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The purpose of this study is to compare the evaluation of search result lists and documents, in particular evaluation criteria, elements, association between criteria and elements, pre/post and evaluation activities, and the time spent on evaluation.

The study analyzed the data collected from 31 general users through prequestionnaires, think aloud protocols and logs, and post questionnaires. Types of evaluation criteria, elements, associations between criteria and elements, evaluation activities and their associated pre/post activities, and time were analyzed based on open coding.

The study identifies the similarities and differences of list and document evaluation by analyzing 21 evaluation criteria applied, 13 evaluation elements examined, pre/post and evaluation activities performed and time spent. In addition, the authors also explored the time spent in evaluating lists and documents for different types of tasks.

This study helps researchers understand the nature of list and document evaluation. Additionally, this study connects elements that participants examined to criteria they applied, and further reveals problems associated with the lack of integration between list and document evaluation. The findings of this study suggest more elements, especially at list level, be available to support users applying their evaluation criteria. Integration of list and document evaluation and integration of pre, evaluation and post evaluation activities for the interface design is the absolute solution for effective evaluation.

This study fills a gap in current research in relation to the comparison of list and document evaluation.

A self‐help guide to achieving success in business. Directed more towards the self‐employed, it is relevant to other managers in organizations. Divided into clear sections on creativity and dealing with change; importance of clear goal setting; developing winning business and marketing strategies; negotiating skills; leadership; financial skills; and time management.

Ubiquitous web applications (UWA) are a new type of web applications which are accessed in various contexts, i.e. through different devices, by users with various interests, at anytime from anyplace around the globe. For such full‐fledged, complex software systems, a methodologically sound engineering approach in terms of model‐driven engineering (MDE) is crucial. Several modeling approaches have already been proposed that capture the ubiquitous nature of web applications, each of them having different origins, pursuing different goals and providing a pantheon of concepts. This paper aims to give an in‐depth comparison of seven modeling approaches supporting the development of UWAs.

This methodology is conducted by applying a detailed set of evaluation criteria and by demonstrating its applicability on basis of an exemplary tourism web application. In particular, five commonly found ubiquitous scenarios are investigated, thus providing initial insight into the modeling concepts of each approach as well as to facilitate their comparability.

The results gained indicate that many modeling approaches lack a proper MDE foundation in terms of meta‐models and tool support. The proposed modeling mechanisms for ubiquity are often limited, since they neither cover all relevant context factors in an explicit, self‐contained, and extensible way, nor allow for a wide spectrum of extensible adaptation operations. The provided modeling concepts frequently do not allow dealing with all different parts of a web application in terms of its content, hypertext, and presentation levels as well as their structural and behavioral features. Finally, current modeling approaches do not reflect the crosscutting nature of ubiquity but rather intermingle context and adaptation issues with the core parts of a web application, thus hampering maintainability and extensibility.

Different from other surveys in the area of modeling web applications, this paper specifically considers modeling concepts for their ubiquitous nature, together with an investigation of available support for MDD in a comprehensive way, using a well‐defined as well as fine‐grained catalogue of more than 30 evaluation criteria.

Successful commissioning and startup (CSU) is critical to successful capital project completion. Industrial facility production and operations can also be affected by the level of CSU success. Specifically, transitions between construction, commissioning and startup (CCSU) phases, as well as between project organizations, have been identified as an opportunity for improvement across the industry. The purpose of this paper is to establish and clarify CCSU accountabilities and responsibilities for industrial-type capital projects across these transitions.

This research used a panel of industry practitioners to assist with data collection, review research products and provide industry perspective. The authors used the insight of these CCSU experts to craft new CCSU models. A separate set of industry practitioners was used to validate the findings, and an illustrative case study is also provided. Descriptive analyses and statistics aid the interpretation of research findings.

Substantial research findings include: three novel CCSU project delivery models, a comprehensive CCSU activity flowchart applicable across industrial sectors, and an extensive CCSU RACI (Responsible, Accountable, Consulted and Informed) matrix detailing responsibility and accountability assignments across 60 project functions for all of the 124 CCSU flowchart activities. Four key leadership functions are found to be accountable for most of the CCSU process. A need for frontloading CCSU activities during construction is clearly demonstrated, and the value of administrative activities as enablers of core CCSU activities should not be underestimated.

