Risk factors affecting the ability for earned value management to accurately assess the performance of infrastructure projects in Australia

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate a set of risk-related factors influencing the earned value management (EVM) concept as an assessment technique in evaluating the progress of modern sustainable infrastructure construction projects. Design/methodology/approach – A qualitative research approach has been adopted for identifying risk-related factors influencing EVM concept from a literature review and through interviewing industry personnel, followed by an inductive process to form sets of key factors and their measuring items. Findings – EVM is a common method for assessing project performance. A weakness of this approach is that EVM assessment in its current form does not measure the impact of a number of project performance factors that result from the complexity of modern infrastructure construction projects, and thus does not accurately assess their impact in this performance. This paper discusses and explains a range of potential risk factors to evaluating project performance such as sustainability, stakeholder requirements, communication, procurement strategy, weather, experience of staff, site condition, design issues, financial risk, subcontractor, government requirements and material. In addition, their measuring items were identified. Practical implications – This research assists projects managers to improve the evaluation process of infrastructure construction performance by incorporating a range of factors likely to impact on that performance and which are not included in current EVM calculations. Originality/value – This research addresses the need to include in the EVM calculation a range of risk factors affecting the performance of infrastructure projects in Australia and therefore makes this calculation a more reliable tool for assessing project performance

A geographical study of retail trade and of business districts in English county towns - an examination of regional and urban variations

This thesis studies retailing in Great Britain, but its methods of approach and techniques of analysis may be extended to other countries. International comparisons, however, are notoriously difficult in the distributive trades, for both obvious and more obscure reasons. During the final stages of the compilation of the thesis such comparison has become possible as a result of the work of Jefferys and Knee* (Table A). This note attempts to interpret this standardised data, published in November 1962, in relation to the findings of the thesis as a whole. A major subject of study in this thesis is large shops (high average sales per retail establishment). Jefferys and Knee have suggested that variations between the countries of Europe might be explained in terms of four factors:-(a) The number of inhabitants per establishment.(b) The number of employees per establishment.(c) Private expenditure per capita.(d) The structure of the trade. This thesis has found that in Britain two particular factors account for the distribution of large shops: the importance of medium sized towns in the settlement pattern, and of multiple traders in the retail sales of an area. Diagrams A and B show the relationship of these two factors to the size of shops in those countries of Europe with annual per capita private consumption expenditure of over 415 dollars (the rest of Europe has too dissimilar economic landscapes to make comparison profitable).The relationship between the size of shop and the proportion of the population in towns between 20,000 and 100,000 is close for the countries of Northern Europe. Only three countries are notably divergent, having smaller shop than their urban structure would warrant. These are however Belgium, France and the Netherlands, suggesting that different consumption habits and economic conditions in this part of Europe are important. The second relationship is far less marked. A relationship does however exist if the Scandinavian countries are isolated from the rest of Europe, for in these countries the great importance of Co-operative Retailing makes comparisons based on trade structure somewhat unreal. Austria is an exception for which no ready explanation can be given. A direct relationship between the two variables exists in the cases of the U.K., Switzerland, West Germany, Netherlands, France and Ireland. Jefferys and Knee have given a descriptive account of the variations in the size of shops. If causal explanations are to be found it is essential to examine the geographical pattern of retailing, the towns in which most shopping takes place and where large scale organisations set up their branches. It is clear that in order to explain the regional variations noted above much detailed examination would be needed. The study of retailing is also seen to be relevant to the examination of regional patterns which may not other1vise statistically be apparent.* Jefferys, J .B. and Knee, D. Retailing in Europe: Present Structure and future trends. London 1962

Experiential learning approaches for developing professional skills in postgraduate engineering students

The postgraduate coursework curriculum at the University of Southern Queensland includes a number of engineering management courses focused on developing professional engineering knowledge and skills, such as advanced project management, asset management, risk management and innovation management. Such skills are normally developed through traditional coursework approaches like on-line and written study materials, lectures and tutorials. While such teaching approaches have been successful, it is considered desirable to more strongly embed the professional skills taught into the learner’s future professional practice. Teaching techniques based on experiential learning have the potential to achieve this objective, through processes based on activities like having a concrete experience, reflective observation, abstract conceptualisation and active experimentation. In teaching professional skills, this approach can be delivered through activities like reflective exercises designed to aid understanding, and assignments that as well as being authentic include reflection, development and implementation of the principles taught. It is also possible to further enhance student development though using marker feedback from an experiential learning activity, such as an assignment in a particular course, to inform a subsequent learning cycle of that course. Experiential learning can be enhanced through other approaches like embodied learning, which helps learners to better understand a principle through experiencing the application of theory, and through other techniques like gaming. Advantages and disadvantages of how experiential learning approaches can be applied to improve the development of professional knowledge and skills in postgraduate students undertaking engineering management courses, along with examples of its use, are discussed

Modeling vitreous silica bilayers

We computer model a free-standing vitreous silica bilayer which has recently been synthesized and characterized experimentally in landmark work. Here we model the bilayer using a computer assembly procedure that starts from a single layer of amorphous graphene, generated using a bond switching algorithm from an initially crystalline graphene structure. Next each bond is decorated with an oxygen atom and the carbon atoms are relabeled as silicon. This monolayer can be now thought of as a two dimensional network of corner sharing triangles. Next each triangle is made into a tetrahedron, by raising the silicon atom above each triangle and adding an additional singly coordinated oxygen atom at the apex. The final step is to mirror reflect this layer to form a second layer and then attach the two layers together to form the bilayer. We show that this vitreous silica bilayer has the additional macroscopic degrees of freedom to easily form a network of identical corner sharing tetrahedra if there is a symmetry plane through the center of the bilayer going through the layer of oxygen ions that join the upper and lower layers. This has the consequence that the upper rings lie exactly above the lower rings, which are tilted in general. The assumption of a network of perfect corner sharing tetrahedra leads to a range of possible densities that we have previously characterized in three dimensional zeolites as a flexibility window. Finally, using a realistic potential, we have relaxed the bilayer to determine the density, and other structural characteristics such as the Si-Si pair distribution functions and the Si-O-Si bond angle distribution, which are compared to the experimental results obtained by direct imaging

What's Up with Cultural Sociology? : from Bourdieu and the Mainstream to 'Productive Weirdness'

Peer reviewe

Translation Encounters and the Histories of Globalization

Peer reviewe

Catwalk Catholicism: On the Ongoing Significance of Federico Fellini’s Ecclesiastical Fashion Show

In Fellini-Roma (1972), the film director Federico Fellini includes a sequence about an imaginary ecclesiastical fashion show, a display of ever more outlandish clerical clothing designs. Fellini brought together various elements that, in conventional cultural coding, do not seem to fit together: secular fashion design and catwalks, and Catholic practice and ceremonial. The sequence juxtaposes and intermingles these apparent incompatibles. Surprisingly little scholarly attention has been paid to the nature and significance of this sequence. Yet it is complex, being simultaneously satirical and empathetic, as well as camp and carnivalesque. The paper reaches back in time, reviewing the history of Catholic vestments, to show that the sequence also dramatizes the fact that sartorial fashion and Church garb have overlapped and informed each other historically. The appeal of the sequence for various types of audience has been enhanced in the internet age, and the paper considers how it has become an increasingly ubiquitous reference-point for the fashion industry, bloggers, and cultural critics, especially when the latter want to thematize controversies about male homosexuality in the Church today. Fellini’s presentation of catwalk Catholicism is both a rich object of scholarship, and a multivalent vehicle used by actors for various contemporary purposes