Kevin Turner and Geoff Williams
In most countries the distribution system for new cars has remained unchanged for many years, with the main emphasis on supplying customers from stock held at dealers. Despite…
Abstract
Purpose
In most countries the distribution system for new cars has remained unchanged for many years, with the main emphasis on supplying customers from stock held at dealers. Despite high stocks, the performance of the supply chain has failed to meet customer expectations in terms of delivering the exact specification desired within an acceptable timescale. This paper investigates changes to the design of the supply chain which potentially offer significant improvements in performance.
Design/methodology/approach
A simulation of the supply of new cars, from ordering through the assembly plant and finished vehicle stocking to customer delivery, has been used to develop further understanding of the dynamic performance of the supply chain. The application of the simulation model is demonstrated through scenarios drawn from research into the UK car market.
Findings
The findings demonstrate the benefits of central stocking (storing new cars in distribution centres, rather than at dealers) for both manufactures and customers, supported by recent industry data.
Research limitations/implications
The results presented are based on a representative vehicle model manufactured and sold in the UK; a range of alternative scenarios and changes to the supply chain design can be investigated using the simulation model.
Practical implications
For the automotive industry, the research supports the introduction of central stocking, and demonstrates a methodology for assessing future changes to the supply chain.
Originality/value
The research extends the range of applications of simulation to investigating supply chain design, and demonstrates the feasibility of this approach in modelling complex supply chains.
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In this chapter, network analysis has been used to map out disciplinary areas of research and authorship in economic history. A total of 5,330 peer-reviewed articles published in…
Abstract
In this chapter, network analysis has been used to map out disciplinary areas of research and authorship in economic history. A total of 5,330 peer-reviewed articles published in the leading economic history journals has been surveyed. Since 1980, the number of publications has risen and then rapidly accelerated over the last 2 decades. This rise has been fueled by research being conducted within European universities instead of US or UK ones.
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The purpose of this paper it to investigate how sophistication of top management view on information technology (IT) infrastructure influences the firm's IT infrastructure…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper it to investigate how sophistication of top management view on information technology (IT) infrastructure influences the firm's IT infrastructure capability and the effect of IT infrastructure capability on new product development (NPD) process outcomes such as cost, cycle time, and quality.
Design/methodology/approach
Drawing from research‐based and knowledge‐based theories, a conceptual model on how IT infrastructure influences NPD process efficiency is developed.
Findings
The paper demonstrates that sophistication of top management view on IT Infrastructure enhances NPD process through its effect on IT infrastructure capability. IT infrastructure capability enhances the NPD process efficiency by reducing the cycle time and cost of NPD projects and improving the NPD process quality.
Practical implications
It is useful for practitioners to know that by adopting an enabling IT infrastructure view, managers can create IT infrastructure capabilities that could improve their NPD processes significantly.
Research limitations/implications
Future research should conduct empirical analysis of this paper's propositions and could examine what moderates the relationship between the sophistication of the top management's view on the firm's IT infrastructure and IT infrastructure capability. Scholars could also include firm performance as the final outcome of the influence of IT infrastructure view when testing the proposed model empirically.
Originality/value
Recent research pointed out that IT enabled the development of efficient new processes. This paper extends this argument by conceptually investigating how IT infrastructure enhances NPD process of a firm.
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This chapter is about child labour as slavery in modern and modernizing societies in an era of rapid globalization.For the most part, child slavery in modern societies is hidden…
Abstract
This chapter is about child labour as slavery in modern and modernizing societies in an era of rapid globalization.
For the most part, child slavery in modern societies is hidden from view and cloaked in social customs, this being convenient for economic exploitation purposes.
The aim of this chapter is to bring children's ‘modern slavery’ out of the shadows, and thereby to help clarify and shape relevant social discourse and theory, social policies and practices, slavery-related legislation and instruments at all levels, and above all children's everyday lives, relationships and experiences.
The main focus is on issues surrounding (i) the concept of ‘slavery’; (ii) the types of slavery in the world today; (iii) and ‘child labour’ as a type, or basis, of slavery.
There is an in-depth examination of the implications of the notion of ‘slavery’ within international law for child labour, and especially that performed through schooling.
According to one influential approach, ‘slavery’ is a state marked by the loss of free will where a person is forced through violence or the threat of violence to give up the ability to sell freely his or her own labour power. If so, then hundreds of millions of children in modern and modernizing societies qualify as slaves by virtue of the labour they are forced – compulsorily and statutorily required – to perform within schools, whereby they, their labour and their labour power are controlled and exploited for economic purposes.
Under globalization, such enslavement has almost reached global saturation point.
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Freddie Acosta and Arlene Acosta
Business ethics, entrepreneurship, ICT.
Abstract
Subject area
Business ethics, entrepreneurship, ICT.
Study level/applicability
Undergraduate, MBA, MSIT.
Case overview
The dilemma could be described something like: “I want to do an honest business in order to alleviate somewhat the financial difficulty of my family […] yet my pursuit impacts negatively on my immediate customers”. This is a case of the morality of actions with indirect effects (non-intentional effects).
Expected learning outcomes
Understand actions with double effects, formulate business policy to regulate access to services, appreciate the challenges of starting a business enterprise, understand the social impact of ICT.
Supplementary materials
Teaching notes are available for educators only. Please contact your library to gain login details or email support@emeraldinsight.com to request teaching notes.
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David Stewart Briggs, Richard Nankervis, John Baillie, Catherine Turner, Kevin Rigby and Lorin Livingstone
The purpose of this paper is to review the establishment of Primary Health Network (PHN) in Australia and its utility in commissioning Primary Health Care (PHC) services.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to review the establishment of Primary Health Network (PHN) in Australia and its utility in commissioning Primary Health Care (PHC) services.
