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1 – 10 of 642This chapter presents a study on the work of commercial diplomats as international business promoters at foreign posts. Research has largely overlooked the actual roles and…
Abstract
This chapter presents a study on the work of commercial diplomats as international business promoters at foreign posts. Research has largely overlooked the actual roles and activities of commercial diplomats in explaining the effectiveness of commercial diplomacy and international business support. In this study, it is assumed that commercial diplomats’ behavior is influenced by informal institutions. Face-to-face semi-structured interviews with 23 commercial diplomats at foreign posts from different countries were conducted and analyzed. The results show three different types of role behavior and differences in proactivity per type. Informal institutions such as background, skills, and experience, cultural differences, and the working environment suggest to explain the differences in levels of proactive international business support behavior of commercial diplomats. Further research is needed to assert these findings.
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The arguments in this chapter address all three of the questions motivating this volume on network strategy. First, they focus on the issue of network evolution and show how…
Abstract
The arguments in this chapter address all three of the questions motivating this volume on network strategy. First, they focus on the issue of network evolution and show how networks can emerge and change over time. Second, the chapter tackles the issue of endogeneity and shows that, under certain conditions, some structural advantages do precede rather than follow network positions. Networks evolve over trajectories and the trajectories matter. Third, the arguments respond to the core question of network entrepreneurship: does the awareness of structural advantages available to network positions inspire managers, acting on behalf of organizations, to seek these advantages? In responding, this chapter challenges the idea that filling structural holes necessarily confers advantages on the actors filling them. It follows that the advantages of bridging are dependent not only on the network structure, when decisions regarding tie formation or deletion are made, but also on the costs of forming and maintaining ties relative to the benefits obtained from doing so.
Angel E. Muñoz Zavala, Arturo Hernández Aguirre, Enrique R. Villa Diharce and Salvador Botello Rionda
The purpose of this paper is to present a new constrained optimization algorithm based on a particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm approach.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to present a new constrained optimization algorithm based on a particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm approach.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper introduces a hybrid approach based on a modified ring neighborhood with two new perturbation operators designed to keep diversity. A constraint handling technique based on feasibility and sum of constraints violation is adopted. Also, a special technique to handle equality constraints is proposed.
Findings
The paper shows that it is possible to improve PSO and keeping the advantages of its social interaction through a simple idea: perturbing the PSO memory.
Research limitations/implications
The proposed algorithm shows a competitive performance against the state‐of‐the‐art constrained optimization algorithms.
Practical implications
The proposed algorithm can be used to solve single objective problems with linear or non‐linear functions, and subject to both equality and inequality constraints which can be linear and non‐linear. In this paper, it is applied to various engineering design problems, and for the solution of state‐of‐the‐art benchmark problems.
Originality/value
A new neighborhood structure for PSO algorithm is presented. Two perturbation operators to improve PSO algorithm are proposed. A special technique to handle equality constraints is proposed.
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Matthew Egan and Barbara de Lima Voss
Big 4 professional services firms increasingly lay claim to recruiting and including staff of diverse genders, cultures, ages and sexualities. Drawing on Foucauldian insights…
Abstract
Purpose
Big 4 professional services firms increasingly lay claim to recruiting and including staff of diverse genders, cultures, ages and sexualities. Drawing on Foucauldian insights, this study explores how LGBTIQ+ staff navigated shifting technologies of client power, at the time marriage equality was legislated in Australia.
Design/methodology/approach
This article explores changing experiences of LGBTIQ+ staff and allies, through 56 semi-structured interviews undertaken through 2018–2019.
Findings
Technologies of client power were central to shaping workplace experiences for LGBTIQ+ staff. However, each firm was also keen to carve unique and bold responses to changing societal attitudes regarding sexuality and gender. These progressive moves did not sit comfortably with all clients, and so this article provides insight into the limitations of client privilege within professional services firms. For staff, this increasing complexity of sometimes opaque, contradictory and shifting technologies of client and firm power, enabled agency to explore a sense of self for some, but continued to exclude others.
Originality/value
Little attention has been directed to exploring challenges for staff of sexual and gendered diversity within professional services firms, or to exploring how staff navigate changing perceptions of client power.
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To identify the organisations that provide global governance within the sports industry, to discuss their role, and to suggest that they have self‐governance problems due to both…
Abstract
Purpose
To identify the organisations that provide global governance within the sports industry, to discuss their role, and to suggest that they have self‐governance problems due to both their evolution and the massive commercialisation of sport of recent decades.
Design/methodology/approach
An empirical‐based argument is conducted. Standing at the apex of a hierarchy of national governing bodies and playing organisations, global sports organisations (GSOs) are defined and classified in terms of their governance functions, their commonalities and differences and their interconnections described and analysed. The GSOs for soccer, the Olympics and athletics are used as illustrative cases. Deficiencies in the small sports governance literature are identified. It is argued how the GSOs have maintained their authority as governance organisations despite being private organisations. Hirschman's “Voice, exit and loyalty” model is offered as a partial theoretical interpretation of their situation.
Findings
Although one of the GSOs' original major functions of formalising international sport is now complete, they have retained not only their sport governance monopolies and authority but also the original structures designed for amateur sport. This creates problems when the governance monopoly can be used as a revenue device.
Originality/value
Sport is an important part of global culture and an industry worth hundreds of billions of dollars where accusations of corruption are common but global governance is little examined. The GSOs, present‐day commercial roles and enormous revenues create unresolved governance problems and these are described.
