A pragmatic constructivist perspective on sensemaking in management control

In a famous story told by Weick (1995 ), a small military unit got lost in the Swiss Alps. As panic set in they found a map which calmed them down as they plotted a route back to their base. Finding that the map did not match land marks and obstacles, they used other information such as advice from villagers. When they eventually got to their base camp, they discovered that the map was of the Pyrenees and not the Alps. But, as Ancona put it: “When you’re tired, cold, hungry, and scared, any old map will do” ( 2012 , 6). Building on this story, this chapter deploys a pragmatic perspective (PC) to critically examine the notion that “any old map will do”. We consider that the map metaphor may be actually be a very useful way of conceptualising a management control package just as it can be for explaining the role of theoretical models in social science for as Joan Robinson (1962, 33) so famously put it: “A model which took account of all the variegation of reality would be of no more use than a map at the scale of one to one.” Similarly, a management control package need not try to represent the totality of organisational detail even if we knew what that was. We also fi nd that the map metaphor has a number of different aspects: how are maps made; how are these used; and what constitutes a ‘good map’? But drawing on the PC approach, we also fi nd that the map metaphor has limitations in comparison with a multi-dimensional perspective based on facts, logics, values and communication ( Nørreklit et al. 2006 ; Nørreklit 2011 ; Cinquini et al. 2013). In the next section we review some of the key insights of sensemaking that have infl uenced the management accounting and control literature. In the following sections we use pragmatic constructivism to point out some of the weaknesses of the sensemaking concept and how pragmatic constructivism can contribute to the use of sensemaking in a management control context

HGNC: The Why and How of Standardised Gene Nomenclature

The HUGO Gene Nomenclature Committee (HGNC) aims to approve a unique gene symbol and gene name for every human gene. Standardisation of gene symbols is necessary to allow researchers and curators to refer to the same gene without ambiguity. Consistent use of gene symbols in publications and across different websites makes it easy for researchers to find all relevant information for a particular gene and facilitates data mining and retrieval. For each gene that we name we curate relevant information including symbol aliases, chromosomal location, locus type, sequence accessions and links to relevant databases. Therefore, our website is a central resource for human genetics. 
 
We endeavour to approve gene symbols that are acceptable to researchers to encourage widespread use of our symbols. In order to achieve this, we contact researchers that work on particular genes for advice before approving symbols and allow researchers to submit gene symbols to us directly for our consideration. We attend conferences to discuss difficult nomenclature matters and to gain community agreement. We interact with annotators of genes and proteins to provide symbols and names that accurately reflect the nature of each gene and its products. We also work with the gene nomenclature committees for other organisms, and aim to approve equivalent gene symbols for orthologous genes in human and other vertebrate species, especially mouse and rat. 
 
We will demonstrate the steps that are required to name a gene, and will show how and where the nomenclature of a particular gene is used. We will also explain the nature of our collaborations with particular journals and other databases in striving to achieve the use of a common gene nomenclature by all

Controlling strategy through dialectical management

Abstract. Controlling strategy has been portrayed as a matter of managing tensions. But what are these tensions and how do they arise in firms? In this paper, organizational strategy is represented by a target operating model that is maintained by dialectical relationships between functional areas. Using a pragmatic constructivist framework, the functional areas may be conceptualised as specialised managerial topoi. Drawing on field work in the hospitality industry, the paper employs an actor-based research methodology to show that organizational tensions may develop out of conflicts between the different goals and logics associated with the various functional areas such as marketing, sales, revenue management and finance. Although there was evidence of accountants acting as custodians of the budgetary system, in some situations, other functional areas such as marketing or revenue management seemed to be the corporate policemen as they protected the corporate brand against unplanned price discounting or short term cost saving tactics. Rather than seeing functional specialisation as a disruptive obstacle to organizational coherence, the paper presents arguments and evidence which suggest that with the deployment of the principles of dialectical management, tensions between the different business functions can enhance strategic control and development

ANOS1: a unified nomenclature for Kallmann syndrome 1 gene (KAL1) and anosmin-1.

It is accepted that confusion regarding the description of genetic variants occurs when researchers do not use standard nomenclature. The Human Genome Organization Gene Nomenclature Committee contacted a panel of consultants, all working on the KAL1 gene, to propose an update of the nomenclature of the gene, as there was a convention in the literature of using the 'KAL1' symbol, when referring to the gene, but using the name 'anosmin-1' when referring to the protein. The new name, ANOS1, reflects protein name and is more transferrable across species.This work was supported by grants from the Spanish Ministerio de Economia y Competitividad-MINECO (SAF2012-40023 and RD12-0032-12) and Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas-CSIC (CSIC-2015201023) to F.dC., from National Human Genome Research Institute (U41HG003345) and Wellcome Trust (099129/Z/12/Z) to R.S. and from Fondazione Telethon (E.523) and Ministero dell’Istruzione Universitá e Ricerca (MIUR) to R.

