Innovation: a financial asset of the capitalist or an “intellectual property” of the entrepreneur?

The purpose of this study is to identify the specific subjects that deal with innovation, in order to understand if the innovation “belongs” more to the capitalist or to the entrepreneur, and if there is any difference between the capitalist and the entrepreneur in terms of commitment, risk, and expectations. In this study a literature review methodology is used for classifying the capitalist and the entrepreneur form different profiles and in relation with the innovation process. Data are obtained mainly from books and articles, relying on an interdisciplinary perspective. Research findings show that the figure of the capitalist is distinguished from that of the entrepreneur in front of business activities. Thus, the capitalist is financially committed by offering the capital, expecting as a return the financial interest rate, and assuming a financial risk. Instead, the entrepreneur is committed with innovation and change, expecting the profit as remuneration for the assumed organizational ris

Beyond the Structure; Footbridge as a Landscape Architectural Design Product

Footbridge, by its name, proclaims that it is a special urban access medium for pedestrians. Unfortunately, there are less works that through research highlight this fact. Generally, pedestrian bridges are taken into account not enough differently than the `classical` bridge1 itself. There are many scientific works focusing on the structural properties of footbridges rather than on its architectural and urban values. This study aims to scrutinize the architectural and urban added values of the footbridge to its context and human life. It will be taken into consideration in this study as an urban furniture, a public space, a pathway, a landmark as well as a landscape feature. The goal of this research hides behind concerning with the user density rather than load bearing capacity, the urban aesthetics rather than large spans, the accessibility rather than constructability. A selection of ten pedestrian bridges will be the raw input of this research. The selection criteria of these ten projects can be listed as follows; being built, being a recent project- due to the availability of one of the research tools of this study- [within 10 years], being of an urban context and over passing a waterway rather than a motorway. Geography has been intentionally kept wide so that to have cases from different cultures as well. Apart from general information about the cases, this study will try to highlight the architectural and urban added values of each project to its context by various methods. Some qualitative values of an architectural and urban character of the current state of each project will be evaluated by professionals through Likert scale method. These people will be provided enough written and visual material about each case so that a rational evaluation process can be achieved. Another special method is used to highlight the added values of each footbridge to its neighborhood. Google earth Timeline plugin will be a crucial application to assist us on that. By contrasting and comparing two satellite images of the zone representing its state before and after the construction of the project we may read those values more clearly

The Role of Business Innovation in the Internationalization Process: Loccioni Group Case Study

Il presente lavoro vuole comprendere le dinamiche e le connessioni esistenti tra il relations management e le strategie di innovazione con focus su come queste vengano efficacemente implementate da parte delle imprese nel processo di internazionalizzazione. Lo studio e’ avviato con un’introduzione ai principali contributi economici nel campo del management e del marketing relazionale con focus specifico sul marketing relazione nel settore industriale. Il secondo capitolo definisce il ruolo dell’approccio relazionale sull’innovazione. Dopo l’introduzione dell’innovazione del XX secolo, la quale e’ stata caratterizzata principalmente da strategie della “closed innovation”, la ricerca sviluppa un’analisi del paradigma della “open innovation”. Il terzo capitolo introduce il ruolo dell’innovazione nel processo di internazionalizzazione con riferimento alle principali teorie, ai vantaggi e agli svantaggi sull’adozione di strategie di open innovation nella struttura organizzativa. Il capitolo studia come l’adozione delle strategie di open innovation, sfruttando la leva dei contatti e delle relazioni delle imprese, possa facilitare il processo di internazionalizzazione delle imprese. Nel quarto capitol l’analisi viene approfondita attraverso lo studio del caso di studio del Gruppo Loccioni il quale rappresenta il principale caso studio di questo documento. L’analisi si concentra sul processo di internazionalizzazione del Gruppo Loccioni individuando i punti in comune con i contribute scientifici ampiamente discussi nel documento. L’autore ha un approccio proattivo proponendo una piu’ intensa adozione ed implementazione delle strategie di open innovation nel processo di internazionalizzazione. In generale la ricerca suggerisce indicazioni per future ricerche nell’ambito dell’innovation management nel processo di internazionalizzazione per le piccole e medie imprese.The candidate’s work aims to understand dynamics and connections between relations management and innovation strategies and how enterprises successfully adopt those in the internationalization process. . The study starts with an introduction to the main academic contributions in the management and relationship marketing field with specific focus on relationship marketing in the industrial market. . The second chapter defines the role of relationship’s approach to innovation. After an introduction to XX century’s innovation, which has been represented mainly by closed innovation strategies, the research develops an attentive analysis of open innovation paradigm. . The third chapter introduces the role of innovation in the international process with reference to the main theories, the advantages and disadvantages on adopting open innovation strategies in the organizational structure. In fact, the chapter studies how adoption of open innovation strategies, also by leveraging companies’ networks and relations, could facilitate the internationalization process of corporations. . In the fourth chapter the research goes deeper into the analysis studying the Loccioni Group case, which is the main case study of this document. The analysis focuses on Loccioni’s internationalization process finding a match with the scientific contributions widely discussed in the document. The author takes a proactive approach trough the proposal of a deeper adoption and implementation of open innovation strategies in the internationalization process. . Overall the research provides directions for future research in innovation management related to the internationalization process undertaken by SMEs

