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The purpose of this paper is to explore the perceived association between audit rotation (AR) and audit quality (AQ) using respondents from a sample of audit firms operating in a developing economy, the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The paper addresses the following research question: How do UAE auditors perceive the association between various forms of AR and AQ?

The authors collected perception data from a sample of UAE auditors using a questionnaire, and applied several non-parametric statistical techniques to analyze the data, and to answer five exploratory research questions on the perceived association between various forms of AR and AQ.

The findings suggest that the UAE auditors in our sample did not perceive the association between individual types of AR and AQ as significantly different, and that AR in general is essential for AQ improvement and enhances trust in the audit process. Similarly, we find more support for the perception that medium audit tenure is associated with a lower impairment effect on auditor independence. Furthermore, we find no significant differences in perception based on gender, but younger/less experienced professionals and professionals in self-employed practices and small audit firms (compared to other demographics) significantly perceived AR enforceability and AT length to be associated with AQ. Our findings help to enrich our understanding of the perceived AR-AQ association in a relatively new context and less researched audit area in a developing economy.

Although lively debates on the question of AR and AQ within the accounting, finance, investment professions and in the financial media continue, there has been relatively limited knowledge and a dearth of empirical studies on this question in most developing economies. Being the first attempt in the country – the UAE, this study contributes towards addressing this gap in empirical knowledge by exploring the perceived association between various forms of AR and AQ in a developing economy.

In recent years, investment management education has become increasingly relevant. As a result of this development, it is essential that various role players should be consulted to ensure that investment management is taught in line with practitioners’ requirements. The South African Qualifications Authority also specifies that educators and practitioners should collaborate to maintain relevance in all fields of education. The importance of various areas in investment management was investigated. This article compares the ranking of these areas in terms of their importance as perceived by academics and practitioners. The study being reported also aimed to determine whether gaps exist between the areas that academics regard to be important and the areas that practitioners regard as such. Areas that are generally regarded to be most important include asset allocation, fundamental analysis and the measurement of risk and return. Areas that are regarded to be least important include arts, antiques and other hard assets; rights and capitalisation issues; and real estate. Areas in need of research include the measurement of risk and return; asset allocation; derivatives; and global markets and instruments. The findings of this study could have a significant impact on the provision of relevant training for South African investment specialists.

This chapter explores the impact of equality, diversity, and inclusivity (EDI) on internal change agents’ (ICAs) personal and professional development. We have surveyed 117 ICAs that undergo a four-year digital development programme at Edinburgh Business School (EBS). Our survey design draws from expectancy, surprise, sensemaking, and attribution theories to test four hypotheses using Spearman’s rank. We found that diversity features such as gender, age, sector affiliation, work experience, management responsibility, and programme stage do not strongly impact ICAs’ experience of personal and professional development. Surprisingly, some diversity features had a modest or moderate impact on ICAs’ experience of personal and professional development. This disconfirmed our basic assumption about the effectiveness of inclusivity practices in the digital development programme at EBS. We conclude that future research should further investigate the impact of evaluation on ICAs’ personal and professional development and how we can secure it in a digital Business School context.

The purpose of this paper is to know how do early-phase planning of real estate (RE) and facilities management (FM) create value for owners and users of commercial and public sector buildings.

The data were collected in Norway in 2015 through a national online survey (N = 837). The sample gives a good picture of Norwegian owners’ and even users on tactical-level (customer) perspectives on RE and FM. The data have been analysed through descriptive statistics and exploratory factor analysis. The hypotheses have been tested through analyses of correlations and ordinary least square (OLS) linear regressions.

Exploratory factor analysis made it possible to establish seven composite variables (constructs). Based on these seven constructs, six hypotheses were derived and tested. Obstacles and financials have no significant effect on buildings’ perceived usability. The most important factors during early-phase planning that influence buildings’ perceived usability and lifetime value creation are measures promoting environment and life-cycle costs (LCC), FM, adaptability and image.

Further empirical and preferably, comparative studies are needed to establish whether the findings can be generalized. The study has shown that a building’s usability and lifetime value creation is largely determined by decisions made during early phase planning.

Well-founded early-phase planning of RE and FM may actually provide very high return on the investments and significantly improve the buildings’ lifetime value creation for owners and users. Early-phase planning is also of great importance both for buildings’ physical design, as well as for successful FM during the buildings’ use phase, and may prevent irreversible blunders.

This is a large N empirical study in Norway. The findings indicate what owner and users of buildings should emphasize during early phase planning.

This research explores perceptions of knowledge management processes held by managers and employees in a service industry. To date, empirical research on knowledge management in the service industry is sparse. This research seeks to examine absorptive capacity and its four capabilities of acquisition, assimilation, transformation and exploitation and their impact on effective knowledge management. All of these capabilities are strategies that enable external knowledge to be recognized, imported and integrated into, and further developed within the organization effectively. The research tests the relationships between absorptive capacity and effective knowledge management through analysis of quantitative data (n = 549) drawn from managers and employees in 35 residential aged care organizations in Western Australia. Responses were analysed using Partial Least Square-based Structural Equation Modelling. Additional analysis was conducted to assess if the job role (of manager or employee) and three industry context variables of profit motive, size of business and length of time the organization has been in business, impacted on the hypothesized relationships.

