Costs and benefits of inter-departmental innovation collaboration

Inter-departmental innovation collaboration facilitates innovation performance. At the same time, it has been identified as source of increased coordination costs. Using organizational information processing theory, this paper builds and tests hypotheses on the costs and benefits of innovation-related collaboration within firms. Based on a sample of 433 German manufacturing firms we show inter-departmental innovation collaboration to increase process innovation performance, but also to produce costs in terms of project delay and project termination. These costs, however, do not affect innovation performance at the firm level. This finding suggests firms to be well able to balance the costs and benefits of interdepartmental collaboration across their innovation project portfolio. Theoretical and managerial implications are discussed. --Inter-departmental innovation collaboration,innovation performance,project delay,project termination

Collaborative planning and its antecedents: An assessment in supply chain relationships

The purpose of this study is to investigate the interactive effects of individual work autonomy and interdependence on collaborative planning, building on the distinction of task and outcome interdependence. Using a questionnaire study, we assess collaborative planning and its antecedents in supply chain relationships, incorporating the forestry and timber industry. While no interactive effects hold for task interdependence, outcome interdependence only facilitates collaborative planning for individuals with low work autonomy. Individuals with high autonomy always invest in collaborative planning. This study provides a picture of supply chain reality more complete than that sketched in studies that have assessed interdependence as a one-dimensional construct and alludes to the importance, often overlooked, of work autonomy in supply chain relationship

Why and when leadership training predicts effectiveness: The role of leader identity and leadership experience

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to build and test an integrative model of leader identity as an important mechanism explaining why reactions to leadership training associate with leader effectiveness. It is proposed that this mediation relationship is conditional on leadership experience (i.e. time in a formal managerial role), such that it will be weaker for more experienced leaders because they already possess complex leadership-related knowledge and skills. Design/methodology/approach Hypotheses were tested using a sample of German managers (n=196) in formal leadership positions (i.e. with direct subordinates) across a range of industries. Data were collected using online questionnaires. The proposed first-stage mediation model was tested using the structural equation approach. Findings Leader identity was found to mediate the relationship between reactions to leadership training and leader effectiveness. This mediation was conditional upon leadership experience, such that the indirect effect only held for less, but not for more, experienced leaders. Research limitations/implications The findings should be interpreted with caution because all data are self-report and cross-sectional. Practical implications Leadership training for senior leaders should qualitatively differ (in terms of content and length) from that for novice leaders. Originality/value Leadership training can substantially improve managers' ability to lead effectively. The present study is the first to establish leader identity as a motivational mechanism that explains this relationship. This is also the first study to test for the role of leadership experience in leader development

A toolbox for managing organisational issues in the early stage of the development of a ubiquitous computing application

In this paper, we present a toolbox for the prospective management of organisational issues in ubiquitous computing. Ubiquitous computing applications are developed to enable new services and new ways of working, to increase management control and to improve safety. However, they may also interfere with established work practices and may have unforeseen consequences for organisations. Despite their importance, such organisational issues are rarely addressed in ubiquitous computing innovation projects. Drawing on socio-technical design approaches and existing research on organisational issues in ubiquitous computing, we have developed a toolbox containing three tools for managing organisational issues of ubiquitous computing applications in the early stage of development. The toolbox supports the realisation of hoped-for benefits of ubiquitous computing in organisations and the management of unwanted organisational issues. The "work process tool” supports the description of envisioned work processes, including flexibility and variability requirements, changing responsibilities and different points of view. The "work system tool” analyses the alignment between a ubiquitous computing application and work systems task completeness, independency and the fit between regulation opportunities and requirements. The "human controllability tool” assesses how the control capabilities of workers are enabled or constrained by the new ubiquitous computing application. We show the applicability of the toolbox using a case study of an early stage ubiquitous computing technology innovation project, where the toolbox contributed to the set-up of the field trial and the development of application guideline

Do interpersonal conflict, aggression and bullying at the workplace overlap? A latent class modeling approach

In this paper, we tackle an important but unresolved research question: How distinct are workplace conflict, aggression and bullying? We study this question by means of latent class (LC) analysis using cross-industry data from 6,175 Belgian workers. We find a two-factor solution (conflict-aggression versus bullying) to provide the best fit to the data. Employees with low exposure to conflict-aggression and bullying perceived the phenomena as mostly overlapping. Employees who were exposed more frequently to the phenomena reported them to be more distinct - especially so for workplace bullying. We also find conflict-aggression and bullying to have distinct relationships with well-being and strain outcomes. These findings entail that a simple unifying approach or a single label for all three phenomena is not appropriate, at least from a measurement point of view and from the perspective of those exposed. Our results have important implications for the theoretical understanding of conflict, aggression and bullying, and for practitioners who provide support to affected employees including policymakers who help prevent and manage these problems at the workplace

