Guía para implementación de un sistema de gestión de la calidad bajo la norma NTC GP 1000:2004 en empresas prestadoras de servicios públicos, caso particular: empresas de acueductos

La Ley 872 de 2003 reglamentada a través del decreto 4110 de 2004 precisa en su artículo 1, que el propósito de implementar un sistema de gestión de la calidad es servir como “…una herramienta de gestión sistemática y transparente que permita dirigir y evaluar el desempeño institucional, en términos de calidad y satisfacción social en la prestación de los servicios…”. Este documento pretende convertirse en una ayuda didáctica para aquellas empresas prestadoras de servicios públicos domiciliarios cuya intención este orientada en lograr la satisfacción de sus clientes a través de la estandarización de sus procesos que en última instancia garantiza un buen servicio ya sea: de agua potable, saneamiento básico y /o aseo. Aunque la norma NTCGP 1000:2004 se deriva de la norma ISO 9001 versión 2000: muy popular a nivel internacional, este tipo de certificación solo tiene validez en Colombia, donde se le transformo, a partir de la mencionada, hasta convertirla en una herramienta de evaluación de la gestión pública. El que existan pocos antecedentes de normativas de igual interés en otros países, se convierte en obstáculo para su interpretación y aplicación. La norma NTCGP 1000:2004, no se reduce a un ISO. La literatura existente acerca del tema se limita a referirse a modelos que distan mucho del alcance de las empresas prestadoras de servicio públicos domiciliarios. Este documento abordará el tema específico de las empresas que prestan el servicio de acueducto y como este tipo de entidades pueden relacionarse con la norma en cuestión

Assessing the Sensitivity of Different Life Stages for Sexual Disruption in Roach (Rutilus rutilus) Exposed to Effluents from Wastewater Treatment Works

Surveys of U.K. rivers have shown a high incidence of sexual disruption in populations of wild roach (Rutilus rutilus) living downstream from wastewater treatment works (WwTW), and the degree of intersex (gonads containing both male and female structural characteristics) has been correlated with the concentration of effluent in those rivers. In this study, we investigated feminized responses to two estrogenic WwTWs in roach exposed for periods during life stages of germ cell division (early life and the postspawning period). Roach were exposed as embryos from fertilization up to 300 days posthatch (dph; to include the period of gonadal sex differentiation) or as postspawning adult males, and including fish that had received previous estrogen exposure, for either 60 or 120 days when the annual event of germ cell proliferation occurs. Both effluents induced vitellogenin synthesis in both life stages studied, and the magnitude of the vitellogenic responses paralleled the effluent content of steroid estrogens. Feminization of the reproductive ducts occurred in male fish in a concentration-dependent manner when the exposure occurred during early life, but we found no effects on the reproductive ducts in adult males. Depuration studies (maintenance of fish in clean water after exposure to WwTW effluent) confirmed that the feminization of the reproductive duct was permanent. We found no evidence of ovotestis development in fish that had no previous estrogen exposure for any of the treatments. In wild adult roach that had previously received exposure to estrogen and were intersex, the degree of intersex increased during the study period, but this was not related to the immediate effluent exposure, suggesting a previously determined programming of ovotestis formation

University industry links and product innovation: cooperate or contract?

The role of universities in product innovation has received considerable attention over the past decade. However, little is known about how the type of formal university-firm interaction predicts innovative performance and the degree of novelty of new products. This research differentiates two forms of firm high-relational interaction with universities: R&D contracting and cooperation. We exploit the panel structure of a dataset of 5,858 Spanish manufacturing firms with fixed-effects models. The empirical analysis finds that, although both contracting and cooperation predict product innovative performance, the two activities differ in the degree of novelty of new product outcomes. The implications are that the codified nature and asymmetric scope of R&D contracting is more suitable for exploitative innovation, resulting in product innovation that is incremental in nature. On the other hand, the possibility to exchange and create tacit knowledge and the explorative nature of R&D cooperation provide firms with the opportunity to better access the broad knowledge base of universities, leading to product innovations with a higher degree of novelt

Características de la demanda de I+D de las universidades de la Comunidad Valenciana

9 pages, 7 tables, 1 figurePeer reviewe

Do classrooms matter? Pass rates, achievement and classroom procedures: a quanti-qualitative study.

