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21 – 30 of over 1000
Article
Publication date: 21 January 2020

Emanuel Fernando Samasseca Zeferino, Khumbulani Mpofu, Olasumbo Ayodeji Makinde, Boitumelo Innocent Ramatsetse and Ilesanmi Afolabi Daniyan

The determination of the appropriate site for the location of a research institute represents a multi-criteria problem which requires a scientific approach for decision-making…

Abstract

Purpose

The determination of the appropriate site for the location of a research institute represents a multi-criteria problem which requires a scientific approach for decision-making. The research centre in this study is an institute that intends to carry out the state-of-the-art research activities and provide the requisite skills to expedite and optimize the manufacturing of rail cars in South Africa. Hence, the selection of a suitable and conducive location capable of achieving these aforementioned objectives in an effective manner is a problem which requires scientific justification for the allocation of the weights and biases. In light of this, using various decision techniques, this paper aims to establish a suitable framework for the location selection of the research institute which is capable of meeting the short- and long-term objectives of the institute.

Design/methodology/approach

This aim was achieved by ascertaining the suitability of potential location alternatives using the factor rating (FR) and centre of gravity (CoG) technique.

Findings

The CoG revealed that any location within the longitude of 28.28 and latitude of −25.75 (with a Cartesian coordinate position of 5053.62; 2718.69) is suitable for the research institute, while the result of the FR/weighted score matrix revealed that location J3 with a weighted score of 72.6% is the most suitable location for the research institute with the longitude of 5053.62 and latitude of 2718.69.

Practical implications

The results of this paper helped decision-makers in locating the given research institute which is currently operational.

Originality/value

The present study is focussed on the application of location decision techniques in the research institute scenario. The combination of FR and CoG techniques for the selection of the most suitable location for a research institute amidst conflicting criteria has not been widely reported by the existing literature.

Details

Journal of Facilities Management , vol. 18 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1472-5967

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 9 February 2010

Louise Tourigny, Vishwanath V. Baba and Xiaoyun Wang

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of role stressors on job stress among airline employees in mainland China. More specifically, the aggravating effects of…

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Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of role stressors on job stress among airline employees in mainland China. More specifically, the aggravating effects of shift work and the mitigating effects of decision latitude are explored to facilitate strategies of intervention aimed at reducing job stress.

Design/methodology/approach

Data are collected using a field survey in Mandarin from 485 airline employees, including pilots, flight attendants, and service employees in five major cities in mainland China.

Findings

The findings demonstrate that role overload and role conflict have significant positive effects on job stress. Furthermore, both shift work and its interference with non‐work activities significantly elevated the impact of role overload on job stress. Findings also reveal that decision latitude mitigated the detrimental effect of role overload on job stress for employees working on fixed shift, but not for employees working on rotating shift.

Research limitations/implications

This is a cross‐sectional study using perceptual measures.

Practical implications

The findings suggest that aviation managers in China need to focus not only on decision latitude but also on job and organizational design to mitigate the impact of job demands on stress. While decision latitude works to ease demands among those who work on fixed shifts, it does not work in the same way for those working on rotating shifts.

Originality/value

This paper corroborates the cross‐cultural applicability of stress theory by demonstrating the detrimental role of rotating shift on stress while at the same time calling attention to some cultural shaping of the findings.

Details

Cross Cultural Management: An International Journal, vol. 17 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1352-7606

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 28 March 2023

Virpi Ala-Heikkilä and Marko Järvenpää

This study aims to take a step toward integrating research regarding the image, role and identity of management accountants by understanding how employers’ perceptions of the…

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Abstract

Purpose

This study aims to take a step toward integrating research regarding the image, role and identity of management accountants by understanding how employers’ perceptions of the ideal management accountant image differ from operational managers’ perceived role expectations, how management accountants perceive their identity and how those factors shape management accountants’ understanding of who they are and want to be.

Design/methodology/approach

A qualitative design draws upon the case company’s 100 job advertisements and 31 semi-structured interviews with management accountants and operational managers. Those data are entwined with role theory and its core concepts of expectations and identities and also early recruitment-related theoretical aspects such as image and employer branding.

