Search results

This paper aims to provide an alternative method of building quality collections for Jewish Studies collection development professionals in small and medium‐sized academic libraries with highly restricted budgets.

Sources of Jewish Studies literary awards were identified and a detailed analysis of awarded books' subjects and the publishing sources was conducted.

The results show that awarded books cover a vast variety of subjects of interest to Jewish Studies collections. Since many of them are also published by academic presses, the use of identified Jewish Studies book award sources should be considered by bibliographers responsible for building Jewish Studies collections in non‐sectarian college libraries with very limited budgetary resources.

The “one stop” access to all award sources and awarded books provides an easy access to otherwise dispersed information.

The comprehensive list of awards, nominated and winning titles, as well as the subject analysis presented herein, is the first of its kind. This can be used by Jewish Studies bibliographers to build and improve their collections and can also serve as a model for building other interdisciplinary subject collections.

This paper circulates around two major questions: what is the character of prizes as a media product? And how do the specifics of media prizes relate to the understanding of organizations with respect to a given aspect of their activities? The purpose of this paper is to bring forward theoretical arguments that show the significance of media preferences and values as central in how media prizes and awards are created and operated by discussing these questions.

The paper draws on a variety of literature – mainly within management and media/communication studies – that is interested in the construction of different assessment tools such as prizes and rankings.

The paper addresses three particular characteristics of media prizes relevant for the understanding of how media evaluate organizations: the forming and spreading of stereotypical representative or behavior within a specific category or field; the simplification of status through the creation of “winners”; and the popularization of public measures for success in business life.

This is a conceptual paper and as such it needs more systematic empirical testing to validate the findings.

The paper suggests three different roles media prizes have in evaluating organizations’ performance and their social status. The findings suggest that the qualities/aspects emphasized by the prizes are framed in such a way that they follow the rational or logic of media, and that they as such bear witness should be regarded with certain critical scrutiny.

The paper discusses an expanding area of journalistic practice – i.e. production and proliferation of media prizes. These prizes have a significant effect on how the authors conceptualize and understand different aspects of the life – in the case business practices such as entrepreneurship. The authors suggest here how media prizes can come to shape the perceptions of reality through processes of simplification, stereotypification and popularization.

Up to now there are few studies focusing on media as a producer of assessments central for building normative and cognitive bases on which organizations are evaluated. The conceptual arguments in this paper highlight a number of areas that can serve as a starting point for future inquiry.

The purpose of this paper is to understand the commonalities and differences between the Deming Prize (DP) and the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award (MBNQA).

A qualitative comparison is made of the changes in the Deming Prize and the MBNQA from 1992 to 2005. In the process, the paper arrives at their current commonalities and differences.

Concludes that during the last 13 years the emphasis of both the Deming Prize and the MBNQA has shifted from technical quality to excellence of all organizational processes. They have moved towards a common understanding of “good leadership” and an appreciation of systems thinking. However, they have maintained their basic difference in the sense that, while inherent in the DP are consulting and guidance by the Union of Japanese Scientists and Engineers (JUSE) over a longer timeframe, MBNQA begins with a more self‐ assessment approach and is more competitive in spirit. Further, since its inception, while the MBNQA has been very public with its entire award process, the DP has made its award process public only since 2003.

Prior experience in TQM is considered desirable if an organization is to reap full benefit from the Deming Prize.

Compares the changes in the understanding of quality by two major awards in a common time period. It shows that, in spite of all its mutations, the DP maintains its basic congruence with the Deming's philosophy. It also brings out the differences in the assessment methods of the Deming Prize and the MBNQA.

The purpose of this study is to understand the identity of the Nobel Prize as a corporate heritage brand and its management challenges.

An in-depth case study analysed within a heritage brand model and a corporate brand identity framework.

The Nobel Prize is a corporate heritage brand – one whose value proposition is based on heritage – in this case “achievements for the benefit of mankind” (derived directly from Alfred Nobel’s will). It is also defined as a “networked brand”, one where four independent collaborating organisations around the (Nobel) hub create and sustain the Nobel Prize’s identity and reputation, acting as a “federated republic”.

The new and combined application of the Heritage Quotient framework and the Corporate Brand Identity Matrix in the Heritage Brand Identity Process (HBIP) offers a structured approach to integrate the identity of a corporate heritage brand. In a networked situation, understanding the role of stewardship in collaborating organisations is essential: The network entities maintain their own identities and goals, but share common values of the network hub.

The integrated frameworks (HBIP) provides a platform for managing a corporate heritage brand.

This is the first field-based study of the Nobel Prize from a strategic brand management perspective.

Several bibliometric indicators that are extensively used to estimate research performance have not been validated against an external criterion of excellence. This paper aims to investigate whether this validation is possible using the number of Nobel Prize awards.

This study uses several analytical treatments of the data to investigate: whether Nobel Prize awards are sporadic events or they depend on the scientific activity of countries or institutions and can be used in research evaluation; and the association between the number of Nobel Prize achievements and conventional bibliometric indicators across countries and institutions.