Structural model analysis examines the relationships between variables as hypothesized in the research framework. Analysis found that absorptive capacity and the four capabilities correlated significantly with effective knowledge management, with absorptive capacity explaining 56% of the total variability for effective knowledge management. Findings from this research also show that absorptive capacity and the four capabilities provide a useful framework for examining knowledge management in the service industry. Additionally, there were no significant differences in the perceptions held between managers and employees, nor between respondents in for-profit and not-for-profit organizations. Furthermore, the size of the organization and length of time the organization has been in business did not impact on absorptive capacity, the four capabilities and effective knowledge management.

The research considers implications for business in light of these findings. The role of managers in providing leadership across the knowledge management process was confirmed, as well as the importance of guiding routines and knowledge sharing throughout the organization. Further, the results indicate that within the participating organizations there are discernible differences in the way that some organizations manage their knowledge, compared to others. To achieve effective knowledge management, managers need to provide a supportive workplace culture, facilitate strong employee relationships, encourage employees to seek out new knowledge, continually engage in two-way communication with employees and provide up-to-date policies and procedures that guide employees in doing their work. The implementation of knowledge management strategies has also been shown in this research to enhance the delivery and quality of residential aged care.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate readers’ annotations in library books and attitudes towards marginalia among library users. In particular, the study discusses how marginalia function as reader-to-reader communication.

The study used data collected from both public library and university library collections, as well as a user survey conducted among library users. The empirical results are discussed in relation to theories of affordances, in order to understand what characterizes the socio-physical realm within which marginalia exist (RQ1), and what specific conditions make marginalia possible as a communicative act between readers (RQ2).

The study suggests that marginalia in library books are mainly by-products of reading/studying processes. The user survey depicts an overall picture of ambiguous attitudes towards marginalia. It is argued that marginalia seen as communication rely heavily on the proximity of the context and the permanence of the physical medium. Three distinctive categories are proposed for classifying marginalia according to their relationship with the text: embedded; evaluative; extratextual. In spite of being an often unwanted communication, marginalia thus still function as an additional layer to the main message of the primary text.

The findings are indicative pointing to follow-up studies that may further validate them. The study contributes to a referential frame for future studies on the subject.

The study addresses factual and communicative aspects of marginalia less covered in previous research, thus providing a basis for further research also in relation to designing affordances for annotations in e-books.

The inverse kinematics in robot manipulator have to handle the arctangent and arccosine function. However, the two functions are complicated and need much computation time so that it is difficult to be realized in the typical processing system. The purpose of this paper is to solve this problem by using Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) to speed up the computation power.

The Taylor series expansion method is firstly applied to transfer arctangent and arccosine function to a polynomial form. And Look-Up Table (LUT) is used to store the parameters of the polynomial form. Then the behavior of the computation algorithm is described by Very high-speed IC Hardware Description Language (VHDL) and a co-simulation using ModelSim and Simulink is applied to evaluate the correctness of the VHDL code.

The computation time of arctangent and arccosine function using by FPGA need only 320 and 420 ns, respectively, and the accuracy is <0.01°.

Fast computation in arctangent and arccosine function can speed up the motion response of the real robot system when it needs to perform the inverse kinematics function.

This is the first time such to combine the Taylor series method and LUT method in the computation the arctangent and arccosine function as well as to implement it with FPGA.

The purpose of this paper is to integrate the function of a speed controller for induction motor (IM) drive, such as the speed PI controller, the current vector controller, the slip speed estimator, the space vector pulse width modulation scheme, the quadrature encoder pulse, and analog to digital converter interface circuit, etc. into one field programmable gate array (FPGA).

First, the mathematical modeling of an IM drive, the field-oriented control algorithm, and PI controller are derived. Second, the very high speed IC hardware description language (VHDL) is adopted to describe the behavior of the algorithms above. Third, based on electronic design automation simulator link, a co-simulation work constructed by ModelSim and Simulink is applied to verify the proposed VHDL code for the speed controller intellectual properties (IP). Finally, the developed VHDL code will be downloaded to the FPGA for further control the IM drive.

In realization aspect, it only needs 5,590 LEs, 196,608 RAM bits, and 14 embedded 9-bit multipliers in FPGA to build up a speed control IP. In computational power aspect, the operation time to complete the computation of the PI controller, the slip speed estimator, the current vector controller are only 0.28 μs, 0.72 μs, and 0.96 μs, respectively.

Fast computation in FPGA can speed up the speed response of IM drive system to increase the running performance.

This is the first time to realize all the function of a speed controller for IM drive within one FPGA.

Cognitive style has been identified to be significantly influential in deciding users' preferences of search engines. In particular, Witkin's field dependence/independence has been widely studied in the area of web searching. It has been suggested that this cognitive style has conceptual links with the holism/serialism. This study aims to investigate the differences between the field dependence/independence and holism/serialism.

An empirical study was conducted with 120 students from a UK university. Riding's cognitive style analysis (CSA) and Ford's study preference questionnaire (SPQ) were used to identify the students' cognitive styles. A questionnaire was designed to identify users' preferences for the design of search engines. Data mining techniques were applied to analyse the data obtained from the empirical study.

The results highlight three findings. First, a fundamental link is confirmed between the two cognitive styles. Second, the relationship between field dependent users and holists is suggested to be more prominent than that of field independent users and serialists. Third, the interface design preferences of field dependent and field independent users can be split more clearly than those of holists and serialists.

The contributions of this study include a deeper understanding of the similarities and differences between field dependence/independence and holists/serialists as well as proposing a novel methodology for data analyses.