Search results

This study aims to explore the competencies needed by performance consultants, a particular role identified for training and development professionals. The role was formally named and promoted nearly two decades ago. Two ongoing discussions in the field are the competencies needed by training and development professionals and the role of consulting within the field.

This study identifies the general competencies needed by a performance consultant as reflected in job descriptions for the position. It accomplished this goal by collecting job descriptions for the position from organizations in Canada (the result of a practical arrangement with an organization that would collect the descriptions and remove identifying information before the research team analyzed them), systematically analyzing them using qualitative content analysis techniques and generating a profile of the position, which can be used as a basis for further analysis of the position.

The job title and competencies sought in the job descriptions differ from those proposed in the literature. Specific areas of difference include the title (none of the job descriptions analyzed explicitly used the title performance consultant), role in needs analysis and client relationships, technology competence (the job descriptions sought little, if any, while the literature suggests broad conceptual knowledge) and qualifications (most job descriptions only require a bachelor’s degree; many training and development professionals have more education).

The profile presented in this paper only represents that used in job descriptions (typically an idealized version) and in a particular national context. But if the results are validated with other methodologies and in other contexts, they suggest that the actual consulting role significantly differs from the one conceptualized in the literature.

The findings suggest that the consultant role conceived in the literature differs from the actual job expected by employers, at least as reflected in job descriptions. Research with incumbents in the job is needed to assess whether the inconsistencies are also reflected in the day-to-day work.

Social implications validate the broad concern that trainers have skills and talents to offer organizations that those organizations do not fully utilize.

The paper provides one of the few empirical studies of the job responsibilities of a performance consultant.

Increasingly, attention has been given to the need to mainstream risk reduction in development work in order to reduce the vulnerability of the urban poor. Using El Salvador as a case study, the paper analyses the mainstreaming process in the developmental disciplines of urban planning and housing. The overall aim is to identify how the existing separation between risk reduction, urban planning and housing can be overcome and integration achieved.

Since Hurricane Mitch in 1998, and especially after the 2001 earthquakes, not only relief and development organisations, but also social housing organisations have initiated a shift to include risk reduction in their fields of action in order to address the underlying causes of urban vulnerability. The factors that triggered the process were: 1) the negative experiences of organisations with non-integral projects, 2) the organisations' increased emphasis on working with municipal development, 3) political changes at national level, and more importantly, 4) the introduction and promotion of the concept of risk reduction by international and regional aid organisations. However, required additional knowledge and institutional capacities were mainly built up independently and internally by each organisation, and not through the creation of co-operative partnerships, thus duplicating efforts and increasing ineffective competition.

Whilst positive experience has been gained through the implementation of more integral projects, the creation of adequate operational, organisational, institutional and legal frameworks is still in its initial stage. Unfortunately, four years after the 2001 earthquakes, emergency relief funding for post-disaster risk reduction is coming to an end without the allocation of resources for following up and consolidating the initial process. Based on the findings, an integral model is proposed which shows how mainstreaming risk reduction in urban planning and housing could be dealt with in such a way that it becomes more integrated, inclusive and sustainable within a developmental context.

This paper aims to describe the application of several Six Sigma tools to explain the improvement changes needed in a company that manufactures concrete blocks. The paper explains the methodology and the tools of the Six Sigma system, their use in the project, the application of the DMAIC (Define, Measure, Analyse, Improve and Control) process for the identification and definition of the problems, the related performance variables and the results obtained.

The paper reports the research made to improve the production of concrete blocks, specifically, the application of the DMAIC process, which is part of the Six Sigma methodologies; DMAIC stands for Definition of the problem, Measurement of the performance, Analysis using specific statistical methods and tools, Improvement the factors that cause the problem and Control the processes to ensure that the problem will not occur again. Each of those steps is explained in detail in the paper, which also presents the application of other improvement techniques.

The results show the adaptability and relevance of Six Sigma for the improvement of production operations. It is clearly demonstrated that it leads to benefits such as the elimination of machine downtime, reduction of scrap from 18 to 2 per cent and the improvements made in plant layout and production facilities to increase the productivity.

In improvement projects, the differential between the initial and final conditions varies, depending on the magnitude of the problems or potential opportunities. Although this paper describes only the application of Six Sigma, the methodology has a wide potential application in most manufacturing industries.