Do Interpersonal Conflict, Aggression and Bullying at the Workplace Overlap? A Latent Class Modeling Approach

In this paper, we tackle an important but unresolved research question: How distinct are workplace conflict, aggression and bullying? We study this question by means of latent class (LC) analysis using cross-industry data from 6,175 Belgian workers. We find a two-factor solution (conflict-aggression versus bullying) to provide the best fit to the data. Employees with low exposure to conflict-aggression and bullying perceived the phenomena as mostly overlapping. Employees who were exposed more frequently to the phenomena reported them to be more distinct - especially so for workplace bullying. We also find conflict-aggression and bullying to have distinct relationships with well-being and strain outcomes. These findings entail that a simple unifying approach or a single label for all three phenomena is not appropriate, at least from a measurement point of view and from the perspective of those exposed. Our results have important implications for the theoretical understanding of conflict, aggression and bullying, and for practitioners who provide support to affected employees including policymakers who help prevent and manage these problems at the workplace

Causative classification of river flood events

A wide variety of processes controls the time of occurrence, duration, extent, and severity of river floods. Classifying flood events by their causative processes may assist in enhancing the accuracy of local and regional flood frequency estimates and support the detection and interpretation of any changes in flood occurrence and magnitudes. This paper provides a critical review of existing causative classifications of instrumental and preinstrumental series of flood events, discusses their validity and applications, and identifies opportunities for moving toward more comprehensive approaches. So far no unified definition of causative mechanisms of flood events exists. Existing frameworks for classification of instrumental and preinstrumental series of flood events adopt different perspectives: hydroclimatic (large‐scale circulation patterns and atmospheric state at the time of the event), hydrological (catchment scale precipitation patterns and antecedent catchment state), and hydrograph‐based (indirectly considering generating mechanisms through their effects on hydrograph characteristics). All of these approaches intend to capture the flood generating mechanisms and are useful for characterizing the flood processes at various spatial and temporal scales. However, uncertainty analyses with respect to indicators, classification methods, and data to assess the robustness of the classification are rarely performed which limits the transferability across different geographic regions. It is argued that more rigorous testing is needed. There are opportunities for extending classification methods to include indicators of space–time dynamics of rainfall, antecedent wetness, and routing effects, which will make the classification schemes even more useful for understanding and estimating floods

Optimasi Portofolio Resiko Menggunakan Model Markowitz MVO Dikaitkan dengan Keterbatasan Manusia dalam Memprediksi Masa Depan dalam Perspektif Al-Qur`an

Risk portfolio on modern finance has become increasingly technical, requiring the use of sophisticated mathematical tools in both research and practice. Since companies cannot insure themselves completely against risk, as human incompetence in predicting the future precisely that written in Al-Quran surah Luqman verse 34, they have to manage it to yield an optimal portfolio. The objective here is to minimize the variance among all portfolios, or alternatively, to maximize expected return among all portfolios that has at least a certain expected return. Furthermore, this study focuses on optimizing risk portfolio so called Markowitz MVO (Mean-Variance Optimization). Some theoretical frameworks for analysis are arithmetic mean, geometric mean, variance, covariance, linear programming, and quadratic programming. Moreover, finding a minimum variance portfolio produces a convex quadratic programming, that is minimizing the objective function ðð¥with constraintsð ð 𥠥 ðandð´ð¥ = ð. The outcome of this research is the solution of optimal risk portofolio in some investments that could be finished smoothly using MATLAB R2007b software together with its graphic analysis

Differential cross section measurements for the production of a W boson in association with jets in proton–proton collisions at √s = 7 TeV

Measurements are reported of differential cross sections for the production of a W boson, which decays into a muon and a neutrino, in association with jets, as a function of several variables, including the transverse momenta (pT) and pseudorapidities of the four leading jets, the scalar sum of jet transverse momenta (HT), and the difference in azimuthal angle between the directions of each jet and the muon. The data sample of pp collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of 7 TeV was collected with the CMS detector at the LHC and corresponds to an integrated luminosity of 5.0 fb[superscript −1]. The measured cross sections are compared to predictions from Monte Carlo generators, MadGraph + pythia and sherpa, and to next-to-leading-order calculations from BlackHat + sherpa. The differential cross sections are found to be in agreement with the predictions, apart from the pT distributions of the leading jets at high pT values, the distributions of the HT at high-HT and low jet multiplicity, and the distribution of the difference in azimuthal angle between the leading jet and the muon at low values.United States. Dept. of EnergyNational Science Foundation (U.S.)Alfred P. Sloan Foundatio