Urban upper primary schools in Espirito Santo are better staffed and equipped than rural schools yet their "pass rates" are lower. Given evidence that: (a) urban areas are more developed than rural areas, (b) development and educational quality correlate positively, (c) school characteristics account for about 80 percent of the variation in pupil achievement in less developed countries, and (d) learning assessment in Brazil is not centralized, the reported "pass rates" are paradoxical and call for clarification. This is the problem this thesis approaches from a quanti-qualitative focus. Survey data on achievement scores, school results and the correlations between these measures of pupil attainments indicate that "pass rates" enmesh teachers' set learning goals. High school results / lower achievement scores in rural areas, which lack significant correlations, suggest lower quality education geared towards rote-learning. Lower school results / higher achievement scores in urban areas, with weak-moderate positive correlations signal more complex cognitive demands and improvement of educational quality through content understanding. Therefore, "pass rates" have specific meanings and are not suitable as comparison of performance of different schools. The ethnography of an urban school illuminates the survey findings and unveil the meaning of "pass rates" from the viewpoint of "successful" classroom practices. In a context of similar qualifications teachers share a progressive pedagogical discourse but their classroom practices portray diversity of educational quality and corresponding learning achievement standards. Teaching approaches, displayed in a typology (based in textbook use and pupils participation in the lesson), represent a continuum from rote-learning to the recreation of knowledge. Options for teaching approaches are compromises between educational ideals and existing constraints. These include teachers' competence (rooted in their background), the ethos and culture of the school, and external demands on schooling. Pupils' responses to teaching approaches embody their appraisal of the process, the subjectmatter, and prevailing teacher-pupil affective ties. Ultimately learning outcomes expressed through "pass rates" represent distinctive teaching practices and learning results

Marshallian industrial district evolution: Technological impacts and firms’ heterogeneity

This paper adds to the literature by deconstructing knowledge heterogeneity for the understanding of cluster evolution. Starting from the distinction between sustaining and radical innovations, as moderators of knowledge heterogeneity in Marshallian industrial districts (MIDs), this study’s objective consists of answering the question why and how districts evolve, through the understanding of the differing processes creating knowledge, i.e. sustaining and radical, and the type of firms that do so, and analysing critical issues such as how technological changes affect the pattern of district evolution. Theoretical development states that (1) in MIDs radical disruption can be expected to be led by new firms and not by incumbent technology gatekeepers (TGs), which are mainly oriented to providing incremental innovations in order to maintain their status quo and centrality, and (2) in MIDs leading incumbents demonstrate predominantly an orientation towards the creation of sustaining knowledge in dense and orchestrated networks and aim to develop competence-enhancing variety which ensures their centrality and the status quo, making clusters evolve expanding central stages, i.e. specialization. Our argumentation has also challenged a central assumption in MIDs about leading incumbents: the type of knowledge necessary to challenge leading incumbents must be new to the industry and to the district, based on exploratory district boundary-spanning, technology-distant knowledge

Do firms benefit from interactions with public research organisations beyond innovation? An analysis of small firms

In this paper we argue that there is an extensive number of studies examining how firms obtain new products from their interactions with scientific agents, but other type of benefits has been overlooked. Specifically, we add to previous literature by considering not only product innovation, but also exploratory (long-term) and exploitative (short-term) results. We administer a tailored survey to firms collaborating with the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) and data was completed with secondary sources. Results based on a sample of 756 firms suggest that firms consider all types of result as moderately important to them. Moreover, we observe that small firms report higher benefits in terms of product innovation and long-term results in contrast to large firms

Las relaciones universidad empresa y su efecto sobre la segunda misión universitaria

