How to Manage Organizational Reputation when Under Attack: Learnings from the Child and Adult Protection Authorities

What does the reputation management of a public authority look like under extreme conditions? The present article studies the Swiss Child and Adult Protection Authorities (CAPA), which experienced a major reputational crisis after a mother killed her two children in 2015 and accused the CAPA of bearing responsibility. We use the CAPA as one of the most contested public organizations in Switzerland to study reputation management when a public authority is under severe attack and draw learnings for public organizations in similar situations in the future. Applying the Narrative Policy Framework (NPF) in a content analysis to newspaper articles from the German- speaking part of Switzerland, we examine narratives uttered by CAPA representatives. Furthermore, by comparing the CAPA’s communication with a similar case in the Romandie, we draw general lessons for public organizations that want to improve their reputation management and crisis communication. The results show how in German-speaking Switzerland, negative media reports increased sharply and caused lasting damage to the CAPA’s reputation. By contrast, the scandal in French-speaking Switzerland did not lead to a full-blown crisis. Our findings underscore the need for public organizations to speak up when under attack, to build up the respective communication skills and resources and to employ positive narratives with shiny hero characters rather than negative narratives emphasizing villains.Wie sieht das Reputationsmanagement einer Behörde unter Extrembedingungen aus? Der vorliegende Artikel untersucht die schweizerischen Kindes- und Erwachsenenschutzbehörden (KESB), die eine schwere Reputationskrise erlebten, nachdem eine Mutter im Jahr 2015 ihre beiden Kinder getötet und die KESB beschuldigt hatte, dafür verantwortlich zu sein. Wir verwenden die KESB als eine der am stärksten umstrittenen öffentlichen Organisationen in der Schweiz, um zu untersuchen, wie Reputationsmanagement aussieht, wenn eine öffentliche Behörde massiv angegriffen wird, und um Lehren für öffentliche Organisationen in der Zukunft zu ziehen, wenn sie sich in ähnlichen Situationen wiederfinden. Wir untersuchen Narrative von KESB-Vertreter*innen, die in grossen deutschsprachigen Schweizer Zeitungen erschienen sind. Darüber hinaus vergleichen wir die Kommunikation der KESB mit einem ähnlichen Fall in der Romandie und ziehen daraus allgemeine Lehren für öffentliche Organisationen, die ihr Reputationsmanagement und ihre Krisenkommunikation verbessern wollen. Die Ergebnisse zeigen, wie in der Deutschschweiz die negative Medienberichterstattung ausser Kontrolle geriet und den Ruf der KESB nachhaltig schädigte. Im Gegensatz dazu führte der Skandal in der Westschweiz nicht zu einer ernsthaften Krise. Unsere Ergebnisse unterstreichen die Notwendigkeit für öffentliche Organisationen, sich zu äussern, wenn sie angegriffen werden, die entsprechenden Kommunikationsfähigkeiten und -ressourcen aufzubauen und positive Narrative mit glänzenden Heldenfiguren anstelle von negativen Narrativen mit Bösewichten zu verbreiten.À quoi ressemble la gestion de la réputation d’une autorité publique dans des conditions extrêmes? Cet article analyse les services de protection de la jeunesse (SPJ) suisses, qui ont connu une crise de réputation majeure après qu’une mère ait tué ses deux enfants en 2015 et accusé la SPJ d’en porter la responsabilité. Nous utilisons la SPJ comme l’une des organisations publiques les plus contestées en Suisse pour étudier la gestion de la réputation lorsqu’une autorité publique est sévèrement attaquée et pour en tirer des leçons pour les organisations publiques dans des situations similaires à l’avenir. Nous examinons les narratifs des représentants de la SPJ qui ont été publiés dans les principaux journaux suisses germanophones. En outre, en comparant la communication de la SPJ avec un cas similaire en Romandie, nous tirons des leçons générales pour les organisations publiques qui veulent améliorer leur gestion de la réputation et leur communication de crise. Les résultats montrent comment, en Suisse alémanique, les rapports négatifs des médias ont échappé à tout contrôle et ont causé des dommages durables à la réputation de la SPJ. En revanche, le scandale en Suisse romande n’a pas débouché sur une véritable crise. Nos résultats soulignent la nécessité pour les organisations publiques de s’exprimer lorsqu’elles sont attaquées, de renforcer leurs compétences et leurs ressources en matière de communication et d’utiliser des narratifs positifs avec des héros brillants plutôt que des narratifs négatifs présentant des méchants

Reprocessing of dental instruments in washer-disinfectors: does a representative test soil exist in dentistry?

