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The Centre for Reviews and Dissemination was commissioned to conduct a systmatic review of clinical audits undertaken to assess the implementation and effectiveness of the National Health Service (NHS) two‐week waiting time policy for cancer referrals in England and Wales. This paper highlights the logistical difficulties experienced by the review team in trying to obtain information from the NHS, and discusses what needs to be done in order to improve the reporting and usefulness of clinical audit reports.

A total of 650 key individuals within NHS Trusts and Strategic Health Authorities were contacted for copies of relevant audits. Other key individuals and organisations across the NHS were also contacted, web sites of key organisations searched, requests for audits on relevant e‐mail discussion lists posted and electronic databases and conference proceedings searched.

Finds that many trusts do not appear to hold a centralised record of what clinical audits have been performed within the trust. In many instances several follow‐up contacts were necessary. The majority of included audits were poorly reported, with fewer than half providing sufficient detail on methodological aspects for the audit to be reproducible.

There should be a system of recording ongoing and completed audits conducted within the NHS, to ensure that audit reports are produced and accessible. The NHS needs to make sure that not only are appropriate audit methods used but that audit reports are written up in sufficient detail to allow the reader to ascertain how the audit was conducted and to assess the validity of the results. Documentary evidence of action plans would make it easier for those not directly involved in the audit to assess if, and in what ways, the audit findings are being acted upon to improve existing practices and procedures.

This paper discusses what needs to be done in order to improve the reporting and usefulness of clinical audit reports.

This exploratory study examined the qualitative and quantitative financial measures that best describe the patterns, predictors, or degree of success for vision driven organizations. A framework was developed within the methodology to qualitatively partition and link the financial contributions of the organizational and strategic factors within visionary organizations. The qualitative measures were identified utilizing content analysis within the literature stream. Five financial indicators were chosen to represent the respective quantitative measures from 57 visionary organizations over a 16‐year period. The inferential test results from two multiple discriminant analyses and verifying MANOVA tests show the accuracy for predicting the level of a visionary organization at 84 percent. The results of this research suggest that group membership, either visionary or average visionary, can be predicted reliably from a set of financial indicators. This research further suggests that organizations can enhance their opportunities for sustained competitive advantage and supernormal profits by focusing on the alignment of ten core elements of vision driven strategies identified from within the research stream.

Building on organizational support theory and social exchange theory, the purpose of this paper is to study the impact of organizational support on employee performance (EP) in the context of flexible manufacturing. In particular, the authors aimed to investigate the mediating role of employee attitude between organizational support and EP, and the moderating role of organizational justice (OJ).

A total of 180 participants from 36 work teams employed in 7 large automotive manufacturing enterprises in China were surveyed using a questionnaire designed by the authors. Multiple linear regressions were used to test the proposed hypotheses.

The results revealed four new performance indicators of frontline workers in the context of flexible manufacturing: continuous learning, teamwork, problem solving and active work. Organizational support can be divided into reinforcing support and inhibitive support. Reinforcing organizational support has a positive effect on new performance of frontline workers, and a sense of belonging plays a strong mediating role between them. Inhibitive organizational support plays an important role in the sense of awe (SA) of employees, but the SA has no influence on new performance of frontline workers. OJ plays a strong moderating role between organizational support and employee attitudes.

This study is one of the first attempts to explore the performance of frontline workers in the context of flexible manufacturing and contributes to the existing literature on the relationship between organizational support and EP.

Legumes are widely grown and are consumed as a source of plant protein throughout the world. They rank second after cereals with respect to their consumption order. Legumes have anti‐nutritional factors which make their uses limited. This study aims to check the effect of soaking and cooking on the anti‐nutrient contents and nutritional quality of the legumes.

Five legumes (white kidney bean, red kidney bean, lentil, chickpea, and white gram) frequently used by the masses were selected for soaking and cooking trials. Legumes were tested for their weight, volume, density, swelling capacity and water absorption capacity before soaking and cooking. Legumes were soaked in simple water, 2 per cent sodium chloride solution, acetic acid and sodium bicarbonate and cooked in a beaker with 1 : 5 seed water ratio to uniform soft mass. After soaking and cooking, legumes were tested for anti‐nutrients (phytic acid and tannin) and their nutritional quality.

The statistical analysis of the study results revealed that dark colour legume (red kidney bens) has a high level of phytic acid and tannin compared with light colour (white kidney beans and white grams). Soaking and cooking of legumes result in significant reduction in phytic acid and tannin contents. Maximum reduction of phytic acid (78.055) and tannin (65.81 per cent) was found for sodium bicarbonate soaking followed by cooking. These treatments also result in a slight reduction in nutrients such as protein, minerals and total sugars.

Soaking and cooking of legumes reduce their anti‐nutrients; phytic acid and tannin significantly. These treatments may be used domestically as well as commercially to increase the nutrients' availability from legumes to meet the problem of protein and minerals deficiencies.

Along with water different soaking solutions which are easily available in the market were used to test out their effect on the nutritional quality and safety. These may be used by the common people to raise their nutritional status.

