likely to persist when they relate to low-volatility processes that do not require maintenance to ensure ongoing accessibility. Characteristics that make norms transferable are also identified. Adherence to aesthetic and pragmatic norms depends on how well they fit into new occupational contexts: uptake varies in proportion to the similarity between the failed firm and the new occupational setting of a failure survivor. Justice-oriented norms are not context-dependent; they persist regardless of post-failure employment outcomes. In fact, justice-oriented norms are found to drive the selection of new occupations as journalists seek normative consistency in their careers and some investment bankers change careers to reclaim a sense of purpose lost in banking. These observations hold whether survivors find employment in incumbent firms, entrepreneurial projects, or as freelancers. As survivors adapt work practices, their efforts constitute a form of inter-organizational innovation that generates organizational heterogeneity within unstable industries. Post-failure continuity provides an important and largely undocumented mechanism for the preservation of organizational attributes and the diversification of organizational form amidst crisis, an adaptive process that reconsiders the normative environment of a business and selectively discards assumptions about how firms ought to be. Survivors of failure often face a dilemma in deciding whether to attempt to re-create an occupational setting similar to the firm that failed or to go a different direction. This work takes up this dilemma, asking what insight business ethics research can provide for those who might wonder about the purpose of their firms. A theory of property is used to articulate a normative argument: firms should fail when they are unable to cover their debts and externalities, and firms should survive when they generate surplus value. The dissertation contributes to organizational theories of evolution, to the study of career trajectories, and to a life-cycle approach to business ethics

Validation Technique for Modeled Bottomside Ionospheres via Ray Tracing

A new method for validating ionosphere models using High Frequency (HF) angle of arrival (AoA) data is presented. AoA measurements from a field campaign held at White Sands Missile Range, New Mexico, USA in January 2014 provide the actual elevation angle, azimuth and group delay results from 10 transmitter-receiver circuits. Simulated AoAs are calculated by ray tracing through the electron density profiles predicted from the ionosphere models hosted by NASA\u27s Community Coordinated Modeling Center: IRI-2016, USU-GAIM, GITM, CTIPe, TIE-GCM, and SAMI3. Through the implementation of metrics including Mean Absolute Error, Prediction Efficiency, Correlation Coefficient, and others, we are able to compare and analyze model performance using this new model validation approach. The wide variety of metrics determine model performance quantitatively and qualitatively by analyzing behavior over time

Report of the Symposium on Cutaneous Lymphomas: Sixth International Conference on Malignant Lymphoma

The symposium discussed the pathobiology, classification, and treatment of cutaneous lymphomas. Drs. Burg and Kadin commented on the pathophysiology of mycosis fungoides/Sézary syndrome and cutaneous CD30+ lymphoproliferative disorders, respectively. A proposed classification of primary cutaneous lymphomas from the EORTC was presented by Drs. Kerl and Sterry. Dr. Jaffe presented a classification of cutaneous lymphomas based on the REAL classification. All speakers agreed that primary cutaneous lymphomas are usually distinctive in their clinical behavior and biology, and differ from their nodal counterparts. The symposium concluded with remarks from Drs. Vonderheid and Hoppe on the therapeutic approach to primary cutaneous lymphoid malignancie

Debating elective single embryo transfer after in vitro fertilization: a plea for a context sensitive approach

The number of embryos transferred after in vitro fertilization (IVF) have been a topic of debate for over a decade now. Due to the risk associated with multiple pregnancy, there has been a global effort at reducing the multiple pregnancy rates to a minimum while maintaining an acceptable level of successful IVF pregnancy rate. Elective single embryo transfer (eSET) is advocated in most European countries. In Belgium and Sweden, eSET is mandatory for couples with a good prognosis. However, despite clinical recommendations and policy statements, patients in clinical practice frequently do request for the transfer of multiple embryos in order to have twins. Such requests conflict with policy guidelines and create an ethical dilemma for physicians: Should the physician do as the couple requests, and there with respect the autonomy of patients, or adhere to medical policy that takes the health of the mother and children at heart? This article provides an exploration of the arguments found in the literature that plays a role in the discussion on this topic and eventually argues that what a physician should do depends on the specificities of the context in which patients and physicians are implicated. These contextual issues can be taken into account in a shared decision‑making procedure, which allows reflections and the responsibilities of both patients and physicians to be attended in decision about assisted reproduction.Keywords: Autonomy, Embryo transfer, In vitro fertilization, Multiple pregnancy, Values and cultur

Understanding moral responsibility in the design of trailers

This paper starts from the presupposition that moral codes often do not suffice to make agents understand their moral responsibility. We will illustrate this statement with a concrete example of engineers who design a truck’s trailer and who do not think traffic safety is part of their responsibility. This opinion clashes with a common supposition that designers in fact should do all that is in their power to ensure safety in traffic. In our opinion this shows the need for a moral philosophy that helps engineers to interpret their responsibility and think more critically about it. For this purpose we will explore the moral philosophy of Alasdair MacIntyre, which is particularly interesting because he locates the beginning of moral thinking in the daily practice of a profession. This is consistent with the history of moral codes, for codes are also the product of moral reflection by professionals. We will use MacIntyre’s philosophy to (1) explain what is wrong with the designers’ understanding of their responsibility and (2) show a possible way to bring their reflection to a more self-critical level. We will also inspect MacIntyre’s proposal critically

Nanoparticle characterization: What to measure?

What to measure? is a key question in nanoscience, and it is not straightforward to address as different physicochemical properties define a nanoparticle sample. Most prominent among these properties are size, shape, surface charge, and porosity. Today researchers have an unprecedented variety of measurement techniques at their disposal to assign precise numerical values to those parameters. However, methods based on different physical principles probe different aspects, not only of the particles themselves, but also of their preparation history and their environment at the time of measurement. Understanding these connections can be of great value for interpreting characterization results and ultimately controlling the nanoparticle structure–function relationship. Here, the current techniques that enable the precise measurement of these fundamental nanoparticle properties are presented and their practical advantages and disadvantages are discussed. Some recommendations of how the physicochemical parameters of nanoparticles should be investigated and how to fully characterize these properties in different environments according to the intended nanoparticle use are proposed. The intention is to improve comparability of nanoparticle properties and performance to ensure the successful transfer of scientific knowledge to industrial real‐world applications