Tesis Doctoral presentada por: Dña. Liney Adriana Manjarrés Henríquez en el Departamento de Estadística e Investigación Operativa Aplicadas y Calidad de la Universidad Politécnica de Valencia.En los últimos años se ha estimulado a las universidades para que adopten una nueva misión, relacionada con la aplicación y explotación del conocimiento y de otras capacidades universitarias, fuera del ámbito académico. Esta nueva misión ha incrementado las relaciones entre la universidad y su entorno socioeconómico, y ha abierto un campo de debate de gran interés, centrado en los potenciales conflictos y beneficios que tales relaciones pueden tener sobre el desarrollo de las misiones tradicionales, especialmente la investigación. En este sentido, la cuestión central que emerge en este campo es si la universidad es la institución adecuada para transferir y comercializar el conocimiento, no porque dicha función sea incompatible con la de crear conocimiento, sino porque se ejerce con un coste que puede resultar excesivo (David et al. 1994). En el marco descrito se inserta la presente tesis que tiene como objetivo principal evaluar empíricamente el efecto de las relaciones universidad-empresa sobre la segunda misión universitaria. El estudio empírico toma como caso de análisis las dos universidades más importantes de la Comunidad Valenciana- España. La muestra final está conformada por más de 2000 profesores, de los que se tiene información para el periodo 1999-2004. Los resultados más relevantes de esta investigación muestran que las actividades de RUE sólo ejercen un efecto positivo cuando están basadas en actividades con alto contenido científico tecnológico y hasta cierto nivel, a partir del cual se experimentan retornos marginales decrecientes del rendimiento científico. Adicionalmente, se encontró que el efecto positivo que ejercen los contratos de I+D sobre la producción científica, esta moderado por las características del socio con el que se establecen dichos contratos. Estos resultados tienen dos importantes implicaciones. Por una parte, muestran que el desarrollo de actividades rutinarias para la industria puede derivar en pobres indicadores de rendimiento científico, y por otra parte, advierten del peligro que tiene un énfasis exagerado en actividades de vinculación, aunque estén basadas en actividades de I+D. En términos generales, los resultados anteriores tienen una implicación importante en el diseño de las políticas universitarias. Si bien destacan que las RUE no penalizan per se la producción científica del docente, subrayan que el fomento indiscriminado de este tipo de actividades puede derivar en un menor rendimiento científico. En este sentido, emergen algunas preocupaciones con respecto al impacto negativo que pueden tener sobre la contribución científica de los investigadores universitarios, algunas políticas de fomento de la RUE tales como, la disminución de los fondos públicos para la investigación tradicional. El reto para las instituciones gubernamentales y las universidades en general, se encuentra en el diseño de políticas más selectivas orientadas a minimizar los conflictos entre las funciones y alcanzar un equilibrio adecuado entre las actividades de segunda y tercera misión, que aprovechen las complementariedades que se pueden generar entre ellas.[CA]: En els últims anys s'ha estimulat a les universitats perquè adopten una nova missió, relacionada amb l'aplicació i explotació del coneixement i d'altres capacitats universitàries, fora de l'àmbit acadèmic. Esta nova missió ha incrementat les relacions entre la universitat i el seu entorn socioeconòmic, i ha obert un camp de debat de gran interés, centrat en els potencials conflictes i beneficis que tals relacions poden tindre sobre el desenvolupament de les missions tradicionals, especialment la investigació. En este sentit, la qüestió central que emergix en este camp és si la universitat és la institució adequada per a transferir i comercialitzar el coneixement, no perquè la dita funció siga incompatible amb la de crear coneixement, sinó perquè s'exercix amb un cost que pot resultar excessiu (David t'al. 1994). En el marc descrit s'inserix la present tesi que té com a objectiu principal avaluar empíricament l'efecte de les relacions universitat-empresa sobre la segona missió universitària. L'estudi empíric presa com a cas d'anàlisis les dos universitats més importants de la Comunitat Valenciana- Espanya. La mostra final està conformada per 2135 professors, dels que es té informació per al període 1999-2004. En general, la tesi posa de manifest que les activitats de RUE només exercixen un efecte positiu quan estan basades en activitats amb alt contingut científic tecnològic i fins a cert nivell, a partir del qual s'experimenten retorns marginals decreixents del rendiment científic. Addicionalment, es va trobar que l'efecte positiu que exercixen els contractes d'I+D sobre la producció científica, esta moderat per les característiques del soci amb què s'establixen tals contractes. Els resultats anteriors tenen importants implicacions. D'una banda, mostren que el desenvolupament d'activitats rutinàries per a la indústria pot derivar en pobres indicadors de rendiment científic, i d'altra banda, advertixen del perill que té un èmfasi exagerat en activitats de vinculació, encara que estiguen basades en activitats d'I+D. Este últim punt destaca la necessitat aprofundir en el debat sobre els límits de les relacions universitat empresa, ja que, almenys en el context analitzat, la condició de “com més, millor” no es complix per a les activitats de RUE. El repte per a les institucions governamentals i les universitats en general, es troba en el disseny de polítiques més selectives orientades a minimitzar els conflictes entre les funcions i aconseguir un equilibri adequat entre les activitats de segona i tercera missió, que aprofiten les complementarietats que es poden generar entre elles.[EN]: During the last decades a new university “mission” has been promoted from different social spheres, related with the application and exploitation, outside the academic environment, of the knowledge and other capabilities available to universities. This new mission has generated an increment of the relations between the university and its socioeconomic environment, and has opened a new field for debate and scientific analysis, focused on the conflicts and benefits of such relations. The central question that emerges in this field is if the university is the appropriate institution to transfer and to commercialize knowledge, not because this function is incompatible with the one of creating knowledge, but because it is exercised with a cost that can be excessive (David et al. 1994). It is within this context that this thesis aims to evaluate the effects that university-industry relations exercise on the development of one of the traditional university missions: research. The analysis of this question is carried out taking as case of study the University of Valencia and the Polytechnic University of Valencia. Specifically, the study sample comes from a database of more than 2,000 faculty members from these two universities, who have conducted research projects and/or been involved in UIR activities during the 1999–2004 period. The data are analyzed at lecturer level and focus on three aspects: UIR, academic research activities and scientific production. The most relevant results from this study are that UIR can have a positive effect on scientific production, depending on the type and the intensity of the linkage activity, and the partner’s characteristics. For example, if the linkage is based on activities with high scientific or technological content (R&D contracts), but only up to a certain level of intensity. These results have two important implications. On the one hand, they show that the development of routine activities for industry can result in loss of scientific production, and on the other hand, they warn of the risks of too much emphasis in UIR activities even when they are based on R&D. This highlights that, at least in this context, the condition of “more is better” does not apply to UIR activities. The above results have also important implications for the design of university policies. Although they show that UIR does not penalize per se a researcher’s scientific productivity, they underline that the indiscriminate promotion of these types of activities could result in lower scientific performance. Therefore, some policies promoting UIR as a substitute of the public funds for research, raise concerns regarding the negative impact those policies could have on scientific contribution.Peer reviewe