Diverse virtual social networks: Implications for remote software testing teams

This paper evaluates offshore outsourcing in the IT testing industry and determines what conditions determine its success. There is particular focus on the influence of diversity in teams on group relationships. Two studies are described: the first, investigated the perceptions of professional software testers on the critical factors of offshore outsourcing; and the second study looked at the ability for diverse teams to form close working relationships through virtual networks. We find that overt diversity factors inhibit interaction across nationality boundaries. The limitations of virtual networks for fostering personal communications is apparent in preventing group members from overcoming the initial aversion to mix with out-group members, which could be achieved with closer and more personal communications between members with different diversity factors in normal face to face communications. Where software testing teams are outsourced globaly, and must rely on virtual communications, there seems potential for significant difficulties in developing close working relationships, which on the one hand, can be negative for group cohesion, but one the other hand, can be positive for encouraging imparitality

La compétence du comité d’audit français face à la crise sanitaire COVID-19

Durant la crise sanitaire, le rôle du comité d’audit, comme étant le premier responsable dans l’évaluation et la maîtrise des risques, s’est progressivement renforcé. Par conséquent, dans une période d’incertitude exceptionnelle, les comités d’audit sont tenus d’opter à des compétences spécifiques afin de surmonter cette crise. Dans cette optique, nous avons mené une étude examinant l'impact de la pandémie de COVID-19 sur les compétences du comité d’audit à travers un échantillon composé de 164 entreprises françaises cotées. Les résultats montrent que ces compétences ont été négativement impactées par la pandémie. Ce résultat confirme l'idée que cette pandémie a rendu extrêmement difficile la maîtrise des nouveaux risques émergents avec les compétences habituelles acquises par les comités d’audit. Par contre, les résultats révèlent une relation positive et significative entre les connaissances économiques et financières des membres du conseil d’administration et les compétences du comité d’audit. En effet, un résultat pareil a d’importantes implications sur les futures réformes inhérentes au comité d’audit et interpelle à solliciter d’autres compétences au-delà des expertises financières et comptables dans sa composition. Les résultats confirment, ainsi, que la compétence des membres du conseil est susceptible de renforcer celle du comité d'audit exceptionnellement en période de crise sanitaire

Improving project management planning and control in service operations environment.

Projects have evidently become the core activity in most companies and organisations where they are investing significant amount of resources in different types of projects as building new services, process improvement, etc. This research has focused on service sector in attempt to improve project management planning and control activities. The research is concerned with improving the planning and control of software development projects. Existing software development models are analysed and their best practices identified and these have been used to build the proposed model in this research. The research extended the existing planning and control approaches by considering uncertainty in customer requirements, resource flexibility and risks level variability. In considering these issues, the research has adopted lean principles for planning and control software development projects. A novel approach introduced within this research through the integration of simulation modelling techniques with Taguchi analysis to investigate ‗what if‘ project scenarios. Such scenarios reflect the different combinations of the factors affecting project completion time and deliverables. In addition, the research has adopted the concept of Quality Function Deployment (QFD) to develop an automated Operations Project Management Deployment (OPMD) model. The model acts as an iterative manner uses ‗what if‘ scenario performance outputs to identify constraints that may affect the completion of a certain task or phase. Any changes made during the project phases will then automatically update the performance metrics for each software development phases. In addition, optimisation routines have been developed that can be used to provide management response and to react to the different levels of uncertainty. Therefore, this research has looked at providing a comprehensive and visual overview of important project tasks i.e. progress, scheduled work, different resources, deliverables and completion that will make it easier for project members to communicate with each other to reach consensus on goals, status and required changes. Risk is important aspect that has been included in the model as well to avoid failure. The research emphasised on customer involvement, top management involvement as well as team members to be among the operational factors that escalate variability levels 3 and effect project completion time and deliverables. Therefore, commitment from everyone can improve chances of success. Although the role of different project management techniques to implement projects successfully has been widely established in areas such as the planning and control of time, cost and quality; still, the distinction between the project and project management is less than precise and a little was done in investigating different levels of uncertainty and risk levels that may occur during different project phase.United Arab Emirates Governmen

EFFECTIVENESS OF FOOD SAFETY TRAINING ON KNOWLEDGE, ATITUDE, AND PRACTICES (KAP) OF HOMEBASED FOOD BUSINESS (HFB) IN Al AIN, UAE

This research aimed at evaluating the levels of knowledge, relevant attitudes, and food safety practices (KAP) of food handlers that have home food businesses (HFB) in Al Ain city, UAE. It examined the effectiveness of the Essential Food Safety Training Program (EFST) in providing food safety Knowledge, attitude, and practices. A quantitative research method was conducted using a sample of 68 participants who responded to the questionnaires. Three research questions were used to guide the study and explore the differences of the level of Knowledge, Attitudes, and Practice (KAP) before and after training program by using a paired-samples t-test. This study revealed that EFST had positive effects on all subcategories of food safety practices. Most of the subcategories of attitudes showed a positive impact except the cross-contamination. Regarding the food safety knowledge, no positive impact was found in the subcategories of cleaning and chilling. The results of this study can contribute to improving government policies and actions regarding the safety of food and training programs