H. Joseph Wen, Billy Lim and H. Lisa Huang
As a result of the dot‐com collapse and the slowdown in the economy, the flood of venture capital dollars for e‐commerce has evaporated. E‐commerce companies have been enforced to…
Abstract
As a result of the dot‐com collapse and the slowdown in the economy, the flood of venture capital dollars for e‐commerce has evaporated. E‐commerce companies have been enforced to review their business performance. E‐commerce efficiency has been touted to be a critical component that can assist a company in its strategies to become successful. This study proposes a model for evaluating e‐commerce efficiency using data envelopment analysis (DEA) approach. The model includes not only financial and operational measures, but also e‐commerce specific measures. An illustrative example demonstrates that the DEA model can not only effectively reflect the relative efficiency of e‐commerce firms but also identify their potential efficiency problems. Management can, therefore, take the right remedial actions.
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Natalie Barker-Ruchti and Laura G. Purdy
Gymnasts worldwide have turned to media to speak out about their experiences of abuse in sport. More formally, services to report abuse have been recognised as important; however…
Abstract
Gymnasts worldwide have turned to media to speak out about their experiences of abuse in sport. More formally, services to report abuse have been recognised as important; however, we know little about athletes' experiences of the process. Therefore, we consider in this chapter how (former) athletes experience the process of reporting abuse and maltreatment. This chapter begins with a narrative poem that was created using direct quotes from an interview with a former gymnast, Lisa (pseudonym), who described her involvement with her national gymnastics federation's reporting process. We then examine reporting services and discuss the reasons why (former) athletes may not report abuse and maltreatment. As a conceptual framework, we present the pixie model of women's artistic gymnastics (WAG) as the root of the culture of fear, control and silence that prevents gymnasts from reporting their experiences, and discuss factors that enable the reporting of abuse and maltreatment. To illustrate the ways the WAG pixie model shaped Lisa's reporting experience, the poem presented at the outset of this chapter is extended to a narrative about her engagement with reporting processes. The chapter concludes with a call to put abuse and maltreatment on the sports governance agenda, the development of trauma-informed processes and further research on reporting abuse in sport.
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Kwame Owusu Kwateng, Edna Edwina Osei-Wusu and Kofi Amanor
Increased competition in the banking sector coupled with long queues in the banking hall has necessitated the introduction of internet banking among banks in Ghana. As a result…
Abstract
Purpose
Increased competition in the banking sector coupled with long queues in the banking hall has necessitated the introduction of internet banking among banks in Ghana. As a result, internet banking has attracted a great deal of attention from both academicians and practitioners. The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of internet banking on the performance of banking institutions in Ghana.
Design/methodology/approach
In total, 20 banks in Ghana were selected from the Bank of Ghana website for the study. The financial information about the banks’ operations was retrieved from the financial statements of the respective banks for the end of the year 2016. The data envelopment analysis-bootstrap approach with principal component analysis and cluster analysis was used to estimate 49 models.
Findings
The findings of the study indicated that the integration of internet banking into traditional banking methods has led to superior bank performance in Ghana. It was observed that while the independent application of internet banking as a strategy to raise performance was not yielding higher returns due to the low patronage of internet services among banking consumers, its integration with possible traditional methods is widely observed among the top performers in the banking industry.
Practical implications
Traditional banking methods, integrated banking service strategies and the internet banking service-oriented strategy emerged as the main banking strategies among the banks.
Originality/value
Extant literature is quite silent on the effect of internet banking on bank performance in Africa. However, this paper is among the first significant attempts to examine the effect of internet banking on bank performance.
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Lisa Maria Beethoven Steene, Lisa Gaylor and Jane L. Ireland
The current review aims to focus on how risk and protective factors for self-harm in secure mental health hospitals are captured in the literature.
Abstract
Purpose
The current review aims to focus on how risk and protective factors for self-harm in secure mental health hospitals are captured in the literature.
Design/methodology/approach
Fifty-seven articles were included in a systematic review, drawn from an initial 1,119 articles, post duplicate removal. Databases included Psycinfo, Psycarticles, Psycnet, Web of Science and EBSCO host. A thematic analysis was used, which included a meta-ethnographic approach for considering qualitative papers.
Findings
There was a clear focus on risk factors, with eight identified (in order of occurrence): raised emotional reactivity and poor emotion regulation; poor mental health; traumatic experiences; personality disorder diagnosis and associated traits; increased use of outward aggression – dual harm; constraints of a secure environment and lack of control; previous self-harm and suicide attempts; and hopelessness. Protective factors featured less, resulting in only three themes emerging (in order of occurrence): positive social support and communication; positive coping skills; and hope/positive outlook.
Research limitations/implications
This includes a proposal to move focus away from “risk” factors, to incorporate “needs”, in terms of individual and environmental factors. There is also a need for more attention to focus on developing high quality research in this area.
Originality/value
The research captures an area where a synthesis of research has not been comprehensively undertaken, particularly with regards to capturing protective as well as risk factors.
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Yaquan Han, Jihe Wang, Haifeng Huang, Jun Sun and Yue Sun
This study aims to establish the laser links between satellites among large-scale distributed satellite systems; a combined attitude control strategy containing two stages is…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to establish the laser links between satellites among large-scale distributed satellite systems; a combined attitude control strategy containing two stages is proposed in this paper.
Design/methodology/approach
These two stages are: one is the attitude initial pointing control to change the attitude of satellite pointing to the other satellite based on the position information of each satellite; the other one is the high precision attitude tracking control to scan the uncertainty cone because the initial pointing control accuracy is not enough to establish the laser link. At the initial pointing control stage, a method to determine the target attitude of each satellite is presented based on the position information of each satellite, and the fuzzy adaptive control algorithm is used to control the satellites to its calculated attitude. Then, at the high precision attitude tracking control stage, a strategy for laser link acquisition and scanning the uncertainty cone by the lasers of the spacecraft is proposed, and an angular velocity tracking scanning controller is designed while the convergence of the attitude tracking error is ensured through Lyapunov–Krasovskii theory.
Findings
Simulations are conducted to verify the effectiveness of the proposed control algorithm, and the laser link for a large-scale distributed satellite system with super long distance is achieved through a combined attitude control strategy.
Research limitations/implications
A combined attitude control strategy is valid for a large-scale distributed satellite system with super long distance.
Practical implications
A combined attitude control strategy can be used to achieve laser link acquisition for a large-scale distributed satellite system like space gravitational wave detection.
Originality/value
A combined attitude control strategy can provide a way to solve the typical problem that pointing control accuracy is not enough to establish the laser link for a large-scale distributed satellite system.