Findings

The findings reveal how employers’ perceptions of the ideal image and operational managers’ role expectations shape and influence the identity of management accountants. However, management accountants distance themselves from a brand image and role expectations. They experience identity conflict between their current and desired identity, the perception of not being able to perform the currently desired role. Although this study presents some possible reasons and explanations, such as employer branding for the misalignment and discrepancy between perceptions of employer (image), expectations of operational managers (role) and management accountants’ self-conception of the role (identity), this study argues that the identity of a management accountant results from organizational aspects of image and role and individual aspects of identity.

Research limitations/implications

Image and external role expectations can challenge identity construction and also serve as a source of conflict and frustration; thus, a more comprehensive approach to studying the identity of management accountants is necessary to understand what contributes to the fragility of their identity.

Practical implications

The results provide an understanding of the dynamics of the image, role and identity to support management accountants and employers and to further address the suggested dissonance and ambiguities.

Originality/value

This study contributes by showing how the dynamics and connections between the image, role and identity influence the identity construction of management accountants. Moreover, this study shows how overpromising as a part of employer branding might not reflect the reality experienced by management accountants but may cause frustration and threaten the management accountants’ identity.

Details

Qualitative Research in Accounting & Management, vol. 20 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1176-6093

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 13 May 2014

James J. Cordeiro, Rong Yang, D. Donald Kent Jr and Charles Callahan III

Relative performance evaluation (RPE) involves board comparisons of firm performance to that of a peer group when evaluating CEO performance. To date, research on RPE in the USA…

Abstract

Purpose

Relative performance evaluation (RPE) involves board comparisons of firm performance to that of a peer group when evaluating CEO performance. To date, research on RPE in the USA has typically relied on models where RPE is implicitly assumed. In contrast, Bannister and Newman provide some direct evidence on the explicit RPE usage by US firms showing that it is limited and there is significant inter-industry variation in its use. The authors aim to focus on why boards in some industries employ RPE to a greater extent than those in other industries do using measures of industry discretion, industry homogeneity, industry competition.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors utilize the sample use in the Bannister and Newman study of RPE usage in industries (160 firms from the 1992 Fortune 250 with proxy statements for 1992 and 1993). The authors compile measures of industry membership (using SIC codes), industry discretion, industry homogeneity, and industry competition from Compustat a well. Multiple regression is used to test the hypotheses.

Findings

The authors find that the use of RPE at the industry level is significantly related to industry discretion (i.e. the degree of latitude that managers have over strategic and operational choices in the particular industry environment) and industry homogeneity, but not to industry competition.

Research limitations/implications

The study is limited in terms of a dated sample (necessary to be consistent with the Bannister and Newman paper). It would bear updating. In addition, multi-year panel data could be used to generate more robust results. It would also be useful to replicate the study in other national (and hence governance) contexts.

Practical implications

The findings should help boards when deciding how to reward or punish CEOs and top managers for their firm performance by filtering out relative performance in a more rational manner (e.g. by taking relevant industry context into account).

Originality/value

In terms of originality, this is the first study, to the authors' knowledge, that investigates RPE at the industry level. It is valuable because industry discretion is an important contextual variable that a board of directors will find useful in evaluating managers since this type of discretion is beyond managerial control.

Details

Management Research Review, vol. 37 no. 5
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2040-8269

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 2 October 2007

John Hinks, Martin Alexander and Graham Dunlop

This is a conceptual paper for facilities management (FM) practitioners and FM researchers. The paper seeks to analyse a number of well‐documented successes and failures in…

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Abstract

Purpose

This is a conceptual paper for facilities management (FM) practitioners and FM researchers. The paper seeks to analyse a number of well‐documented successes and failures in military exploitation of innovation, and identify several recurrent facets that resonate with the contemporary approach to, and difficulties with achieving innovation in FM.

