Impact of organizational politics on employee performance in public sector organizations

The present study seeks to investigate the impact of organizational politics on employee performance in the public sector organizations. The study developed a framework on the basis of an extensive literature review which was then tested to provide an empirical insight about the proposed relationships. The data were collected from the employees of 15 public sector organizations in Pakistan. The data was statistically analyzed using regression analysis. The results revealed that organizational politics have a significant impact on employee performance. The findings of the study reinforce that the management needs to understand the perception of employees about the organizational politics prevailing in their organizations and have to adopt strategies that would minimize the perception of organizational politics and enhance employee performance. The present study has been conducted in a developing economy; therefore, the findings of the present study are partially generalized able to other developing economies as well. The future researchers can also perform the studies in other settings

Keamanan Fisik Teknologi Informasi: Desain Lingkungan

Keamanan fisik fasilitas teknologi informasi menjadi semakin populer beberapa tahun belakangan ini. Hal ini disebabkan oleh semakin meningkatnya kesadaran institusi teknologi informasi terhadap pentingnya keamanan fasilitas fisik mereka. Keamanan fisik mempunyai cakupan yang sangat luas, meliputi hak akses, lingkungan dan juga infrastruktur. Banyak institusi tidak mempunyai pilihan dalam membangun keamanan fisiknya sendiri. Karena mayoritas infrastuktur yang digunakan merupakan infrastruktur yang sudah siap pakai. Hal ini tentu saja sangat membatasi kebijakan keamanan fisik yang ingin diterapkan. Selain aspek infrastruktur, ada aspek lain yang sering terabaikan, yaitu manusia yang terlibat di dalamnya. Manusia dapat melakukan kejahatan dengan berbagai kondisi. Maka dari itu, keamanan fisik juga harus mempertimbangkan motif dan situasi yang dapat memicu terjadinya kejahatan oleh manusia. Bahkan orang yang sangat dipercayapun mampu melakukan kejahatan jika motif dan situasinya mendukung. Dalam tulisan ini akan dibahas beberapa alternatif penanganan keamanan fisik berdasarkan CPTED (Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design) serta standarisasi infrastruktur berdasarkan TIA-942. Konsep dasar dari CPTED adalah bahwa lingkungan fisik dapat diubah dan berdampak pada berkurangnya tindak kejahatan. CPTED berfokus pada empat area untuk mencapai tujuannya, yaitu pengendalian akses, pengawasan pasif, kegiatan pendukung, dan motivasi. Sedangkan TIA-942 adalah standar yang dikeluarkan oleh Telecommunications Industry Association untuk infrastruktur teknologi informasi

Measuring Multidimensional Poverty and Inequality in Pakistan

The key development objective of Pakistan, since its existence, has been to reduce poverty, inequality and to improve the condition of its people. While this goal seems very important in itself yet is also necessary for the eradication of other social, political and economic problems. The objective to eradicate poverty has remained same but methodology to analysing this has changed. It can be said that failure of most of the poverty strategies is due to lack of clear choice of poverty definition. A sound development policy including poverty alleviation hinges upon accurate and well-defined measurements of multidimensional socio-economic characteristics which reflect the ground realities confronting the poor and down trodden rather than using some abstract/income based criteria for poverty measurement. Conventionally welfare has generally been measured using income or expenditures criteria. Similarly, in Pakistan poverty has been measured mostly in uni-dimension, income or expenditures variables. However, recent literature on poverty has pointed out some drawbacks in measuring uni-dimensional poverty in terms of money. It is argued that uni-dimensional poverty measures are insufficient to understand the wellbeing of individuals. Poverty is a multidimensional concept rather than a unidimensional. Uni-dimensional poverty is unable to capture a true picture of poverty because poverty is more than income deprivatio

Strongly lensed SNe Ia in the era of LSST: observing cadence for lens discoveries and time-delay measurements

The upcoming Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST) will detect many strongly lensed Type Ia supernovae (LSNe Ia) for time-delay cosmography. This will provide an independent and direct way for measuring the Hubble constant $H_0$, which is necessary to address the current $4.4 \sigma$ tension in $H_0$ between the local distance ladder and the early Universe measurements. We present a detailed analysis of different observing strategies for the LSST, and quantify their impact on time-delay measurement between multiple images of LSNe Ia. For this, we produced microlensed mock-LSST light curves for which we estimated the time delay between different images. We find that using only LSST data for time-delay cosmography is not ideal. Instead, we advocate using LSST as a discovery machine for LSNe Ia, enabling time delay measurements from follow-up observations from other instruments in order to increase the number of systems by a factor of 2 to 16 depending on the observing strategy. Furthermore, we find that LSST observing strategies, which provide a good sampling frequency (the mean inter-night gap is around two days) and high cumulative season length (ten seasons with a season length of around 170 days per season), are favored. Rolling cadences subdivide the survey and focus on different parts in different years; these observing strategies trade the number of seasons for better sampling frequency. In our investigation, this leads to half the number of systems in comparison to the best observing strategy. Therefore rolling cadences are disfavored because the gain from the increased sampling frequency cannot compensate for the shortened cumulative season length. We anticipate that the sample of lensed SNe Ia from our preferred LSST cadence strategies with rapid follow-up observations would yield an independent percent-level constraint on $H_0$.Comment: 25 pages, 22 figures; accepted for publication in A&