Improved Reverse Transcription Loop-Mediated Isothermal Amplification (RT-LAMP) for the rapid and sensitive detection of Yam mosaic virus

Yam (Dioscorea spp.) productivity is constrained significantly by the lack of a formal seed system. Vegetative propagation, through tuber setts as ‘seed’ yams, encourages the recycling of virus-infected planting materials, contributing to high virus incidence and yield losses. Efforts are ongoing to increase the production of high-quality seed yams in a formal seed system to reduce virus-induced yield losses and enhance the crop’s productivity and food security. Specific and sensitive diagnostic tests are imperative to prevent the multiplication of virus-infected materials contributing to a sustainable seed yam certification system. During routine indexing of yam accessions, discrepancies were observed between the results obtained from the reverse transcription loop-mediated isothermal amplification (RT-LAMP) test and those from reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR); RT-LAMP failed to detect Yam mosaic virus (YMV) in some samples that tested positive by RT-PCR. This prompted the design of a new set of LAMP primers, YMV1-OPT primers. These primers detected as little as 0.1 fg/µL of purified RNA obtained from a YMV-infected plant, a sensitivity equivalent to that obtained with RT-PCR. RT-LAMP using YMV1-OPT primers is recommended for all future virus-indexing of seed yams for YMV, offering a rapid, sensitive, and cost-effective approach

Serum-deprivation stimulates cap-binding by PARN at the expense of eIF4E, consistent with the observed decrease in mRNA stability

PARN, a poly(A)-specific ribonuclease, binds the 5′ cap-structure of mRNA and initiates deadenylation-dependent decay. Eukaryotic initiation factor 4E (eIF4E) also binds to the cap structure, an interaction that is critical for initiating cap-dependent translation. The stability of various mRNA transcripts in human cell lines is reduced under conditions of serum starvation as determined by both functional and chemical half-lives. Serum starvation also leads to enhanced cap association by PARN. In contrast, the 5′ cap occupancy by eIF4E decreases under serum-deprivation, as does the translation of reporter transcripts. Further, we show that PARN is a phosphoprotein and that this modification can be modulated by serum status. Taken together, these data are consistent with a natural competition existing at the 5′ cap structure between PARN and eIF4E that may be regulated by changes in post-translational modifications. These phosphorylation-induced changes in the interplay of PARN and eIF4E may determine whether the mRNA is translated or decayed

Guidelines for human gene nomenclature.

Standardized gene naming is crucial for effective communication about genes, and as genomics becomes increasingly important in healthcare, the need for a consistent language for human genes becomes ever more vital. Here we present the current HUGO Gene Nomenclature Committee (HGNC) guidelines for naming not only protein-coding but also RNA genes and pseudogenes, and outline the changes in approach and ethos that have resulted from the discoveries of the last few decades.National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI) grant U24HG003345 (1.5.2018-30.4.-2023) Wellcome Trust grant 208349/Z/17/Z (1.9.2017-31.8.2022

Natural language processing in aid of FlyBase curators.

BACKGROUND: Despite increasing interest in applying Natural Language Processing (NLP) to biomedical text, whether this technology can facilitate tasks such as database curation remains unclear. RESULTS: PaperBrowser is the first NLP-powered interface that was developed under a user-centered approach to improve the way in which FlyBase curators navigate an article. In this paper, we first discuss how observing curators at work informed the design and evaluation of PaperBrowser. Then, we present how we appraise PaperBrowser's navigational functionalities in a user-based study using a text highlighting task and evaluation criteria of Human-Computer Interaction. Our results show that PaperBrowser reduces the amount of interactions between two highlighting events and therefore improves navigational efficiency by about 58% compared to the navigational mechanism that was previously available to the curators. Moreover, PaperBrowser is shown to provide curators with enhanced navigational utility by over 74% irrespective of the different ways in which they highlight text in the article. CONCLUSION: We show that state-of-the-art performance in certain NLP tasks such as Named Entity Recognition and Anaphora Resolution can be combined with the navigational functionalities of PaperBrowser to support curation quite successfully.RIGHTS : This article is licensed under the BioMed Central licence at http://www.biomedcentral.com/about/license which is similar to the 'Creative Commons Attribution Licence'. In brief you may : copy, distribute, and display the work; make derivative works; or make commercial use of the work - under the following conditions: the original author must be given credit; for any reuse or distribution, it must be made clear to others what the license terms of this work are

Viruses of yams (Dioscorea spp.): current gaps in knowledge and future research directions to improve disease management

Viruses are a major constraint for yam production worldwide. They hamper the conservation, movement, and exchange of yam germplasm and are a threat to food security in tropical and subtropical areas of Africa and the Pacific where yam is a staple food and a source of income. However, the biology and impact of yam viruses remains largely unknown. This review summarizes current knowledge on yam viruses and emphasizes gaps that exist in the knowledge of the biology of these viruses, their diagnosis, and their impact on production. It provides essential information to inform the implementation of more effective virus control strategies