This study examines the effect of a firm's level of intra-regional sales in the triad markets of North American, Europe, and Asia on its performance. The form of the relationship is explored. The results show that there exists a strong positive relationship between a firm's level of intra-regional sales and its performance (measured by return on equity (ROE) and return on assets, (ROA)). A firm tends to perform better when it has its sales in the home region of the triad. The hypothesis that there exists a non-linear relationship (second- and third-order curvilinear relationship) between performance and intra-regional sales is not supported.

Given the mixed evidence on the relationship between internationalisation and firm performance, the purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of internationalisation on the financial performance in the setting of a matured and stagnant market, the global automotive industry.

The study uses 37 automotive manufacturers covering from 2000 to 2015. Panel regression analyses were used to estimate the relationship between four financial performance variables (return on equity [ROE], return on asset [ROA], return on capital [ROC] and return on sales [ROS]) and three main independent variables (foreign assets to total assets [FATA], research and development intensity [RNDi], advertising intensity [ADVi]), controlling for product diversification, firm size, age and risk.

The findings reveal that automotive firms with a lower FATA ratio, lower RNDi and higher ADVi tend to achieve higher financial performance. However, the intensity of product diversification does not influence the financial performance of global automakers. Ceteris paribus, larger firms in terms of market capitalisation and new entrants into the market tend to have higher financial performance relative to smaller and older firms.

This study contributes to the literature first by examining the relationship between internationalisation and firm performance in the setting of a matured market, i.e. the automotive industry. Secondly, the paper uses a multinational sample at a global level; and third, it analyses financial performance on a comprehensive basis via four measures, namely, ROA, ROE, ROC and ROS, as the dependent variables.

We investigate the relative roles of key components of earnings change in explaining the value relevance of earnings across different life‐cycle stages of the firm. We hypothesize that firms in different life‐cycle stages take different strategic actions: change in sales is emphasized in the growth and mature stages, while in later stages, profitability is emphasized. Because payoffs to such strategies vary across the life‐cycle, the stock market reaction to the success firms have in employing these strategic actions is likely to vary across the life‐cycle. To test our hypotheses, we disaggregate changes in earnings into three key components: earnings change from change in sales, earnings change from change in profitability, and an interaction term comprising both sales change and profitability change. Our findings are consistent with our hypotheses: when firms are in the growth stage, the value‐relevance of change in sales is relatively greater than that of change in profitability. In the mature stage, the value relevance of change in profitability increases, relative to that of change in sales. When firms are in stagnant stage, the value‐relevance of changes in profitability are relatively greater than that of change in sales. Collectively, the results demonstrate a shift in the value relevance of earnings components from a growth emphasis early in the life‐cycle to a profitability emphasis later in the life‐cycle.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between the chief data officer’s (CDO) presence and firm performance, and the moderating effect of firm size.

The performance data for 64 treatment firms with CDOs and 64 control firms without CDOs is collected from Compustat database. The Wilcoxon signed-rank test is used to analyze the performance differences between treatment firms and control firms. Hierarchical regression method is used to test the moderating effect of firm size.

The results indicate that the profit ratios of treatment firms are significantly improved after the appointment of CDOs, and the profit ratios of treatment firms are significantly higher than that of the control firms. For the cost ratios, the findings provide some empirical evidence revealing two of the cost ratios are lower and only one ratio is higher for the treatment firms after CDOs’ appointment. Firm size moderates the relationship between the CDO’s presence and firm performance indicator, ROS, in the same direction. Firm size has no moderating effect on relationships between CDO’s presence and other performance indicators.

The findings provide practical insights that will help managers to realize the importance of CDOs and their work. CDOs would bring some cost to the firms, but they would bring more profit to firms. In addition, if for large firms, the CDO’s presence would bring more ROS.

The study explores the relationship between the CDO’s presence and firm performance. It is the first attempt to explore the CDO’s presence and the cost performance in the specific time period, and the study is also the first attempt to analyze the moderating effect of the firm size on the relationship between the CDO’s presence and firm performance.

This paper utilizes a new data base on the international activities of small, new ventures in Korea to examine the impact of internationalization on firm performance. Main findings are two‐fold: first, the degree of internationalization by new ventures is related to firm performance in a non‐linear fashion with four phases resulting in the new M‐shaped curve; and, second, the internationalization of the new ventures in the home region of the triad moderates positively the non‐linear M‐shaped relationship between the two as their degree of internationalization increases.

The purpose of this paper is to provide evidence regarding the contributions of ambidextrous workforces as a source of value for dynamic companies and organizations facing emerging market turbulence.

Using structural equation modeling, the paper analyses the data collected via a semi-structured questionnaire administered to a sample of 1,227 employees from 37 Italian small- to medium-sized enterprises to investigate the effect on companies’ economic performance of ambidextrous workforce-related elements such as study background, previous work experience, work flexibility and soft capabilities.

The research shows that multidisciplinary human resources’ study background, previous human resources’ work experience and human resources’ soft capabilities are positively linked to companies’ return on sales, providing indirect evidence about the role of ambidextrous workforces in supporting companies facing emerging market turbulence.

The research demonstrates the relevant role of human resources in supporting companies to better align themselves to the emerging social and economic variety.