Search results

Far too much weight seems to have been given to the Local Government Board circular which mentioned public libraries as institutions whose expenditure should be examined with a view to effecting economies. This, to the ordinary person, would seem to call on library committees to exercise special care to prevent unnecessary expenditure, and more particularly to see that capital expenditure on new buildings and extensions is not made. The first of these requirements has been common for years; had there been wasteful expenditure, and if librarians had not carefully financed their resources, half the libraries in England would have been bankrupt long ago. The second requirement is just, and would be accepted even by the most unbridled library enthusiast. But local bodies have not been content so to read the circular. They have frequently interpreted it to mean that “libraries must mark time,” are “of small value in peace and less in war,” and the war is being made an excuse by old‐standing opponents of public culture to do as much damage as possible to the library movement.

The purpose of this research is to undertake an examination of the impacts of socio‐demographic and economic variables on the probability of purchasing financial products. There is relatively little empirical research that has been taken to understand how the underlying economy affects customers' subsequent financial product purchase behaviours. Understanding this influence would improve prediction of when purchases will occur and hence is important for the Customer lifetime value models of financial service organisations.

Two proportional hazard modelling approaches – Cox and Weibull – are compared in terms of predictive ability on a data set from a major insurance company. The risk factors for purchase are both economic and socio‐demographic.

The results show that the external economic environment is an extremely important influence in driving customers' financial products purchasing behaviours. Furthermore, the results also indicate that Cox's proportional hazard models are superior to Weibull proportional hazard models in this case because of an annual purchase effect.

Financial organisations need to consider the current economic conditions before determining how much marketing effort to undertake.

The originality of this paper is that it considers economic conditions and socio‐demographic variables in modelling the long run purchase behaviour of customers for insurance and savings products. It has a large data set from a major insurance company. It is also one of the first papers to make a detailed comparison between the semi‐parametric and parametric proportional hazard models in the bank marketing area.

This paper has been developed with the intent to establish specific assumptions which will provide a foundation for new formulae for marketing mega events. The basis for these assumptions are to be found in Werner Wyss “New Marketing” and in J. Zauhar and J. Kurtzman “Programme Management: festivals, carnivals, public celebrations, special events”. The following pages have been prepared purely for discussion purposes and have been so written.

The selection criteria for contractor pre‐qualification are characterized by the co‐existence of both quantitative and qualitative data. The qualitative data is non‐linear, uncertain and imprecise. An ideal decision support system for contractor pre‐qualification should have the ability of handling both quantitative and qualitative data, and of mapping the complicated non‐linear relationship of the selection criteria, such that rational and consistent decisions can be made. In this research paper, an artificial neural network model was developed to assist public clients identifying suitable contractors for tendering. The pre‐qualification criteria (variables) were identified for the model. One hundred and twelve real pre‐qualification cases were collected from civil engineering projects in Hong Kong, and 88 hypothetical pre‐qualification cases were also generated according to the ‘If‐then’ rules used by professionals in the pre‐qualification process. The results of the analysis totally comply with current practice (public developers in Hong Kong). Each pre‐qualification case consisted of input ratings for candidate contractors' attributes and their corresponding pre‐qualification decisions. The training of the neural network model was accomplished by using the developed program, in which a conjugate gradient descent algorithm was incorporated for improving the learning performance of the network. Cross‐validation was applied to estimate the generalization errors based on the ‘re‐sampling’ of training pairs. The case studies show that the artificial neural network model is suitable for mapping the complicated non‐linear relationship between contractors' attributes and their corresponding pre‐qualification (disqualification) decisions. The artificial neural network model can be concluded as an ideal alternative for performing the contractor pre‐qualification task.

The purpose of this paper shows the effect of hot and humid weather conditions (HHWCs) on workers that has resulted in considerable loss in the construction industry, especially during the hottest periods due to decline in worker productivity (WP). Until the last few decades, there is very limited research on construction WP in HHWCs. Nevertheless, these studies have sparked interests on seeking for the most appropriate methods to assess the impact of HHWCs on construction workers.

This paper begins by reviewing the current measuring methods on WP in HHWCs, follows by presenting the potential impact of HHWCs on WP. The paper highlights the methodological deficiencies, which consequently provides a platform for scholars and practitioners to direct future research to resolve the significant productivity loss due to global warming. This paper highlights the need to identify the limitations and advantages of the current methods to formulate a framework of new approaches to measure the WP in HHWCs.

