Cost is often the most mysterious area of business. Rather than viewing cost as an existing monolith, management must instead see it as a consciously chosen investment selected to…
Abstract
Cost is often the most mysterious area of business. Rather than viewing cost as an existing monolith, management must instead see it as a consciously chosen investment selected to achieve a specific revenue stream. In addition to redefining cost in a way that makes proactive management possible, it is important to make a distinction between efficiency and effectiveness. Efficiency involves doing things quickly and well, while effectiveness involves doing the things that optimize the results of an organization's overall activities.
That the introduction of the Control system should have given rise to a considerable amount of criticism, both appreciative and adverse, was naturally to be expected. The…
Abstract
That the introduction of the Control system should have given rise to a considerable amount of criticism, both appreciative and adverse, was naturally to be expected. The appreciative remarks which have appeared in the press, and those also which have been privately communicated to the directors, indicate that the subject has been intelligently considered, and in some cases carefully investigated and studied. The opinions given are worth having on account of the position and influence of hose who have given them, and on account of the obvious freedom from bias which has characterised them. This is so far satisfactory, and goes to show that the success which has attended the working of the Control system abroad may well be expected to attend it in this country as soon as it is sufficiently well known to be appreciated by the manufacturers and vendors of good and genuine products, and by the general public, whose best interests it cannot but serve.
Albert ‘Bert’ Gillegin has retired from the chairmanship of Fishburn Printing Ink but remains a consultant to Inmont Corporation, the parent company.
Barrie O. Pettman and Richard Dobbins
This issue is a selected bibliography covering the subject of leadership.
Abstract
This issue is a selected bibliography covering the subject of leadership.
Details
Keywords
Michèle Truscott, Deon de Beer, George Vicatos, Keith Hosking, Ludrick Barnard, Gerrie Booysen and R. Ian Campbell
The last decade has seen major advances in rapid prototyping (RP), with it becoming a multi‐disciplinary technology, crossing various research fields, and connecting continents…
Abstract
Purpose
The last decade has seen major advances in rapid prototyping (RP), with it becoming a multi‐disciplinary technology, crossing various research fields, and connecting continents. Process and material advancements open up new applications and manufacturing (through RP) is serving non‐traditional industries. RP technology is used to support rapid product development (RPD). The purpose of this paper is to describe how the Integrated Product Development research group of the Central University of Technology, Free State, South Africa is applying various CAD/CAM/RP technologies to support a medical team from the Grootte Schuur and Vincent Palotti hospitals in Cape Town, to save limbs – as a last resort at a stage where conventional medical techniques or practices may not apply any longer.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper uses action research to justify the proposal of a new method to use CAD/CAM/RP related technologies to substitute lost/damaged bone regions through the use of CT to CAD to.STL manipulation.
Findings
A case study where RP related technologies were used to support medical product development for a patient with severe injuries from a road accident is discussed.
Originality/value
The paper considers current available technologies, and discusses new advancements in direct metal freeform fabrication, and its potential to revolutionise the medical industry.
Details
Keywords
Communications regarding this column should be addressed to Mrs. Cheney, Peabody Library School, Nashville, Term. 37203. Mrs. Cheney does not sell the books listed here. They are…
Abstract
Communications regarding this column should be addressed to Mrs. Cheney, Peabody Library School, Nashville, Term. 37203. Mrs. Cheney does not sell the books listed here. They are available through normal trade sources. Mrs. Cheney, being a member of the editorial board of Pierian Press, will not review Pierian Press reference books in this column. Descriptions of Pierian Press reference books will be included elsewhere in this publication.
This chapter provides a new theory for organizational leadership in which an organization's leadership, authority, management, power, and environments (LAMPE) are made coherent…
Abstract
This chapter provides a new theory for organizational leadership in which an organization's leadership, authority, management, power, and environments (LAMPE) are made coherent and integrated. Organizations work best if their LAMPE is coherent, integrated, and operational. The chapter begins by introducing basic concepts, such as structures, processes, process frameworks, task–role matrices, interdependence uncertainty, and virtual-like organizational arrangements. The LAMPE theory is then built upon this base. Leadership is defined as the processes of initiating, enabling, implementing, and sustaining change in an organization. Authority is defined as the legal right to preempt the outcome of a decision or a process. Management is defined in term of its major processes. Power is the control of interdependence uncertainty. When 29 leadership practices are introduced, it is possible to link them to all five of LAMPE's constructs. A number of conclusions are derived, in the form of 36 propositions: 5 dealing with leadership, 5 focusing on leadership requirements matching, 4 relating to leadership effectiveness, 5 dealing with leadership capacity, 4 concerning the benefits of distributed leadership, and 13 linking LAMPE to the theory of the organizational hologram.
Michel Zaitouni and Mohammed Laid Ouakouak
The purpose of this paper is to develop and empirically test a model in which antecedents of creativity are hypothesized to lead to enhance employee creativity and, subsequently…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to develop and empirically test a model in which antecedents of creativity are hypothesized to lead to enhance employee creativity and, subsequently, to increase innovative performance outcomes. Leader–member exchange (LMX) is posited as a moderator of the leader encouragement of creativity and employee creativity relationship.
Design/methodology/approach
This study is based on a sample of 163 employees working in various service organizations in Kuwait and pursuing an MBA. Structural equation modeling techniques with AMOS software were used to assess the relationships between the different constructs.
Findings
The findings show that all creativity antecedents are positively and significantly related to individual creativity, except for leader encouragement of creativity and perceived organizational support. The results show also that LMX mediates the relationship between leader encouragement of creativity and individual creativity, and that intrinsic motivation moderates the relationship between perceived organizational support and individual creativity.
Research limitations/implications
This study has several limitations including a small sample size, cross-sectional design, same-source bias and one point in time data. Future studies could examine these findings in different settings, use longitudinal design and capture a full range of creativity antecedents,
Originality/value
This study is the first to theorize and identify antecedents that promote individual creativity in a collectivist context (i.e. Kuwait). Moreover, this study is unique in that we predict that employee creativity is a mediating mechanism that can explain the link between creativity antecedents and creativity outcomes.
Details
Keywords
Fatigue, occurring in an average healthy individual, under ordinary conditions of life, and while foodstuffs of a very usual character are being ingested, is an indication of an…
Abstract
Fatigue, occurring in an average healthy individual, under ordinary conditions of life, and while foodstuffs of a very usual character are being ingested, is an indication of an inability on the part of the organism to meet, with sufficient rapidity, the demands of the body created by wear and tear. It is an association of defective oxidation and the undue accumulation of waste products in the tissues and blood, and is in a very large percentage of cases caused solely by a deficiency in the average dietary of to‐day of one or more of those mineral elements which are essential to life. That mineral substances are indispensable to life has been fully demonstrated, for it has been shown that animals fed upon proteins, carbohydrates, and fats, which have been rendered as ash‐free as possible, perish even more rapidly than if they are deprived of food altogether.