Background: Reprocessing of medical devices, being classified as semi-critical B is recommended to be performed in a washer-disinfector. In order to estimate, whether the expected contaminants of the various medical disciplines can be effectively removed by this washer-disinfector, different so called “test soils” have been proposed to be tested as a marker of cleaning efficacy of the disinfector. Todays described test soils are optimised for the testing of contaminations occurring in surgical procedures, but not for dental procedures

Public agency resilience in times of democratic backsliding: Structure, collaboration and professional standards

This article investigates how organizational structure, collaboration, and professional standards influence the resilience of public agencies facing adversity. It links organizational reputation and blame avoidance literature with resilience and collaboration literature. We use the case of the Swiss Child and Adult Protection Agencies (CAPA), which faced massive media attacks. We apply a qualitative research design analyzing data from interviews and participatory observations. Our findings show that professional organizational structure, collaboration and standards are three interrelated factors that increase resilience against adversity. In particular, these factors reduce “blame-avoiding policy implementation” (BAPI), which is a coping strategy where street-level bureaucrats (SLB) exploit their discretion to make policy implementation less blameworthy. In their interplay, professional organizational structure, collaboration and standards increase the knowledge of a public agency about a particular situation because they enable better-informed decisions through collective deliberation practices, and strengthens the collective ownership as well as the individual SLB's confidence that the right decision is being made

Time-resolved 3D visualization of air injection in a liquid-saturated refractive-index-matched porous medium

The main goal of this work is to implement and validate a visualization method with a given temporal/spatial resolution to obtain the dynamic three-dimensional (3D) structure of an air plume injected into a deformable liquid-saturated porous medium. The air plume develops via continuous air injection through an orifice at the bottom of a loose packing of crushed silica grains. The packing is saturated by a glycerin-water solution having the same refractive index and placed in a rectangular glass container. By using high-speed image acquisition through laser scanning, the dynamic air plume is recorded by sequential tomographic imaging. Due to the overlap between adjacent laser sheets and the light reflection, air bubbles are multiply exposed in the imaging along the scanning direction. Four image processing methods are presented for the removal of these redundant pixels arising from multiple exposure. The respective results are discussed by comparing the reconstructed air plume volume with the injected one and by evaluating the morphological consistency of the obtained air plume. After processing, a 3D dynamic air flow pattern can be obtained, allowing a quantitative analysis of the air flow dynamics on pore-scale. In the present experimental configuration, the temporal resolution is 0.1s and the spatial resolution is 0.17mm in plane and about 1mm out of plane of the laser shee

Testing for aerobic heterotrophic bacteria allows no prediction of contamination with potentially pathogenic bacteria in the output water of dental chair units

Background: Currently, to our knowledge, quality of output water of dental chair units is not covered by specific regulations in the European Union, and national recommendations are heterogeneous. In Germany, water used in dental chair units must follow drinking water quality. In the United States of America, testing for aerobic heterotrophic bacteria is recommended. The present study was performed to evaluate whether the counts of aerobic heterotrophic bacteria correlate with the presence of potentially pathogenic bacteria such as Legionella spp. or Pseudomonas aeruginosa

Delineation of Source Protection Zones Using Statistical Methods

Source protection zones are increasingly important for securing the long-term viability of drinking water derived from groundwater resources. These may be either time-related capture zones or catchments related to the activity of a pumping well or spring. The establishment of such zones is an indispensable measure for the proper assessment of groundwater resource vulnerability and reduction of risk, which may be induced by human activities. The delineation of these protection zones is usually performed with the aid of models, which are in turn based on site-specific information of the aquifer's geometry, hydraulic parameters and boundary conditions. Owing to the imperfect knowledge of such information, predicting the location of these zones is inherently uncertain. It is possible to quantify this uncertainty in a statistical manner through the development of probability maps, which shows the probability that a particular surface location belongs to the aquifer's capture zone (or catchment area). This publication aims at the investigation of the requirements for the establishment of probabilistic source protection zones, the practical use of stochastic methods in their delineation, and the use of data-assimilation for uncertainty reduction. It also provides a methodology for the implementation of these methods by modelling practitioner