Housing Design Education: in between Urban Planning and Architecture

Housing design exercises at Middle East Technical University (M.E.T.U.) department of architecture constitute a suitable ground to introduce to students issues of site planning and urban design. This study is intended to be a contribution to the research field of architectural education. It partially explores the educational system of the Faculty of Architecture at METU by focusing mostly on its core subject which is design studio. The aim of the research is to make an overview of the way housing design projects are conducted in the third year architectural design studio. The objectives and the learning outcomes expected from these studio exercises, the approaches and tendencies that determine the way the project exercise is given and lastly the teaching methods, strategies and tools will be studied through observation and interviews with the studio critics. The research will focus on the question related with the introduction of students with urban design in this context in particular

HUMAN CAPITAL TRAJECTORY: PERFORMANCE OF ALBANIA AND SERBIA IN CATCHING UP THE EU COUNTRIES

Purpose. This paper focuses on the measurement of the human capital level in Albania, Serbia and European Countries and in identifying the gaps between them. In addition, it focuses on the link between human capital and the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), by extending the analyse in finding the gender disparity of human capital and GDP relationship. Lastly, this study estimates the growth rate of the human capital level for Albania and Serbia and make a comparison with the average human capital of the European Countries. Methodology. The methodology used in the calculation of the growth rate of human capital is exponential trend method which makes possible the estimation of the years needed for Albania and Serbia to catch up the average of EU-28. The data employed mostly in the above-mentioned analysis is the data set taken from Barro and Lee (2010) corresponding the Educational Attainment Data from 1950 to 2010. For the estimation of the growth rate of the human capital level, additional data until 2015 have been used compiled from the UIS database and UN population database, respectively. Findings. The findings show that Albania has a higher probability of an earlier convergence than the Serbia has. Even though the proxy of human capital for year 2010 for Albania (9.85), is lower than Serbia (10.97), Albania is experiencing a rapid increase in the average years of schooling. Limitations. But again, the study is limited to data related to only the years of schooling without considering the quality of education and skills acquired. Originality. This study can serve as a contributor to the performance examination of Albania and Serbia to the EU community with regard to human capital accumulation

Language Contacts and Collisions of Codes in the Case of Bilingualism

Language constitutes one of the many systems of knowledge that man has acquired during his existence. Unlike traditional conceptions that see language as a phenomenon related to community, we can say that the language has an individual way, which is not only related to its performative displays, but also to its integral competence of special speakers. If nearly two centuries ago, the situations of bilingualism were viewed with suspicion and as temporary existence, now they are seen as the densest forms of linguistic and ethnic contacts. At this point, to a large extent of individuals, the monolingual situation is slowly being replaced by the bi- or multilingualism, as a result of various causes. If we drew a comparison between the monolingual speakers and the bilingual ones, we would understand those bilingual speakers are not just individuals who recognize two languages, but they can also use them regularly. For this reason, we cannot expect their language behavior to be the same with that of monolingual speakers, who use only their native language. In today's society, the idea of a sustainable and clear monolingual situation is unreal. Despite the level of language knowledge, the contact with other languages is inevitable. In such a group, no language system is immune to barriers of words or phrases that come out in one language and take place naturally in the lexicon of another language, or some other languages.Keywords: language analysis, identity, diglossia, social identity, bilingualism, asymmetry

Managing group dynamics with the viable systems approach (VSA): a study on consonance, group cohesiveness, and positive conformity