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A methodology of structuring a garment production simulation model using a spreadsheet is described to minimize the average daily production cost through the investigation of…
Abstract
A methodology of structuring a garment production simulation model using a spreadsheet is described to minimize the average daily production cost through the investigation of various man‐machine combinations. The capability and usability of an easily available modern spreadsheet Excel 7.0 to simulate a simple garment production system is accessed with an attempt to demonstrate the simulation model building in a user friendly environment rather than learning and using costly simulation programming languages or simulation software packages. Simulation has evaluated the resource utilization and measured the system performance and developed strategies for taking operational decisions in a logical and better way to minimize the garment production cost. It may also assist and benefit the garment production managers to plan, design and operate their systems in an efficient manner in a competitive environment.
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Achieving Sustainable Developments Goals (SDGs) is main agenda of any democratic government. The demand for needs of the society is increasing day by day due to increasing…
Abstract
Achieving Sustainable Developments Goals (SDGs) is main agenda of any democratic government. The demand for needs of the society is increasing day by day due to increasing globalization and rapid transformation in all spheres of the society, and as a result, agriculture has shifted from a situation where food is primarily considered as a national concern with high self-sufficiency goals to a situation, where food can be traded subject to high degree of vertical integration of value chain. This study attempts to examine first, how far the state Tripura has developed toward to achieving its SDGs; so that Central dependency of the state would be reduced; second, the impact of globalization on its sustainable development; and, third, the possibility of development in different sectors of the economy toward fulfilling the SDGs through globalization. It observes that the state is in the take-off stage; it needs to go long way to make it developed. The state has lot of potentialities for its sustainable development.
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Wanbin Pan, Hongyi Jiang, Shufang Wang, Wen Feng Lu, Weijuan Cao and Zhenlei Weng
This paper aims to detect the printing failures (such as warpage and collapse) in material extrusion (MEX) process effectively and timely to reduce the waste of printing time…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to detect the printing failures (such as warpage and collapse) in material extrusion (MEX) process effectively and timely to reduce the waste of printing time, energy and material.
Design/methodology/approach
The approach is designed based on the frequently observed fact that printing failures are accompanied by abnormal material phenomena occurring close to the nozzle. To effectively and timely capture the phenomena near the nozzle, a camera is delicately installed on a typical MEX printer. Then, aided by the captured phenomena (images), a smart printing failure predictor is built based on the artificial neural network (ANN). Finally, based on the predictor, the printing failures, as well as their types, can be effectively detected from the images captured by the camera in real-time.
Findings
Experiments show that printing failures can be detected timely with an accuracy of more than 98% on average. Comparisons in methodology demonstrate that this approach has advantages in real-time printing failure detection in MEX.
Originality/value
A novel real-time approach for failure detection is proposed based on ANN. The following characteristics make the approach have a great potential to be implemented easily and widely: (1) the scheme designed to capture the phenomena near the nozzle is simple, low-cost, and effective; and (2) the predictor can be conveniently extended to detect more types of failures by using more abnormal material phenomena that are occurring close to the nozzle.
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Mayank Joshipura and Sangeeta Wats
Over the past three decades, numerous conceptual and empirical studies have discussed momentum investment strategies’ presence, pervasiveness and persistence. However, science…
Abstract
Purpose
Over the past three decades, numerous conceptual and empirical studies have discussed momentum investment strategies’ presence, pervasiveness and persistence. However, science mapping in the field is inadequate. Hence, this study aims to comprehend and explore current dynamics, understand knowledge progression, elicit trends through thematic map analysis, synthesize knowledge structures and provide future research directions in this domain.
Design/methodology/approach
The study applies bibliometric analysis on 562 Scopus indexed articles from 1986 to 2021. Biblioshiny version 3.1.4, a Web-based application included in Bibiliometrix package developed in R-language (Aria and Cuccurullo, 2017), was used to examine: the most prominent articles, journals, authors, institutions and countries and to understand the thematic evolution and to elicit trends through the synthesis of knowledge structures including conceptual, intellectual and social structures of the field.
Findings
Motor themes, basic transverse, niche and emerging and declining themes were identified using (Callon, 1991) strategic thematic map. Besides, four major clusters based on a cocitation network of documents were identified: empirical evidence and drivers of momentum returns, theories explaining momentum returns and implications for asset pricing and market efficiency, avoiding momentum crashes and momentum in alternative asset classes, alternative explanations for momentum returns. The study infers that momentum research is becoming multidisciplinary given the dominance of behavioral theories and economic aspects in explaining the persistence of momentum profits and offers future research directions.
Research limitations/implications
The study deploys bibliometric analysis, appropriate for deriving insights from the vast extant literature. However, a meta-analysis might offer deeper insights into specific dimensions of the research topic. Besides, the study’s findings are based on Scopus indexed articles analyzed using bibilioshiny; the database and software limitations might have affected the findings.
Practical implications
The study is a ready reckoner for scholars who intend to recognize the evolution of momentum investment strategies, current dynamics and future research direction. The study offers practitioners insights into efficiently designing and deploying momentum investment strategies and ways to avoid momentum crashes.
Social implications
The study offers insights into the irrational behavior and systematic errors committed by market participants that helps regulators and policymakers to direct investors’ educational efforts to minimize systematic behavioral errors and related adverse financial consequences.
Originality/value
This comprehensive study on momentum investment strategies evaluates research trends and current dynamics draws a thematic map, knowledge progression in the field and offers future research directions.
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