HRM in Multinationals’ Operations in China: Business, People, and HR Issues

This paper presents the results of a study on the HR function in the Chinese operations of large multinational companies. Surveys of both line and HR executives in these firms were conducted. Results reveal that line executives are more sensitive than HR executives to criticality of people management issues as business issues, and that they see HR\u27s strategic orientation as the most critical area for improvement. The challenges and opportunities implied by these results are discussed

Interactions between marine megafauna and plastic pollution in Southeast Asia

Southeast (SE) Asia is a highly biodiverse region, yet it is also estimated to cumulatively contribute a third of the total global marine plastic pollution. This threat is known to have adverse impacts on marine megafauna, however, understanding of its impacts has recently been highlighted as a priority for research in the region. To address this knowledge gap, a structured literature review was conducted for species of cartilaginous fishes, marine mammals, marine reptiles, and seabirds present in SE Asia, collating cases on a global scale to allow for comparison, coupled with a regional expert elicitation to gather additional published and grey literature cases which would have been omitted during the structured literature review. Of the 380 marine megafauna species present in SE Asia, but also studied elsewhere, we found that 9.1 % and 4.5 % of all publications documenting plastic entanglement (n = 55) and ingestion (n = 291) were conducted in SE Asian countries. At the species level, published cases of entanglement from SE Asian countries were available for 10 % or less of species within each taxonomic group. Additionally, published ingestion cases were available primarily for marine mammals and were lacking entirely for seabirds in the region. The regional expert elicitation led to entanglement and ingestion cases from SE Asian countries being documented in 10 and 15 additional species respectively, highlighting the utility of a broader approach to data synthesis. While the scale of the plastic pollution in SE Asia is of particular concern for marine ecosystems, knowledge of its interactions and impacts on marine megafauna lags behind other areas of the world, even after the inclusion of a regional expert elicitation. Additional funding to help collate baseline data are critically needed to inform policy and solutions towards limiting the interactions of marine megafauna and plastic pollution in SE Asia

Guidelines for the use and interpretation of assays for monitoring autophagy (4th edition)1.

In 2008, we published the first set of guidelines for standardizing research in autophagy. Since then, this topic has received increasing attention, and many scientists have entered the field. Our knowledge base and relevant new technologies have also been expanding. Thus, it is important to formulate on a regular basis updated guidelines for monitoring autophagy in different organisms. Despite numerous reviews, there continues to be confusion regarding acceptable methods to evaluate autophagy, especially in multicellular eukaryotes. Here, we present a set of guidelines for investigators to select and interpret methods to examine autophagy and related processes, and for reviewers to provide realistic and reasonable critiques of reports that are focused on these processes. These guidelines are not meant to be a dogmatic set of rules, because the appropriateness of any assay largely depends on the question being asked and the system being used. Moreover, no individual assay is perfect for every situation, calling for the use of multiple techniques to properly monitor autophagy in each experimental setting. Finally, several core components of the autophagy machinery have been implicated in distinct autophagic processes (canonical and noncanonical autophagy), implying that genetic approaches to block autophagy should rely on targeting two or more autophagy-related genes that ideally participate in distinct steps of the pathway. Along similar lines, because multiple proteins involved in autophagy also regulate other cellular pathways including apoptosis, not all of them can be used as a specific marker for bona fide autophagic responses. Here, we critically discuss current methods of assessing autophagy and the information they can, or cannot, provide. Our ultimate goal is to encourage intellectual and technical innovation in the field

Line and HR Executives’ Perceptions of HR Effectiveness in Firms in the People’s Republic of China

This paper examines the differences in perceptions of the importance and effectiveness of HR practices in firms operating in the People's Republic of China. The major finding is that while there are no significant differences between HR and line executives’ perceptions of the importance of each functional area in HRM, there are significant differences between line and HR executives’ perceptions of the effectiveness of these areas. Line and HR executives both view the issue of securing, developing, and maintaining human resources as a critical issue for the execution of daily operations and long-term strategic plans. However, line executives perceive HR performance effectiveness to be significantly lower than HR executives do in these functional areas. Therefore HR departments are not meeting the performance expectations of line executives. There are three possible reasons for the poor performance of HR departments. First, government intervention may limit HR departments’ ability to act strategically. Second, HR departments may not have enough power to act strategically. Third, HR departments may have few capabilities to respond to line executives’ demands.Line_and_HR_Executives_Perceptions_of_HRWP98_31.pdf: 1716 downloads, before Oct. 1, 2020

Supersaturated “water-in-salt” hybrid electrolyte towards building high voltage Na-ion capacitors with wide temperatures operation

Aqueous asymmetric supercapacitors (ASC) is considered to fulfill the safety and high energy-power requirements simultaneously towards building next-generation storage devices. One of the most attractive electrolytes is multiple ion-based water-in-salt (WIS) solutions, which are steadily conquering the field of rechargeable batteries/capacitors. Stabilizing the pH value is one of the efficient ways to improve the energy density of the charge storage system by widening the operating potential. In this line, we report that acetate ions could help to neutralize the pH of sodium(I)bis(fluorosulfonyl)imide-based WIS electrolyte by diluting the free water molecules without any precipitation or recrystallization, and allow to widen the operating potential window from ~2.7 to 3.1 V. The Physico-chemical properties of mixed anions-based electrolytes are explored from confocal-Raman and Nuclear magnetic resonance studies. In addition, we performed ab-initio density functional theory calculations to study the co-ordination environment. Apparently, the acetate (OAcˉ) ions show a stronger interaction with Na+ ion compared to weakly coordinating imide (FSIˉ) analogues. The Na0.44MnO2 and prosopis juliflora derived activated carbon (PJAC) based ASC, and PJAC based symmetric supercapacitor (SSC) using mixed WIS electrolyte is cycled up to 5000 times. Further, the influence of environmental conditions (60 and −20 °C) is also studied in detail for the WIS based electrolyte for both ASC and SSC.National Research Foundation (NRF)This research is supported by grants from the National Research Foundation, Prime Minister's Office, Singapore under its Campus of Research Excellence and Technological Enterprise (CREATE) programme under the Singapore-HUJ Alliance for Research and Enterprise Ltd (SHARE), NEW-CREATE which is joint research programme between the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HUJ, Israel) and Nanyang Technological University (NTU, Singapore). ROR acknowledges the Department of Science & Technology (DST), Science & Engineering Research Board (SERB) for the Early Career Research Award (ECR/2016/000041). VA acknowledges financial support from the SERB, a statutory body of the DST, Govt. of India, through the Ramanujan Fellowship (SB/S2/RJN-088/2016)