Economics of nitrogen and integrated weed management in dry seeded rice

Dry-seeded rice (DSR) is an emerging production technology in many Asian countries, whose profitability is higher than puddled transplanted rice. However, weed infestations are severe in the DSR. To increase the competitiveness with weeds and achieve the yield potential of rice, weed management in DSR needs an integration of herbicides and higher nitrogen (N) fertilizer rates. Field experiments were conducted in the aman (wet season) 2012 and 2013 in Bangladesh to evaluate the effect of N rates (0, 80, 120, and 160 kg ha) and weed control methods [one hand weeding (HW); pendimethalin 1000 g ai ha followed by (fb) ethoxysulfuron 20 g ai ha; pendimethalin fb ethoxysulfuron fb one HW; and weed-free] on weed growth and crop yield in DSR. The experiment was arranged in a split-plot design with three replications. The highest grain yield (5.3 to 5.5 t ha) was recorded in the season-long manual weed free treatment when N rate was160 kg ha; however, because of the high cost of labor, this method was not profitable. The use of pendimethalin fb ethoxysulfuron fb one HW effectively controlled weeds and produced a similar yield with the weed-free treatment for all levels of N. However, weed management cost was also higher because of the involvement of one HW. Although pendimethalin fb ethoxysulfuron treatment had always lower yielded than the pendimethalin fb ethoxysulfuron fb one HW, grain yield increased and net profit was similar when N rate increased from 120 to 160 kg ha. Considering weed control efficiency, yield, and economics, pendimethalin fb ethoxysulfuron fb one HW with 120 kg N ha may be recommended to growers. However, if laborers are not available for hand weeding, pendimethalin fb ethoxysulfuron with 160 kg N ha is the best option to achieve high yield in DSR

Yield of Muscle Biopsy in Patients with Findings of Myopathy on Electrodiagnostic Testing

Background: The evaluation of neuromuscular diseases includes detailed clinical assessment, blood testing, electrodiagnostic studies (EDS), biopsy, and genetic tests. EDS alone cannot provide a specific diagnosis. Further testing in the form of genetic tests or muscle biopsy (MB) is required. Objective The objective of the study is to evaluate the yield of MB in patients with findings of myopathy on electrodiagnostic testing and assess the factors affecting an abnormal biopsy outcome. Methods: Electromyography (EMG)/nerve conduction studies (NCS) performed for suspected myopathy over 5 years from 2011 to 2016, at the neurophysiology department of a tertiary care center in Pakistan, were reviewed. Based on inclusion criteria, records of 58 patients were retrospectively reviewed. Results: After an EMG/NCS diagnosis of myopathy, the frequency of MB testing was only 10.1%. The median age of patients was 26.5 years. The clinically suspected diagnosis was categorized into hereditary myopathy (n = 15, 25.9%) and acquired myopathy (n = 18, 31%). The positive predictive value of EMG is 77.2%. Twenty-eight (48.2%) patients had abnormal MB whereas 20 (34.4%) revealed normal findings. Factors significantly influencing an abnormal outcome of biopsy included moderate-to-severe elevation of creatine kinase (\u3e2,000 U/L),presence of denervation changes, and severe myopathy on EMG. Conclusion: Even though the overall yield of MB testing may not be very high in our setting due to the unavailability of special techniques and expertise, certain factors can help to improve the diagnostic yield. Clinicians should encourage MB testing, especially in cases with strong clinical, laboratory and electrodiagnostic suspicion, and absence of genetic testing for suspected myopathy

Vestibular schwannomas: Clinical presentation, management and outcome

Objective: To review the demographic trends clinical spectrum, diagnosis, management and outcome of patients with vestibular Schwannoma and to identify areas where improvements are needed.Methods: All patients with vestibular schwannoma admitted to the Aga Khan University Hospital over the past 11 years were reviewed retrospectively.Results: The age range of majority of 22 patients analyzed, was 41-50 years (23%). Hearing loss was the most common presenting symptom (96%). Other clinical features included cranial nerve palsies (59%) and headache (55%). Fifty percent had signs of raised intracranial pressure. Neuroimaging revealed Stage IV b (tumor distorting the brainstem and compressing the 4th ventricle) in 50% cases. Neurosurgical intervention was carried out in 86%; mainly using the retrosigmoid approach. Postoperative complications included facial nerve palsy in 13 (65%) and hydrocephalus in 5 (25%) patients. Hearing determined clinically was preserved in three patients (14%). One patient died during the inpatient stay.Conclusion: Presentation of these patients is late and the outcome is poor

AEGRP: an enhanced geographical routing protocol for vanet

Vehicular ad hoc network (VANET), is a derivative type of mobile ad hoc networks with its unique characteristics and an essential part of intelligent transportation system (ITS). In VANET, the vehicles can disseminate information to certain or all vehicles within a region for different applications. Applications can be categorized as safety, convenience and comfort of the driver and passengers such as traffic conditions, accident detection, roadway safety, mobile sensing, and infotainment. These promising applications require intelligent and efficient routing protocols, which are capable of adapting rapidly changing topologies, high mobility in the network. Geographic routing protocols have become a popular routing type because of its simplicity and low overhead features, but recent research has recognized these protocols are not considering many particular constraints of the vehicular environment. However, existing routing protocols offered limited performance due to frequent disconnectivity, high signal interference in the presence of obstacles and lead to network delay and overhead issues. The main objective of this paper is to design an enhanced geographical routing protocol that addresses the network delay problems and provide necessary improvements over conventional geographic routing in light of constraints of these environments