Design/methodology/approach

Several military cases are selected for their analogous pertinence to FM. They cover military aspects of technological innovation; process innovation, including innovativeness in the modes of engagement; innovativeness within strategy and paradigm; and innovativeness in the tactical behaviours needed to realise the value of innovations. They are presented as an indirect means of illuminating systemic challenges for innovation within FM.

Findings

The paper identifies the primacy of innovativeness over individual technological innovations; and the centrality of empowerment practices and the catalysing of local tactical and operational innovative behaviours to innovativeness. The crucial factors are the attitude and behaviour of leaders, especially in terms of creating latitude for local managers; the locus of command, control and communication; plus local empowerment to achieve clearly explained strategic targets. The authors also identify a shift in performance measurement perspective as a pivotal pre‐requisite for successfully innovating for post‐industrial FM.

Originality/value

Particular focus is made on lessons for developing a culture of organisational innovativeness and for the successful exploitation of latent innovation potential. The paper concludes that these issues represent a significant and systemic challenge to innovation and innovativeness in FM.

Details

Journal of Facilities Management, vol. 5 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1472-5967

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 1 September 2013

Geoffrey Thün, Kathy Velikov, Mary O'Malley and Colin Ripley

This paper presents the Latitude Housing System, a speculative model for a means of imagining multi-scalar nested considerations for the development of a mass-customized net…

Abstract

This paper presents the Latitude Housing System, a speculative model for a means of imagining multi-scalar nested considerations for the development of a mass-customized net energy producing housing system geared to the specific conditions of the Great Lakes region in North America. In the most general sense, the project is motivated by an attempt to frame the discussion of such housing beyond its energy performance alone, and expand by implication, the ways in which we might discuss and debate approaches to the design and delivery of sustainable housing. Considerations that range from regional economic synergies and models of clean-tech collaborations to behaviour shaping building controls systems are presented and briefly outlined as they are applied to a constructed proof of concept prototype, North House, which is based on the Latitude system.

Details

Open House International, vol. 38 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0168-2601

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 31 August 2012

Jingyang Li, Shengping Gong, Xiang Wang and Jingxia Li

The purpose of this paper is to establish an orbital launch window for manned Moon‐to‐Earth trajectories to support China's manned lunar landing mission requirements of high…

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to establish an orbital launch window for manned Moon‐to‐Earth trajectories to support China's manned lunar landing mission requirements of high‐latitude landing and anytime return, i.e. the capability of safely returning the crew exploration vehicle at any time from any lunar parking orbit. The launch window is a certain time interval during which the transearth injection may occur and result in a safe lunar return to the specified landing site on the surface of the Earth.

Design/methodology/approach

Using the patched conic technique, an analytical design method for determining the transearth trajectories is developed with a finite sphere of influence model. An orbital launch window has been established to study the mission sensitivities to transearth trip time and energy requirements. The results presented here are limited to a single impulsive maneuver.

Findings

The difference between the results of the analytical model and high‐fidelity model is compared. This difference is relatively small and can be easily eliminated by a simple differential correction procedure. The launch window duration varies with launch date, from less than one hour to greater than 20 h, and the launch window occurs every day in the sidereal month.

Research limitations/implications

The solution can be used to serve as an initial estimate for future optimization procedures.

Practical implications

The orbital launch window can be used to provide the basis for the preparation of an orbital launch timetable compatible with lunar missions and re‐entry conditions requirements.

Originality/value

Previous studies were mainly concentrated on the launch windows for the departure from the Earth. This paper investigates and establishes the orbital launch window for Moon‐to‐Earth trajectories.

Article
Publication date: 30 January 2019

Jinliang Liu and Yanmin Jia

Cement fly ash gravel (CFG) pile composite foundation is an effective and economic foundation treatment approach, which is significant to build foundation, subgrade construction…

Abstract

Purpose

Cement fly ash gravel (CFG) pile composite foundation is an effective and economic foundation treatment approach, which is significant to build foundation, subgrade construction, and so forth. The purpose of this paper is to present a research on the temperature behaviours of high-latitude and low-altitude island permafrost under CFG pile composite foundation treatment.

