The Faces of Bureaucracy: Understanding Enterprise Social Media

The social media are often perceived as tools that support openness and flexible participation among individuals and communities. This might explain the reason why social media have become indispensible for many daily practices in organizations. But how do these organizations appropriate and use these media relative to their formal structures and characteristics is a question in focus for the current paper. Drawing on classical concepts of organizational bureaucracy from Weber (1978) and Eisenstadt (1959), we present a qualitative analysis of empirical data obtained from two large organizations that use a wiki as a collaborative knowledge platform. The results show how the tendency to organize the use of the wiki through introducing structure might create barriers for open and democratic collaboration and knowledge sharing at the workplace. They also show that while a freer approach to using wikis might allow for self-organizing, there is still a possibility for enacting social structures that limit openness and flexibility. As such, the paper contributes novel insights into how social media might be used in bureaucracies and soft bureaucracies.

In-Band Full-Duplex Communications for Cellular Networks with Partial Uplink/Downlink Overlap

In-band full-duplex (FD) communications have been optimistically promoted to improve the spectrum utilization in cellular networks. However, the explicit impact of spatial interference, imposed by FD communications, on uplink and downlink transmissions has been overlooked in the literature. This paper presents an extensive study of the explicit effect of FD communications on the uplink and downlink performances. For the sake of rigorous analysis, we develop a tractable framework based on stochastic geometry toolset. The developed model accounts for uplink truncated channel inversion power control in FD cellular networks. The study shows that FD communications improve the downlink throughput at the expense of significant degradation in the uplink throughput. Therefore, we propose a novel fine-grained duplexing scheme, denoted as $\alpha$-duplex scheme, which allows a partial overlap between uplink and downlink frequency bands. To this end, we show that the amount of the overlap can be optimized via adjusting $\alpha$ to achieve a certain design objective.Comment: To be presented in IEEE Globecom 201

Value Creation in Digital Service Platforms

Value creation is increasingly relevant for owners of digital service platforms (DSPs). These owners have two vital goals: increase their service base and sustain their service offerers. A key element in continuously accommodating these goals is value creation. While the literature on DSPs is growing, there is a paucity of knowledge on the value creation process in these platforms. Drawing on a qualitative study of Uber drivers in Denmark and Sweden, we synthesize Schumpeter’s theory of value creation to develop an understanding of the value creation process in DSPs from the perspective of service offerers. As such, our study proposes and contributes a value creation framework for DSPs that identifies 8 value sources and highlights resource combination and exchange in the process of value creation

The Evolving Interdependencies between Banks and Fintechs within Open Banking Platforms

The enactment of the revised Payment Services Directive (PSD2) by the European Union, has pushed banks to develop digital open banking platforms to enhance market competition and promote innovation in the banking industry. PSD2 mandates banks to offer APIs to provide access to banking data to external third-party providers (TPPs). This mandate might disrupt the role of banks since external complementors such as fintechs have the legal right to access and leverage banking data to offer innovative banking services. As such, the emergence of regulated open banking platforms engenders complex interdependent relationships between banks and fintechs. Drawing on a case of an open banking platform by Nordea Bank, we aim to examine these interdependencies with emphasis on the engagement between banks and external complementors in a regulated platform context. We conclude with insights into the lack of access control by platform owners and new conditions of platform openness

Replacement Teacher Job Portal Southern Aghwar Directorate Ministry of Education Jordan

A web-based online job application becomes the most useful tool to access the information about the applicant, and applicant information is accessible at the press of a button immediately. Graduates need to work hard to get job that may require cost and time, using Internet technology significantly will reduces the cost and time of transferring information over distance. The purpose of this study was to develop a job portal for South Aghwar Directorate in order to replace the old system, which give job seeker a flexible way to access jobs and give them the capability to register, search, and receive information and Enable them to obtain vacancy as a replacement teacher via online services. Replacement Teacher Job Portal system comprises of a database that is built using MySQL database application software, Apache server as the web server and JSP as its application server. The methodology used is General Methodology using the Unified Modeling Language-UA Approach

The Effectiveness of Corporate Governance: The Impact of Board Quality on the Performance of Malaysian Listed Companies

The study aims to empirically investigate board quality namely; multiple directorships, board independence, board meeting and directors' financial expertise in construction and technology companies that are listed in Bursa Malaysia have impact over their firm performance (ROA). For the purpose of this study, 48 construction companies and 89 technology companies have been chosen from Bursa Malaysia. The conduct of testing is controlled by firm size and level of leverage. The findings show those factors of board quality namely, multiple directorships, board meeting and directors' financial expertise have no significant impact on ROA, while board independence has negative impact on ROA. The findings also show firm size has significant positive relationship with ROA; however the result shows that there is no significant relationship between leverage and ROA

Characterization Of Superparamagnetic Iron Oxide Nanoparticles With Different Surfactants - In Search Of Optimum Synthesis Parameters For Mri Application

Superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles (SPIONs) have been extensively studied for various biomedical applications, such as magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) contrast agents, and hyperthermia. The most common approach used to produce SPIONs is co-precipitation method. However, problem due to agglomeration and the broad size distribution of nanoparticles prepared by co-precipitation method hinder their application progress in MRI. Therefore, this study aims to produce a highly stabilized and monodispersed SPIONs for MRI contrast agents. In this thesis, SPIONs were synthesized with different surfactants (tri-sodium citrate, polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP), chitosan, cetyl trimethylammonium bromide (CTAB) and citric acid) using the one pot co-precipitation method for surface modification and to ensure excellent colloidal stability in water. In addition, the synthesis parameters such as surfactant concentration, pH, and temperature of reaction were optimized to obtain stabilized SPIONs. The SPIONs prepared in the presence of tri-sodium citrate formed the most stable SPIONs due to improved physiological condition, dispersion and stabilization in aqueous solution. In addition, citrate-SPIONs displayed the highest zeta potential (ζ= -44.0 mV) and saturation magnetization (Ms=53.9 emu g-1) compared with other samples, due to the ability of three carboxylate groups dissociated from the citrate to strongly bind to the surface of SPIONs. The TEM measurements of the different SPIONs indicated that the type of surfactant affects their average particle sizes and size distribution. In addition, the presence of defects within the spinel structure, i.e., oxidation of the SPIONs, seems to be also influenced by the choice of surfactant