With the Six Sigma and DMAIC tools’ application and the improvement process, the agility obtained is driving a more mechanized perspective of production operations. The customer service level was increased, through fast deliveries of complete orders. This project shows that the application of the Six Sigma methodology is feasible and produces attractive financial and operational results in this segment of the construction industry.

The companies dedicated to the production of concrete blocks commonly reproduce the systems and standards of the industry, which are commonly designed around civil engineering and technical issues. Thus, the application of improvement tools is exceptional in manufacturing environments. Although this paper is just one application of the methodology, it explains in detail the DMAIC use for companies that are committed to the development of new competencies to increase their competitiveness.

Few people living in informal settlements in the Global South spontaneously claim that they are “resilient” or “adapting” to disaster risk or climate change. Surely, they often overcome multiple challenges, including natural hazards exacerbated by climate change. Yet their actions are increasingly examined through the framework of resilience, a notion developed in the North, and increasingly adopted in the South. To what extent eliminate’ do these initiatives correspond to the concepts that scholars and authorities place under the resilience framework?

Three longitudinal case studies in Yumbo, Salgar and San Andrés (Colombia) serve to investigate narratives of disaster risks and responses to them. Methods include narrative analysis from policy and project documents, presentations, five workshops, six focus groups and 24 interviews.

The discourse adopted by most international scholars and local authorities differs greatly from that used by citizens to explain risk and masks the politics involved in disaster reduction and the search for social justice. Besides, narratives of social change, aspirations and social status are increasingly masked in disaster risk explanations. Tensions are also concealed, including those regarding the winners and losers of interventions and the responsibilities for disaster risk reduction.

Our findings confirm previous results that have shown that the resilience framework contributes to “depoliticize” the analysis of risk and serves to mask and dilute the responsibility of political and economic elites in disaster risk creation. But they also show that resilience fails to explain the type of socioeconomic change that is required to reduce vulnerabilities in Latin America.

The purpose of this research is to determine the convenience of using a contract model as an integration mechanism for decision-making in a decentralized supply chain of small agricultural producers in a developing country, taking as hypothesis coordinated chain achieves better management. The analysis is based on information obtained by direct inquiry to 99 small producers in the region, about planning, production, marketing and distribution in the chain, supplemented with secondary information sources.

As a methodology an analysis of maturity in the chain based on the Capability Maturity Model Integration is done, whose evaluation is later analyzed as a fuzzy logic model, with the support of the fuzzy logic of the MATLAB toolbox, to study the convenience of the use of the contract against the other mechanisms, and to establish an approximation to the level of readiness of the chain toward integration.

Results obtained show that the small farmer supply chain studied, from a maturity perspective, has a strong disposition for the use of contracts as an integration mechanism.

The supply chain for small producers presents a high dispersion, little consolidated offer capacity and lack of coordination. Limitations in terms of information and criteria unification are a challenge for future research. Results have socioeconomic implications for small producers and can serve as a guide to formulate policies by the governments in Latin American countries.

As practical implications, it can be stated that the use of supply contracts is a real mechanism that can be implemented in this type of chain, to break the mistrust between the echelons and improve the supply chain performance. This research will allow to establish support programs from local governments for the sustainability and improving income of small producers. In addition, contracts will allow to formalize the linkage of small producers to a sustainable commercial network.

Small agricultural producers in developing countries live in unfavorable conditions, with socioeconomic limitations. This work offers an alternative for their productive activity development that will allow them access to marketing chains in a safe way and improve their living conditions.

Previous studies related to the maturity toward the chain integration and fuzzy logic as a hybrid methodology, were not found in the literature, and less even applied to a chain of small agricultural products.

This paper aims to present a procedure to change the orientation of a grasped object using dexterous manipulation. The manipulation is controlled by teleoperation in a very simple way, with the commands introduced by an operator using a keyboard.

The paper shows a teleoperation scheme, hand kinematics and a manipulation strategy to manipulate different objects using the Schunk Dexterous Hand (SDH2). A state machine is used to model the teleoperation actions and the system states. A virtual link is used to include the contact point on the hand kinematics of the SDH2.

Experiments were conducted to evaluate the proposed approach with different objects, varying the initial grasp configuration and the sequence of actions commanded by the operator.

The proposed approach uses a shared telemanipulation schema to perform dexterous manipulation; in this schema, the operator sends high-level commands and a local system uses this information, jointly with tactile measurements and the current status of the system, to generate proper setpoints for the low-level control of the fingers, which may be a commercial close one. The main contribution of this work is the mentioned local system, simple enough for practical applications and robust enough to avoid object falls.