This study finds that conventional bibliometric indicators, numbers of publications, citations, and top 1 per cent most cited publications, correlate with the number of Nobel Prize achievements in several advanced countries with similar research abilities. Contrarily, in countries and institutions with more variable research characteristics, there is no association between conventional bibliometric indicators and the number of Nobel Prize achievements, and their use as indicators of research excellence is not valid. In contrast, the number of national articles in Nature and Science correlates with the number of Nobel Prize achievements across countries and institutions.

Science administrators implementing research evaluations and research incentives based on conventional bibliometric indicators should consider that increasing the scores of these indicators does not imply an improvement in research excellence.

The study demonstrates that Nobel Prize achievements are not singular events that occur by chance. Therefore, the number of Nobel Prize achievements can be used to validate bibliometric indicators.

The paper aims to present a review and comparison of the Russian Federation Government Quality Award (RFGQA) with the three major business excellence models, Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award (MBNQA), European Foundation for Quality Management (EFQM) Award and Deming Prize.

The paper briefly reviews the RFGQA through a desk-top research method. Then, it adapts the comparative approach used in a similar study by Vokurka et al. (2000). Thus, the comparative analysis consisted in contrasting two characteristics of the RFGQA with those of the MBNQA, EFQM Award and Deming Prize, namely, award descriptors (i.e. objectives and criteria) and emphasis placed on excellence criteria (i.e. weighting). The study also includes a mapping assessment to explore up to what extent the RFGQA addresses the criteria of the major models.

Although the RFGQA was designed based on the concept and structure of the EFQM model, the results of the study indicate that there are still differences among them, especially in terms of internal business processes. RFGQA finds more differences with the MBNQA and Deming Prize excellence models than with the EFQM.

This research would benefit organisations and managers in Russia, as they will be able to acquire a deeper knowledge on the RFGQA. This may facilitate its awareness and implementation.

The paper expands the current knowledge in the area of quality management and models for business excellence, as it is among the very first investigations to have studied the RFGQA model.

In an increasingly global and competitive environment, an organization’s long‐term survival may depend on improved quality, productivity and customer service. The pressing need to improve competitiveness has resulted in a number of transnational and national quality awards. In broad terms, these awards stress the importance of management process, customer satisfaction, people and total quality to the attainment of superior competitive position. Describes, compares and highlights the key strengths and weaknesses of the following four major national and transnational quality awards: the Deming Application Prize; the European Quality Award (EQA); the Malcolm Baldrige Quality Award (Baldrige Award); and the Australian Quality Award (AQA). Discusses the key requirements of each award and their underlying assumptions and impacts. The awards reviewed represent one of the principal devices used to encourage adoption of self‐assessment, total quality concepts, and external focus in four different continents. To spread good total quality practice the awards publicly recognize the achievements of the organizations which have successfully adopted the concepts of total quality management. The winners serve as useful role models for other organizations intent on adopting total quality management practices. The quality awards reviewed are arguably the premier award in their respective continents.

The purpose of this paper is to propose a system for regularly offered government-sponsored technology prizes. Such prizes would preserve the incentive to invent without the barriers to entry that come with the patent system. This is of particular interest to entrepreneurs as they lack the patent portfolio that incumbent firms can leverage into derivative technology.

After reviewing various efficiency concerns with the patent system, the author describes how technology prizes could work alongside the patent system. Such prizes are best when the sponsor can capture as much of the technology spillover as possible – i.e. through a government agency. This paper provides a framework for a practical prize structure while paying special attention to combating the logistical and public choice concerns of creating a prize.

This paper focuses on two methods to prevent inefficiency in government-sponsored prize: truth-bonding and information markets. Each mechanism helps combat different kinds of problems. Various complications to this system are explored and addressed.

The paper suggests that an efficient prize system is a possible policy and, if implemented, would embolden technology-focused entrepreneurship and other subsequent technological development.

While previous work has noted the benefits of technology prizes over patents, few attempts have been made to outline an incentive-compatible system for doing so. This paper is the first of its kind to propose a practical and efficient government-sponsored prize system.

The purpose of this paper is to present a comparative analysis and usage overview of the most common business excellence models: the European Foundation for Quality Management Model, the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award Model, the Deming Prize Model and the Iberoamerican Model for Excellence in Management.

In order to achieve such goals, the authors have performed a set of statistical analysis over public data sets, related to each one of the analyzed models, as well as making a comparative analysis of the model contents.

The different business excellence models do share a similar set of principles and criteria. However, different adoption patterns have been found across regions of the globe, regarding the use of such business excellence models over the last decades.

As far as the authors were able to find out, based on the literature review carried out, this is the first time that a set of statistical data results, related to the worldwide implementation of business excellence models, is being presented for publication.

“Reference Serials” intends to provide in‐depth, evaluative reviews of abstracting services, indexes, serial bibliographies, yearbooks, directories, almanacs and other continuations which would normally be housed in reference collections. For the purposes of this column, reference serials are defined as materials which meet two rather flexible requirements: 1) they must be useful as reference sources, and 2) they must be issued as serials or be titles superseded periodically by new editions.