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Process variation has become a major concern in the design of many nanometer circuits, including interconnect pipelines. The purpose of this paper is to provide a comprehensive overview of types and sources of all aspects of interconnect process variations.

The impacts of these interconnect process variations on circuit delay and cross‐talk noises along with the two major sources of delays – parametric delay variations and global interconnect delays – have been discussed.

Parametric delay evaluation under process variation method avoids multiple parasitic extractions and multiple delay evaluations as is done in the traditional response surface method. This results in significant speedup. Furthermore, both systematic and random process variations have been contemplated. The systematic variations need to be experimentally modeled and calibrated while the random variations are inherent fluctuations in process parameters due to any reason in manufacturing and hence are non‐deterministic.

This paper usefully reviews process variation effects on very large‐scale integration (VLSI) interconnect.

This study tested the hypothesis of collectivist orientation as a predictor of affective organizational commitment. Data from 510 employees working in two organizations in China supported the hypothesis, that is, collectivist orientation is a significant predictor of affective organizational commitment when employees' specific organization, age, sex, organizational tenure, educational level, and pay satisfaction are controlled.

Conceptually examines the effect of individualism/collectivism on the tenets of equity theory. It is the view of the authors that the equality principle of reward allocation in collectivistic cultures is not a separate method of distribution, but a subset of the theoretically grounded equity principle appropriately integrating the cross‐cultural individualism/collectivism value. To support this position, the authors reduce equity theory to its fundamental elements and illustrate how in dividualism/collectivism separately affects each component. The derived model and subsequent discussion should provide researchers with a theoretical frame work for future empirical studies.

This project focuses specifically on how intercultural negotiating differences are evidenced communicatively. Evidence suggests that negotiators deal differently with internationals than domestics. Therefore, it is important to move beyond within‐culture comparisons as a basis for predicting intercultural negotiation processes. This paper tests empirically the endurance of culturally‐associated negotiation styles in inter‐cultural negotiations between Americans and Taiwanese. Results suggest that culture does exert some global effects in face‐to‐face encounters with cultural outsiders. Other aspects of negotiation are managed locally, so that predicted cultural differences do not emerge in interaction.

The purpose of this paper is to summarise and analyse empirical research on protective factors that promote academic resilience in ethnic minority children mainly aged between 13 and 18 years attending schools in the Nordic countries.

This paper was opted for a literature review of 23 peer-reviewed quantitative articles published between 1999 and 2014. The analysis entailed protective factors at both the personal and environmental levels in ethnic minority children.

Some minority children’s school performance may be just as good if not better than majority children when having similar or even lower socioeconomic status than majority children. Protective factors at the personal level included working hard, having a positive attitude towards school, and having high educational aspirations. Protective factors at the environmental level included supportive school systems, supportive schools, and supportive networks including parental qualities and support. The findings are comparable to the findings outside the Nordic countries with one exception; minority children in the Nordic countries performed better than expected despite socioeconomic disadvantages.

Protective factors affecting academic resilience need further attention in a time with an increased global migration. Research implications may be related to how schools and policy makers develop supportive school systems, supportive schools, and supportive networks to contribute to making a difference for minority children’s educational opportunities in the Nordic countries.

Academic resilience is a relatively new research field in the Nordic countries. This review is the first review which has summarised and analysed existing findings on academic resilience in the Nordic countries in minority children.

The objective of this paper is to contribute to the accounting education literature by demonstrating that there are significant differences in judgments between Australian and Chinese subjects studying within an Australian university with respect to an important issue in accounting, namely, aggressive financial reporting practices. Aggressive financial reporting is the exercise of professional judgment by accountants (including students preparing for a career in accounting) that fails to depict ‘financial reality’. Our study provides some evidence on the influence of culture (operationalised as one's ethnic background), as well as a personal belief variable, ‘belief in a just world’, on students acceptance of aggressive financial reporting practices. The results have implications for improving accounting education. We suggest that assumptions about uniformity in perceiving Western notions of independence and objectivity embedded in official national and international accounting pronouncements are reflections of ‘culture‐blindness’. Additionally, we suggest that accounting educators may like to ensure that the meanings intended in the official accounting pronouncements which are used as primary teaching material are conveyed to students within specific cultural contexts. Moreover, accounting educators and students need to pay greater attention to the role of various contextual factors in the international accounting harmonisation process.

The concept of psychic distance has gained widespread theoretical recognition as a predictor of export behaviour. However, the empirical validation of the concept remains patchy and contradictory in terms of the results obtained. Consequently, this paper attempts to shed fresh light on the empirical usefulness of the psychic distance concept. First, a wider assessment base is offered through the development of two new US samples. Subsequently, the US findings are compared with previous empirical evidence from Japan, Germany, Finland and Austria. Taken collectively, the results call into question the practical value of the current operationalisation of psychic distance in explaining export behaviour and provide pointers for required conceptual and measurement improvements.

While the debate about the value of teaching multiculturalism has continued, recent political events have made the task more difficult. University students affected by these events are likely to bring prejudices with them to the classroom. This article presents steps that an individual Instructor can take to apply multicultural education to an existing curriculum without systemic change to institution or curriculum. The topic is addressed in the context of a US Legal Environment of Business course. Multicultural education is defined and explained, and causes of prejudice are explored. Reactions to terrorism are addressed. Assignments, projects and strategies are presented. The article concludes with a business perspective on the value of multicultural education and its role in economic development, which will be a necessary component to eradicate the causes of terrorism.

When security managers choose to deploy a smart lock activation system, the number of units needed and their location needs to be established. This study aims to present the results of a penetration test involving smart locks in the context of building security. The authors investigated how the amount of effort an employee has to invest in complying with a security policy (i.e. walk from the office to the smart key activator) influences vulnerability. In particular, the attractiveness of a no-effort alternative (i.e. someone else walking from your office to the key activators to perform a task on your behalf) was evaluated. The contribution of this study relates to showing how experimental psychology can be used to determine the cost-benefit analysis (CBA) of physical building security measures.

Twenty-seven different “offenders” visited the offices of 116 employees. Using a script, each offender introduced a problem, provided a solution and asked the employee to hand over their office key.

A total of 58.6 per cent of the employees handed over their keys to a stranger; no difference was found between female and male employees. The likelihood of handing over the keys for employees close to a key activator was similar to that of those who were further away.

The results suggest that installing additional key activators is not conducive to reducing the building’s security vulnerability associated with the handing over of keys to strangers.

No research seems to have investigated the distribution of smart key activators in the context of a physical penetration test. This research highlights the need to raise awareness of social engineering and of the vulnerabilities introduced via smart locks (and other smart systems).

The Greek secondary education system lacks a formal crisis management system. The purpose of this paper is to address this problem as follows: elicit current crisis management practices, outline features for designing a formal crisis management system in Greece.

The research is based on a survey conducted with the directors of secondary education and the interpretation of the survey results. Due to the echelon structure of secondary education the directors are experienced educators with plenty of experience. They are in a unique setting to be able to combine the managerial perspective with field experience, both of which are important for managing crises.

First, events of sociopolitical nature are considered as important crisis triggers. Second, there is tendency to expect extended involvement of the state. Third despite the lack of a formal system, current practices are relevant and tend to mimic formal systems.

In practice the lack of a formal system does not impede crisis management to be applied in secondary education units.

There is no other survey on crisis management at the directors’ level that we are aware of. The findings outline existing practices from a tactical perspective, and can serve as a guide for designing a formal crisis management system that is suited for secondary education in Greece.