This paper aims to identify the risk factors that affect depression in students who sought psychological consultation during lockdown period in the health department at a university in Colombia.

The sample consisted of 33 students (12 men and 21 women) with a mean age of 21 ± 2.5 years during the COVID-19 lockdown in 2020. Convenience sampling was used. The beck depression inventory-II instrument and a sociodemographic questionnaire were used to determine levels of depression and associated risk factors. A Google Form was designed with the respective instruments and sent along with the informed consent by email.

The results indicated that the population is characterized by presenting a level of mild (24.2%), moderate (15.2%) and severe (21.2%) depression. Concerning the levels of depression and risk factors, a significant difference was found with a history of violence (p-value = 0.000), mainly during childhood and adolescence, as well as objection to psychological therapy, belonging to a medium–high socioeconomic stratum, lack of family support and recent significant losses coupled with the lockdown because of the pandemic, which increased symptoms of depression and suicidal ideation.

This research was conducted using Google Forms, which meant that some questionnaires were incomplete. In addition, this study did not count with the full participation of patients who attended psychological consultation.

Universities should generate programs for early detection of risk factors and prevention of depression in students, which could affect academic performance, school dropout, interpersonal relationships and trigger suicidal ideation. These results can also be applied to reducing family violence, which has increased since the pandemic, by improving students' family dynamics.

Because of the scarce research on this topic in Latin America, this study contributes to mental health in this population. The university becomes a fundamental scenario in which the ability to help students develop an adequate expression of emotions, positive coping strategies and sense of life as protective factors against depression can be enhanced.

Waste production is one of the most important problems that humankind faces. Human-based activities generate diverse waste types that have to be treated and disposed differently. This results in the need to build more facilities to manage the waste and to avoid further environmental damage. Colombia established a successful policy to close open dumps and to control pollution. Notwithstanding the advances that have been made in final disposal, it is necessary to extend the life of the final disposal sites and increase the closure of open landfills. Valle del Cauca is the third most populated Colombian province, and it is also considered the third province that generates more waste. This chapter addresses the problem of locating solid waste disposal centers in Valle del Cauca by applying the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) with fuzzy logic, a multicriteria method that compares opinions of a decision-making group. Additionally, each potential location area is characterized by considering industrial and environmental issues, societal dynamics, infrastructure and topography, costs, and taxes. After applying a variant of AHP, the decision-making group was able to find that Jamundi is the best location to open the disposal center. The method shows strong potential to identify and prioritize alternative locations for a diverse group of stakeholders. Most importantly, the methodology lets us structure better qualitative and quantitative data, as well as to link multiple levels to avoid choosing locations that will affect society, environment, and other stakeholders, without considering the trade-offs among diverse criteria considering benefits, opportunities, costs, and risks (BOCR).

The number of online communities has increased rapidly with the development of the Internet. Although these communities provide users with knowledge-sharing channels, the enthusiasm of the users for participation remains low. Ecosystem theory, social cognitive theory, and some other theories emphasize the importance of environmental factors and hypothesize that the behavior of users is affected by personal factors and environmental factors. In this study, the authors investigated the impact of platform environmental factors on knowledge-sharing behavior and improved the platform environment construction of online communities.

First, the authors analyzed the influencing factors of online community knowledge-sharing from the perspective of the platform environment, constructed a research model, and proposed relevant hypotheses. Then, the authors designed a questionnaire and conducted a survey, and finally tested the hypotheses by using the method of structural equation model.

The results showed that community trust, community management, community incentive, community atmosphere, and community information protection had a significant positive impact on community knowledge-sharing behavior. Community trust played a significant intermediary role in the relationship between community management, community incentive, community information protection, and knowledge-sharing behavior; community information protection only affected knowledge-sharing behavior through community trust. Additionally, community atmosphere did not directly affect knowledge-sharing behavior through the intermediary of community trust.

This study showed that theoretical supplements and practical guidance are significant for conducting research and managing knowledge-sharing in the online community. They help community managers pay more attention to the construction of an online community platform environment.

In this study, the authors analyzed the influencing factors of online community knowledge-sharing from the perspective of the platform environment and introduced community trust as an intermediary variable. The research perspective and model of this study are novel to some extent.