The Pennsylvania Dutchman Vol. 8, No. 3

● The Dutch Touch in Iron ● The Pennsylvania Dutch Village ● Five June Days ● On an Amish Farm ● Traveling Pennsylvanians ● The Trail of the Stone Arched Bridges in Berks County ● Displaced Dutchmen Crave Shoo-flies ● Florence Starr Taylor ● Pennsylvania Dutch Pioneers ● Zinzendorf and Moravian Research ● Sheep in Dutchlandhttps://digitalcommons.ursinus.edu/dutchmanmag/1010/thumbnail.jp

The International Deep Planet Survey I. The frequency of wide-orbit massive planets around A-stars

Breakthrough direct detections of planetary companions orbiting A-type stars confirm the existence of massive planets at relatively large separations, but dedicated surveys are required to estimate the frequency of similar planetary systems. To measure the first estimation of the giant exoplanetary systems frequency at large orbital separation around A-stars, we have conducted a deep-imaging survey of young (8-400 Myr), nearby (19-84 pc) A- and F-stars to search for substellar companions in the 10-300 AU range. The sample of 42 stars combines all A-stars observed in previous AO planet search surveys reported in the literature with new AO observations from VLT/NaCo and Gemini/NIRI. It represents an initial subset of the International Deep Planet Survey (IDPS) sample of stars covering M- to B-stars. The data were obtained with diffraction-limited observations in H- and Ks-band combined with angular differential imaging to suppress the speckle noise of the central stars, resulting in typical 5-sigma detection limits in magnitude difference of 12 mag at 1", 14 mag at 2" and 16 mag at 5" which is sufficient to detect massive planets. A detailed statistical analysis of the survey results is performed using Monte Carlo simulations. Considering the planet detections, we estimate the fraction of A-stars having at least one massive planet (3-14 MJup) in the range 5-320 AU to be inside 5.9-18.8% at 68% confidence, assuming a flat distribution for the mass of the planets. By comparison, the brown dwarf (15-75 MJup) frequency for the sample is 2.0-8.9% at 68% confidence in the range 5-320 AU. Assuming power law distributions for the mass and semimajor axis of the planet population, the AO data are consistent with a declining number of massive planets with increasing orbital radius which is distinct from the rising slope inferred from radial velocity (RV) surveys around evolved A-stars.Comment: 20 pages, 10 figures, 7 tables. Accepted for publication in A&

Liquid-gas phase transition in nuclear multifragmentation

The equation of state of nuclear matter suggests that at suitable beam energies the disassembling hot system formed in heavy ion collisions will pass through a liquid-gas coexistence region. Searching for the signatures of the phase transition has been a very important focal point of experimental endeavours in heavy ion collisions, in the last fifteen years. Simultaneously theoretical models have been developed to provide information about the equation of state and reaction mechanisms consistent with the experimental observables. This article is a review of this endeavour.Comment: 63 pages, 27 figures, submitted to Adv. Nucl. Phys. Some typos corrected, minor text change

The Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey of SDSS-III

The Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey (BOSS) is designed to measure the scale of baryon acoustic oscillations (BAO) in the clustering of matter over a larger volume than the combined efforts of all previous spectroscopic surveys of large scale structure. BOSS uses 1.5 million luminous galaxies as faint as i=19.9 over 10,000 square degrees to measure BAO to redshifts z<0.7. Observations of neutral hydrogen in the Lyman alpha forest in more than 150,000 quasar spectra (g<22) will constrain BAO over the redshift range 2.15<z<3.5. Early results from BOSS include the first detection of the large-scale three-dimensional clustering of the Lyman alpha forest and a strong detection from the Data Release 9 data set of the BAO in the clustering of massive galaxies at an effective redshift z = 0.57. We project that BOSS will yield measurements of the angular diameter distance D_A to an accuracy of 1.0% at redshifts z=0.3 and z=0.57 and measurements of H(z) to 1.8% and 1.7% at the same redshifts. Forecasts for Lyman alpha forest constraints predict a measurement of an overall dilation factor that scales the highly degenerate D_A(z) and H^{-1}(z) parameters to an accuracy of 1.9% at z~2.5 when the survey is complete. Here, we provide an overview of the selection of spectroscopic targets, planning of observations, and analysis of data and data quality of BOSS.Comment: 49 pages, 16 figures, accepted by A