The findings contribute to a more accurate model of CCSU execution best practices for industrial applications. Specifically, CCSU project delivery models give insight into high-level transition structures between organizations and across phases.

The extensive listing of CCSU activities along with suggested accountability and responsibility assignments for each activity give CCSU managers a starting point for ensuring that important tasks are not left undone during this critical phase of capital projects.

New CCSU models for industrial capital projects presented in this paper (including CCSU project delivery models, activity flowchart and RACI matrix) constitute substantial contributions to the industrial construction body of knowledge. These models provide more comprehensive coverage of CCSU topics than their predecessors, and specifically address activities and issues pertinent to industrial construction. The establishment and clarification of responsibility and accountability assignments are of particular value during this high-transition stage of capital projects.

This paper provides evidence on the impact of regulatory environment on financial reporting quality of transitional economies. This study compares the financial reporting quality of Hong Kong firms which are cross-listed in mainland China with those of Hong Kong firms cross-listed in China using specific earnings management metrics (earnings smoothing, timely loss recognition, value relevance and managing towards earnings targets) under pre- and post-IFRS regimes.

The financial reporting quality of Chinese A-share companies and Hong Kong listed companies are examined using earnings management measures. Using 2007 as base year, the study used a cumulative of −5 and +5 years of convergence experience which provide a total of 3,000 firm-year observations. In addition to regression analyses, we used the difference-in-difference analysis to check for the impact of regulatory environments on earnings management.

Through the lens of contingency theory, our results indicate that the adoption of the new substantially IFRS-convergent accounting standards in China results in better financial reporting quality evidenced by less earning management. The empirical results further shows that accounting data are more value relevant for Hong Kong listed firms, and that firms listed in China are more likely to engage in accrual-based earnings management than in real earnings management activities. We established that different earnings management practices that are seemingly tolerable in one country may not be tolerable in another due to level of differences in the regulatory environments.

The findings show that Hong Kong listed companies’ exhibit higher level of financial reporting quality than Chinese listed companies, which implies that the financial reporting quality under IFRS can be significantly different in regions with different institutional, economic and regulatory environments. The results imply that contingent factors such as country’s institutional structures, its extent of regulation and the strength of its investor protection environments impact on financial reporting quality particularly in transitional and emerging economies. As such, these factors need to be given appropriate considerations by financial reporting regulators and policy-makers interested in controlling earnings management practices among their corporations.

This study is a high impact study considering that China plays a significant role in today’s globalised economy. This study is unique as it the first, that we are aware of, to compare real earnings activities against accrual-based earnings management in pre- and post-IFRS adoption periods within the Chinese and Hong Kong financial reporting environments, distinguishing between cross-listed and non-cross-listed firms.

The authors observe that actionable guidelines are missing from many reference works on business process management (BPM). Also, success factors are mostly not contextualized in the different phases and concerns of a BPM initiative. The purpose of this paper is to address this research gap.

The research design builds on a literature survey for building an integrated framework for BPM that is referred to as integrated BPM. It integrates lifecycle phases, capability areas and governance aspects. Then, the authors consolidate insights from expert interviews.

As a result, the authors provide a list of various activities that are associated with the different elements of BPM. Furthermore, the authors describe pitfalls for each of the elements that have been avoided in order to make the BPM initiative a success.

The findings emphasize the potential to study BPM success and its factors on a more fine-granular activity level.

The list of activities and the list of pitfalls are directly applicable for practitioners.

The research on the integrated BPM framework consolidates insights from prior research and extends it with an expert perspective on pitfalls.

The purpose of this paper is to describe the development and application of the KIPP-list of care activities. The acronym KIPP stands for Knowledge and Insight into Primary Processes. The instrument is intended as a tool for family coaches to systematically report care activities conducted in the Dutch family support programme Ten for the Future (in Dutch: Tien voor Toekomst).

The design of the instrument was based on the components of the programme and a literature search for similar instruments used in the Netherlands, complemented by a staff survey. A series of three studies was carried out to test the instrument’s validity and user-friendliness, and to assess its potential for programme evaluation.

The majority of care activities were performed in cooperation with one or both parents alone, and less frequently with children or external professionals. Although the main focus of the work of the family coaches fell into the categories of “collecting information” and “working towards (behavioural) change” with families, the relatively high frequency of all the types of care contacts emphasises the intensity of this family support programme with a complex target group.

