14,807 research outputs found
Gender Matters! Analyzing Global Cultural Gender Preferences for Venues Using Social Sensing
Gender differences is a phenomenon around the world actively researched by
social scientists. Traditionally, the data used to support such studies is
manually obtained, often through surveys with volunteers. However, due to their
inherent high costs because of manual steps, such traditional methods do not
quickly scale to large-size studies. We here investigate a particular aspect of
gender differences: preferences for venues. To that end we explore the use of
check-in data collected from Foursquare to estimate cultural gender preferences
for venues in the physical world. For that, we first demonstrate that by
analyzing the check-in data in various regions of the world we can find
significant differences in preferences for specific venues between gender
groups. Some of these significant differences reflect well-known cultural
patterns. Moreover, we also gathered evidence that our methodology offers
useful information about gender preference for venues in a given region in the
real world. This suggests that gender and venue preferences observed may not be
independent. Our results suggests that our proposed methodology could be a
promising tool to support studies on gender preferences for venues at different
spatial granularities around the world, being faster and cheaper than
traditional methods, besides quickly capturing changes in the real world
Working from home during COVID-19 lockdown: Changing competencies and work-home life boundaries
Crisis situations often introduces drastic lifestyle changes. This study is focused on the COVID-19 pandemic and aims to shed light on an unprecedented context of forcing employees to work from home with a short notice of companies and the government. The goal is three-fold: i) to understand the extent to which employees were indeed prepared to work from home; ii) to uncover the most important competencies that enabled employees to deal better with a crisis situation, such as the COVID-19 pandemic; and iii) to discuss the real impact that working from home had in the employees’ lives during the pandemic situation and the quarantine period. Using narrative inquiry, this study explores the experiences of 18 young adult consultants working in different business areas, in Portugal. Semi-structure interviews were conducting during the third wave (12/2020 – 03/2021) and thematic analysis was used to analysis the transcripts. The analysis revealed three main themes: ‘management competencies’, ‘work-life balance’ and ‘work flexibility’. Each theme consisted of several subthemes which illustrates how the participants perceived working from home and the factors that reflect their experiences and understanding. The research findings illustrate that interpersonal communication, anxiety and stress management, time management, and e-leadership are vital skills to cause a great impact on participants’ productivity and well-being at work. Participants all appeared to notice that working from home provides a better work-life balance (e.g. saving time on daily commute) and more flexibility with regards to the work schedule and home commitments. Nonetheless, their experiences of home working depend on the personal situation, personality and the perceived management support offered during the COVID-19 lockdown. The research highlights a need to train employees on soft skills and prepare them to future crisis situations. Theoretical implications suggest that academics should expand research and interventions to include not only the work environment but also other external factors that affect employees. The limitations of the study and recommendations for future research are suggested.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
Avaliação da suscetibilidade de linhagens de soja ao vírus causador de necrose da haste.
O objetivo deste trabalho foi verificar a tolerância de linhagens de soja do programa de melhoramento da Embrapa ao vírus causador da necrose da haste
Shifting to green economy: Hype or hope for entrepreneurs into medicinal and aromatic plants?
This research aimed at finding out if rural development concerning medicinal and aromatic plants (MAP), in Portugal, was sufficiently consolidated to be considered an alternative lifestyle. Secondary data collected from a panel of 12 high-level experts enabled to picture the sector. Operations were the core knowledge area that helped to find out the implementation of the existing social platform into a technological solution to support a virtual collaborative effort among the stakeholders, as the main requirement to consolidate the sector. The required role of State was also defined as holistic, integrative, supportive, despite not-regulative, to implement a broad MAP policy
Creative Teaching of New Product Development to Operations Managers
New Product Development (NPD) has got its roots on an Engineering background. Thus, one might wonder about the interest, opportunity, contents and delivery process, if students from soft sciences were involved. This paper addressed «What to teach?» and «How to do it?», as the preliminary research questions that originated the introduced propositions. The curriculum-developer model that was purposefully chosen to adapt the coursebook by pursuing macro/micro strategies was found significant by an exploratory qualitative case study. Moreover, learning was developed and value created by implementing the institutional curriculum through a creative, hands-on, experiencing, problem-solving, problem-based but organized teamwork approach. Product design of an orange squeezer complying with ill-defined requirements, including drafts, sketches, prototypes, CAD simulations and a business plan, plus a website, written reports and presentations were the deliverables that confirmed an innovative contribution towards research and practice of teaching and learning of engineering subjects to non-specialist operations managers candidates
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