This dissertation makes an inquiry to the group phenomena from the perspective of the Viable Systems Approach (Golinelli, 2000a, 2000b, 2002, 2005, 2008, 2010, 2011; Barile, 2000, 2006, 2008a, 2009, 2011; Barile et al., 2011). It is specifically focused in concepts like consonance (De Falco and Gatti, 2012), group cohesiveness (Festinger et al., 1950; Forsyth, 2010), conformity (Asch, 1955) and positive conformity, interpersonal attraction (Lott and Lott, 1965), and optimism (Scheier et al., 1994; Seligman, 2006). The empirical research was entirely conducted at the University of Tirana with the students of Organizational Behavior course. The study/experiment has shown that it was possible (.66) to achieve what the author of this thesis calls positive conformity. Also, the study verified that consonance, as one of the most discussed and researched VSA’s concepts, can be used as a valid indicator of group cohesiveness. Another innovative aspect of this dissertation was a new way of measuring consonance, weaving the apperception test with the value test which confirmed to be very effective

Children and youth leadership for raising awareness, Empowerment, active citizenship, and wellbeing

The purpose of this study is to explore children and youth leadership through the case study of World Vision Albania as an illustration or representative of different generations of nongovernmental organizations in the matter. More specifically, it considers the contribution of creating a space and opportunity to youth leadership development by raising the leadership awareness within youth potential, the meaning and understanding that children/youth have in terms of leadership and how leadership in children/youth connects to empowerment, active citizenship and wellbeing. The study explores the impact of the variety and diversity of World Vision Albania as a non-governmental organization with regards to working with children and youth for nurturing their leadership potential with the purpose of transforming them into active citizens. Likewise, this research explores employees’ perceptions in terms of leadership style while working with children. Methodologically, the case study approach is used in combination with questionnaires and Key Informant Interviews. Thus, for investigating the research questions through a case study method, this paper uses a combination of quantitative structured interviews with qualitative in-depth interviews. Findings show that most of youth do not consider leadership simply as a goal per se, but also as a mean for being active citizens. They see their own empowerment relevant not only for personal wellbeing but also for the wellbeing of others

Corruption and Human Development Correlation in Western Balkan Countries

The Western Balkan countries are characterized by a series of obstacles in economic, politics and social aspects. A country's progress is measured by different components but the most important one is the economic growth which in the Western Balkans is not very satisfactory. In these last years, instead of economic growth, the economic development is found to be a better index since it includes not only the quantitative issue (income level) but also the qualitative one (health and education level).  From the other side, corruption level is found to be a negative indicator in this group of countries. Different researches have founded out a negative relationship between corruption level and countries' progress. The aim of this study is to identify the relationship between corruption level and human development. A regression analysis and a comparison of the degree of this relationship are performed for each Western Balkan county[1] during years 2002-2010. The main result of this study is that the relationship between corruption and human development is found to be strong in Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Serbia, Montenegro and Albania. Croatia shows a weak relationship whereas the relationship in Bosnia and Herzegovina’s case is meaningless. [1] The countries to be used in this regression analysis are: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Montenegro, Serbia and Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia excluding Kosovo since there do not have available data

Modeling and Simulation of the Photovoltaic Cells for Different Values of Physical and Environmental Parameters

Both research and technological development in the area of renewable energy sources are necessary to account for the increase in energy demand and environment problems in the world. The photovoltaic (PV) cell has been described by non-linear outputs characteristics in current-voltage and power-voltage. This outputs is affected by various effects such as; series resistance ( ), shunt resistance ( ), solar irradiance and temperature. In this paper the effect of variation of parameters has been studied such as series resistance ( ) and shunt resistance ( ) of the diode in the photovoltaic cell and these effects could be seen in the Current-Voltage (I-V) and Power-Voltage (P-V) characteristic curves. In this paper also has been studied the effect of variation of the environmental parameters such as solar irradiance and temperature. Results show that a higher temperature at constant solar irradiance produces a decrease power. So the voltage and the photovoltaic cell output power tend to decrease at higher temperatures, but there is no noticeable effect on the photovoltaic cell current. Thus, it is important to keep the cell temperature as low as possible, because higher temperatures have negative effect on output power of photovoltaic cell. On the other hand, the effect of solar irradiance on photovoltaic cell, it reveals that higher solar irradiance gives higher current and higher power. Shunt resistance has significant effect on the operating characteristic curves of PV cells as low power output is recorded if the value of shunt resistance varies from 0.07 ohms to 1700 ohms. Finally, I have presented power-voltage characteristic curves and current voltage characteristic curves of photovoltaic cell for different solar irradiance in Shkoder, Tirana and Vlore