Design/methodology/approach

In the process of CFG pile construction, the temperature of permafrost and pile body was monitored using the temperature sensors. The influence of subgrade height and atmospheric temperature cycle on permafrost temperature was analysed by finite element simulation.

Findings

In the process of CFG pile construction, the change curve of pile temperature and the temperature of permafrost beside pile following time can be divided into six stages, and the duration of these stages is at least one month. The temperature variation of permafrost while constructing subgrade in FEM has a good agreement with the results of field temperature monitoring. The height of subgrade not only affects the maximum temperature increase of permafrost and the re-frozen time of permafrost after the construction of CFG pile composite foundation, but also affects the temperature variation amplitude of permafrost during atmospheric temperature cycle.

Originality/value

The research will provide a reference for the design on the CFG pile composite foundation used for island permafrost and guarantee the stability of the structure; thus, it has an important significance.

Details

International Journal of Structural Integrity, vol. 10 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1757-9864

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 24 September 2018

Phatcharasiri Ratcharak, Dimitrios Spyridonidis and Bernd Vogel

This chapter takes a new approach to emotions through the lens of a relational identity among hybrid professionals, using those in healthcare as particularly relevant examples…

Abstract

This chapter takes a new approach to emotions through the lens of a relational identity among hybrid professionals, using those in healthcare as particularly relevant examples. Sharpening the focus on underpinning emotional dynamics may further explain how professional managers can be effective in hybrid roles. The chapter seeks to build on the internal emotional states of these professional managers by understanding how outward emotional displays might influence their subordinates. The understanding of how emotional states/displays in manager–employee relationships influence target behaviors may help multiprofessional organizations generate better-informed leadership practice in relation to desired organizational outcomes, e.g. more efficient and effective health services.

Details

Individual, Relational, and Contextual Dynamics of Emotions
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78754-844-2

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 5 September 2016

Lavagnon A. Ika and Jonas Söderlund

The purpose of this paper is to review and analyze Albert Hirschman’s landmark book Development Projects Observed, share its insights for managing big projects, discuss its…

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Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to review and analyze Albert Hirschman’s landmark book Development Projects Observed, share its insights for managing big projects, discuss its theoretical implications and how it may contribute to the current understanding of project behavior, project management (PM), and in what way it may encourage the rethinking of PM.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper is based on an in-depth analysis of Hirschman’s book. The paper draws on the writings of Jeremy Adelman who authored Hirschman’s biography, Cass Sunstein and Michele Alacevich who, respectively, wrote the foreword and afterword of the Brookings Institution classic published in 2014. It also profits from the work of Robert Picciotto who first met Hirschman in 1964, and Bent Flyvbjerg who recently offered a test of validity for Hirschman’s “Hiding Hand” principle.

Findings

Albert Hirschman was an original thinker and, the authors argue in many ways, a father of PM scholarship. His ideas had profound implications for social sciences and lasting influence in academy, policy, and practice. Although, to a great extent based on studies of projects, his ideas have had surprisingly little impact on modern writings of PM. This paper contributes to amending this weakness in current literature on PM. The authors identify in Hirschman’s book a set of core ideas that possess analytical power for explaining problems in contemporary PM. They include the principle of the Hiding Hand, the power of context, the role of complexity and uncertainty, the unexpected project effects, project traits, and latitudes/disciplines. For all his work and way of research, the authors conclude that Hirschman is not only an early behavioral theorist in PM but equally an early rethinker of PM.

Originality/value

This is the first paper that offers a discussion of Hirschman’s ideas on contemporary projects, how to understand them, their behavior, including the principle of the Hiding Hand and other important nuggets of wisdom in his research such as the significance of project traits, latitudes, and disciplines. The authors discuss in what respects these ideas may enlighten PM practice and theory. This paper also conveys the novel idea that Hirschman is an early rethinker of PM.

Details

International Journal of Managing Projects in Business, vol. 9 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1753-8378

Keywords

21 – 30 of over 1000