Search results

Spirituality enables a businessperson to gain a more integrated perspective on their firm, family, neighbors, community and self. Hence, business people and business faculty show a significant increase in interest in spirituality in the workplace. The new interest is measured by the growing number of professional presentations, journal articles, books and conferences devoted to the subject. A consensus is emerging on the principal elements of a spirituality for working people. It includes acknowledging God, the importance of prayer, other people and a sustainable world. Some managers and firms encourage spirituality in the workplace. Many religiously‐oriented universities are integrating mission, spirituality and service in their education.

Intelligent software agents offer the potential to unleash the power of the Internet to optimise the process of supplier sourcing. Aims to promote an awareness in the buyer/supplier community of the potential for using intelligent software agents over the Internet for this purpose. The traditional relationship between suppliers and buyers is contrasted with that of Internet‐based trading. This comparison confirms that trust is a critical component in the traditional relationship and that an understanding of the nature of trust is necessary in revealing where and how agent technology will have maximum benefit for both buyers and suppliers. It is shown that the technology that can enable this form of sourcing is already well established, and a range of conceptual agents are described. Finally, identifies the benefits that will accrue to organisations that adopt agent technology as part of their supplier‐sourcing portfolio, and recommendations for further work are made.

Jerry feels good as he leaves his office for the day. He takes pride in being CEO of a Healthcare System that provides much-needed services to the urban poor often in difficult circumstances. He reflects that his career has been an interesting journey. He had started as an accountant with Price Waterhouse, but found the work and time pressures very heavy. Wanting to spend more time with his family, he moved to the a health care system and rose to Controller. There had been a period while Controller when he wondered whether he had made an error in making the change, given the financial turbulence his health care system experienced with the transition to managed care. He experienced no less stress than at Price Waterhouse as he assisted his new employer to manage a turnaround to eliminate waste and reposition the system within a solid financial model. But he emerged from the turnaround with a new sense of direction and drive. Subsequently, seven years ago Healthhelp chose him as its Chief Financial Officer and he’s been CEO for almost three years. Today he’s excited about the new marketing plan he just reviewed which promises to give Healthhelp a bigger share of the home care market.

Through the application of Hirst’s “forms of knowledge” theory, it is shown that the Shakers’ nineteenth century management principles had many similarities to Deming’s tenets. For example, Shakers were committed to perfection in work, taking their time in pursuit of quality. Training was accomplished through sharing community expertise, apprenticing, and rotating jobs. Also, equality and cooperation were encouraged among the “brothers” and “sisters.” This example of management history research provides a baseline from which management concepts can be understood and potential mistakes avoided.

The Travel and Tourism Research Association‐Canada Chapter held its 27th annual conference in Niagara Falls, Canada, from 14‐16 October 2001, with the theme of optimizing destination development. This paper is a summary of the presentations and workshops. Aside from a research case study of the Niagara region, two keynote addresses and a final plenary session, the conference dealt with six sub‐themes: the environmental and human sides of optimization, innovations in destination development and marketing, challenges associated with them and, finally, the relationship between food, wine and tourism. Two workshops were held on the effective use of online surveys and on the process of developing a tourism optimization management model (TOMM), using Niagara Falls and knowledge gained from the research case study as a basis for building it.

The EPIC system continues to evolve since it was first released in January 1990. Initially EPIC offered improved access to OCLC's formidable bibliographic database. Pasadena Public Library's experiences with the system, as one of the six field test sites, were described in a “first look” article, in January 1990.1 Since then EPIC has added additional databases such as ERIC, ABI Inform, Dissertation Abstracts, Business Dateline, Pharmaceutical News Index, and the GPO Monthly Catalog, as well as opening a gateway to EasyNet. EPIC's growth puts it in the category of a potential competitor to such established systems as DIALOG, BRS, Wilsonline, and others.

Information systems (IS) project failure has been a recurring problem for decades. The purpose of this paper is twofold: first, to examine the key factors that influence project failure and an analysis of the major areas that can have a significant impact on success; and second, to explore some of the key aspects that have an impact on project management performance from the practitioner perspective and discusses the problems faced by organizations in the closer integration of change and project management.

This study critically reviews the IS failure literature developing a synthesized view of the key issues and common reasons for projects to fail. The approach taken in this study is one that focuses on a number of key questions that pull together the relevant themes in this genre of research whilst highlighting many of the implications for practitioners and organizations alike.

Key questions remain on the underlying causes of instances of poor project management as an IS failure factor. The literature has omitted to develop a deeper analysis of the associations between failure factors and the potential causal relationships between these factors. The realization of project benefits relies on the success of both change and project management yet the formal integration of these two disciplines is constrained by separate standards bodies and an immature body of research.

This study is limited by its theoretical nature lacking an empirical element to provide a deeper analysis of IS failure factors and their interrelationships. This specific area is a recommendation for future research, where causal relationships between failure factors could be developed via a mathematic-based method such as interpretive structural modeling.

With failure rates of IS projects still unacceptably high after decades of attempts to significantly change outcomes, a deeper analysis of this topic is required. The research gaps and recommendations for practitioners highlighted in this study have the potential to provide valuable contributions to this topic of research.

The intent of this study is to present a new perspective of this genre of IS research that develops the main arguments and gaps in the literature from the practitioner viewpoint.

This paper examined negotiator behavior in a variable‐sum two‐party negotiation task and its impact on individual and joint negotiator out‐come. Specifically, we examined the role of negotiator opening offer, reciprocity and complementarity of the use of tactics, systematic progression of offers, and information sharing in a negotiation with integrative potential. Results indicated that initial offers affect final outcome differently across buyers and sellers. The buyer's initial offer was curvilinearly related to his or her final outcome in the form of an inverted‐U. The seller's initial offer was positive‐linearly related to seller's outcome. Second, negotiators reciprocated and complemented both distributive and integrative tactics. In addition, highly integrative dyads differed from less efficient dyads in their reciprocation of integrative behaviors and complementarity of distributive behaviors. Third, approximately forty percent of offers made represented systematic concessions, but the proportion of offers reflecting systematic concessions was not related to the efficiency of the joint outcome. Finally, while information sharing did appear to have a positive effect on the efficiency of agreements, differences in the amount of information provided did not affect the proportion of outcome claimed by each party.

The Milk and Dairies Bill introduced by Mr. SAMUEL aims at securing better inspection of dairies, including all premises in which milk is obtained, stored, or sold, such as cowsheds, milk depots, and milk shops. It also aims at the tracing of impure milk and the prevention of its infection, as well as the elimination of cows yielding tuberculous milk.

Index by subjects, compiled by K.G.B. Bakewell covering the following journals: Facilities Volumes 8‐17; Journal of Property Investment & Finance Volumes 8‐17; Property Management Volumes 8‐17; Structural Survey Volumes 8‐17.