Results show that the methods used in providing real-time response on the effects of HHWCs on WP in construction at project, task and crew levels are limited. An integration of nonintrusive real-time monitoring system and local weather measurement with real-time data synchronisation and analysis is required to produce suitable information to determine worker health- and safety-related decisions in HHWCs.

The comprehensive literature review makes an original contribution to WP measurements filed in HHWCs in the construction industry. Results of this review provide researchers and practitioners with an insight into challenges associated with the measurements methods and solving practical site measurements issues. The findings will also enable the researchers and practitioners to bridge the identified research gaps in this research field and enhance the ability to provide accurate measures in HHWCs. The proposed research framework may promote potential improvements in the productivity measurements methods, which support researchers and practitioners in developing new innovative methods in HHWCs with the integration of the most recent monitoring technologies.

Incentive‐based executive compensation is regarded as a mechanism for alleviating agency problems between executives and shareholders. Seventy‐three New Zealand (NZ) listed companies are used to examine the relationship between executive incentive compensation schemes (ICS) and firm performance. The results suggest that neither compensation level nor adoption of an ICS are significantly related to returns to shareholders or ROA. However, there is a statistically significant relationship between Tobin's q and both CEO compensation and executive share ownership. Further, the evidence suggests the recent compensation disclosure requirements in NZ are not yet stringent enough to allow adequate analysis of the link between ICSs and corporate performance.

The mortality rate due to intrapartum asphyxia is generally considered a good guide to the quality of perinatal care. Using a routine system of surveillance, we identified a six‐fold difference in mortality rate due to intrapartum asphyxia depending on the hospital of birth, with the lowest rate (95 per cent confidence intervals) of 0.25 (0.10, 0.64)/1,000 births and the highest rate of 1.59 (0.77, 3.27)/1,000 births. A framework of internal and external reviews of the clinical services was developed, that is able to tackle such clinical governance issues in a robust but sensitive manner. The outcome included specific improvements in service provision. The model is generally applicable and is thus suitable for use wherever such clinical governance issues are identified.

Open innovation (OI) has become increasingly popular as an enterprise strategy in both industry and academia, and has been adopted, at least in part, by many companies. Despite this popularity, there is a dearth of evaluation of OI efficiency and a lack of suitable quantitative indices. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

In this study, the authors used both data envelopment analysis (DEA) and Malmquist techniques to compare the pre- and post-transition levels of performance achievement of Procter & Gamble (P&G), a widely recognised and public early adopter of OI, with a group of its main competitors.

Most detailed analysis of the time-course revealed that the innovation efficiency of P&G improved rapidly and substantially after its embracing of OI, an effect we term the “open rise”. However, there is also a transient decline in R&D efficiency at the beginning of OI adoption (“open dip”) and an unexpected and marked decline (“open drop”) after the peak positive effect.

The quantitative methods appear to meet the needs identified in the preceding literature for more quantitative approaches to the measurement of OI.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the prevalence of attempted suspect-provoked shootings (SPS) in Victoria, Australia, and explore nonlethal tactics police officers use to resolve such incidents.

A random sample of 20 percent of police-attended incidents was sourced from a police contact-based database. The narrative of each incident was coded using established criteria for “suicide-by-cop.” Incidents that met the criteria were further analyzed to elucidate historical and situational characteristics. To supplement these data, operational police officers were invited to participate in a survey about particulars of an attempted SPS incident that they had attended and resolved non-fatally.

Police are encountering these incidents up to three times a week in Victoria, Australia. While they engage in a range of tactics, police report that communication and negotiation skills are the most effective means of successful resolution.

Although the survey attempted to correct for the potential limitations of using administrative data for research purposes, its weakness is in the modest sample size that utilizes self-report data that may lead to recall biases. Further research would benefit from using complementary methodologies that seek to examine police tactics and elucidate decision-making processes using video-based or written vignettes.

Officers’ awareness of both the commonalty of this phenomenon and of the important situational characteristics may lead to greater skill and confidence in managing these.

This is one of the very few published studies investigating prevalence and characteristics of attempted SPS incidents.

Ideology as a mixture of consciously or unconsciously accepted ideas and beliefs provides the underlying support or rationalisation for fundamental features of thought and action in a society. A vigorously promoted contending ideology may at any given time also influence developments. Value judgments, which are likewise not based on the logical rules of observation and verification, may for present purposes be taken as concerned with less comprehensive or less fundamental matters than ideology.