Data gathered with the instrument provided meaningful information by descriptive analysis. KIPP thereby proved its general feasibility in increasing insight into service provision. The instrument can be useful in several stages and on several levels of quality assurance and service optimisation, including reflective practice, supervision, team management and research.

This paper aims to argue that different types of uncertainty are associated with information seeking and retrieval (IS&R), and that, with the proliferation of new and different search tools, channels and sources, uncertainty, whether positive or negative, continues to be a significant factor in the search process. The paper aims to report on one part of an ongoing research that aims to study correlations among a series of information‐seeking activities and information‐seeking problems that cause uncertainty amongst users in academic environment.

An online questionnaire is used to collect data from users in the higher education sector. Quantitative analysis is carried out on the data collected through an online questionnaire distributed through eight online mailing lists comprising a total of 3,607 registered users. A total of 668 responses are returned from three categories of respondents: academic staff, research staff and research students. Pearson's correlation coefficient is used to study correlation among the activities and problems that cause uncertainty in IS&R.

This research shows that uncertainty may occur in course of a number of information‐seeking activities, and may also be created because of some problems associated with information seeking. Some of the activities and problems that caused uncertainty have significant correlations. There is also a correlation between information‐seeking activities and gender and disciplines, though there is little correlation between information‐seeking activities and age, information and communication technology (ICT) skills, and user categories. There is also a correlation between information‐seeking problems and ICT skills, gender and user categories, but there is less correlation between information‐seeking problems and age. Information‐seeking activities and information‐seeking problems that cause uncertainty have a significant correlation with disciplines and gender. Furthermore, it is noted that information‐seeking activities caused less uncertainty for users in the discipline of computer and information sciences compared to the other chosen disciplines such as business and management, and arts and humanities.

This research for the first time aimed to study which information‐seeking activities and problems cause uncertainty and how they are correlated.

The purpose of this paper is to propose a new mixed-integer formulation for the time-dependent multi-skilled resource-constrained project scheduling problem (MSRCPSP/t) considering learning effect. The proposed model extends the basic form of the MSRCPSP by three concepts: workforces have different efficiencies, it is possible for workforces to improve their efficiencies by learning from more efficient workers and the availability of workforces and resource requests of activities are time-dependent. To spread dexterity from more efficient workforces to others, this study has integrated the concept of diffusion maximization in social networks into the proposed model. In this respect, the diffusion of dexterity is formulated based on the linear threshold model for a network of workforces who share common skills. The proposed model is bi-objective, aiming to minimize make-span and total costs of project, simultaneously.

The MSRCPSP is an non-deterministic polynomial-time hard (NP-hard) problem in the strong sense. Therefore, an improved version of the non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm II (IM-NSGA-II) is developed to optimize the make-span and total costs of project, concurrently. For the proposed algorithm, this paper has designed new genetic operators that help to spread dexterity among workforces. To validate the solutions obtained by the IM-NSGA-II, four other evolutionary algorithms – the classical NSGA-II, non-dominated ranked genetic algorithm, Pareto envelope-based selection algorithm II and strength Pareto evolutionary algorithm II – are used. All algorithms are calibrated via the Taguchi method.

Comprehensive numerical tests are conducted to evaluate the performance of the IM-NSGA-II in comparison with the other four methods in terms of convergence, diversity and computational time. The computational results reveal that the IM-NSGA-II outperforms the other methods in terms of most of the metrics. Besides, a sensitivity analysis is implemented to investigate the impact of learning on objective function values. The outputs show the significant impact of learning on objective function values.

The proposed model and algorithm can be used for scheduling activities of small- and large-size real-world projects.

Based on the previous studies reviewed in this paper, one of the research gaps is the MSRCPSP with time-dependent resource capacities and requests. Therefore, this paper proposes a multi-objective model for the MSRCPSP with time-dependent resource profiles. Besides, the evaluation of learning effect on efficiency of workforces has not been studied sufficiently in the literature. In this study, the effect of learning on efficiency of workforces has been considered. In the scarce number of proposed models with learning effect, the researchers have assumed that the efficiency of workforces increases as they spend more time on performing a skill. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, the effect of learning from more efficient co-workers has not been studied in the literature of the RCPSP. Therefore, in this research, the effect of learning from more efficient co-workers has been investigated. In addition, a modified version of the NSGA-II algorithm is developed to solve the model.