Design/methodology/approach
This study is an analysis of management practice about the establishment and development of a PHN as a case study over the three-year period. The PHN is the Hunter New England and Central Coast PHN (HNECCPHN). The study is based on “insiders perspectives” drawing from documentation, reports and evaluations undertaken.
Findings
HNECCPHN demonstrates a unique inclusive organisation across a substantial diverse geographic area. It has taken an innovative and evidence-based approach to its creation, governance and operation. HNECCPHN addresses the health challenges of a substantial Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander population. It contains significant and diverse urban, coastal and distinct rural, regional and remote populations. It can be described as a “virtual” organisation, using a distributed network of practice approach to engage clinicians, communities and providers. The authors describe progress and learning in the context of theories of complex organisations, innovation, networks of practice, knowledge translation and social innovation.
Research limitations/implications
The study provides initial publication into the establishment phase of a PHN in Australia.
Practical implications
The study describes the implementation and progress in terms of relevant international practice and theoretical concepts. This paper demonstrates significant innovative practice in the short term.
Social implications
The study describes significant engagement and the importance of that with and between communities, service providers and health professionals.
Originality/value
This is the first study of the results of the implementation of an important change in the funding and delivery of PHC in Australia.
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The overall aim of the chapter is to explore how preschoolers with different language backgrounds accomplish everyday interaction at a Swedish preschool, where the lingua franca…
Abstract
Purpose
The overall aim of the chapter is to explore how preschoolers with different language backgrounds accomplish everyday interaction at a Swedish preschool, where the lingua franca (common language) is Swedish. More specifically, it aims to analyze how the target children, despite their limited language resources in Swedish, use their existing communicative resources to make friends and achieve intersubjectivity in front of two alphabet charts illustrating the Arabic and Latin alphabets, respectively.
Methodology/approach
The data are drawn from a single play episode between three boys and a girl, aged four years. Their interaction was video-recorded, and the analytical framework of the study is influenced by ethnomethodological work on social action focusing particularly on participants’ methodical ways of accomplishing and making sense of social activities.
Findings
The analyses show that the children’s trajectory of achieving intersubjectivity was partly bothersome as their interpretation of the alphabet charts diverged, due to their different language knowledge and earlier experiences. Hence, to attain joint understanding and intersubjectivity, they used a range of communicative resources: besides speaking Swedish they used word mixing, attention-getters (“look” and “check it out”), and nonverbal moves such as pointing, gesturing, intone, and screaming. It is notable that, despite some problems in understanding, their desire to make friends and have fun together seemed to compensate for their joint failure to always understand each other.
Practical implications
Detailed analyses and observations of how children with diverse language backgrounds use their communicative resources to achieve intersubjectivity and make friends can be useful for preschool teachers’ understanding of how they can further support the children’s socialization and capturing of the majority language – here Swedish.
Originality/value
The present chapter contributes to a wider understanding of how second-language learning is a complex trajectory edged with both setbacks and successes, especially when all the children interacting have diverse language backgrounds and experiences. However, the analysis highlights how, in their endeavor to make friends, the children find ways to solve problems in situ in their own way, and enjoy each other’s company despite the fragility of the play and their language shortcomings.
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Babak Taheri, Thomas Farrington, Keith Gori, Gill Hogg and Kevin D. O’Gorman
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationships between consumer motivations, their interactions with hospitality spaces and experiential outcomes. Enhancing…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationships between consumer motivations, their interactions with hospitality spaces and experiential outcomes. Enhancing consumer experience is of clear interest to industry professionals. This quantitative study explores the impact of escapism and entitlement to leisure upon involvement in liminoid consumptions spaces, thereby contributing a theory of liminoid motivators within commercial hospitality.
Design/methodology/approach
This study adopts a quantitative methodology, using a survey of a sample of student nightclubbers in the UK. Data are analysed through Partial Least Squares.
Findings
Hospitality consumers are positively affected by the feelings of increased involvement experienced in consumption spaces that exhibit liminoid characteristics.
Research limitations/implications
Surveys involve potential for error regarding respondents’ ability to agree with questionnaire statements. Data collection was conducted in Scotland, and so, results may not be generalised to other commercial hospitality spaces outside of Scotland.
Practical implications
Hospitality consumers become more involved, and thereby more satisfied, in liminoid consumption spaces when motivated by escapism and entitlement to leisure. Attending to the liminoid motivators that drive consumers away from work and domesticity, and towards commercial hospitality spaces, will go some way towards creating the desired consumer experience.
Originality/value
This is the first quantitative study to investigate consumer motivations to escape and entitlement to leisure as antecedents of involvement in a commercial hospitality context. It develops a theory of hospitality consumption using the liminoid anthropological concept.
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Rachel Roegman, Kevin Tan, Nathan Tanner and Caitlin Yore
Drawing on Coburn and Turner's framework for research on data use, this study looks at how contextual factors support interactions around data. In so doing, the authors contribute…
Abstract
Purpose
Drawing on Coburn and Turner's framework for research on data use, this study looks at how contextual factors support interactions around data. In so doing, the authors contribute to the emerging body of literature on administrators supporting high school students' social-emotional learning (SEL).
Design/methodology/approach
This two-site case study “follows the data” that were shared with administrators at two high schools based on a longitudinal study of students' SEL. One author of this study has been leading a research project of high school students' SEL in two high schools from two different districts in a Midwest university town since 2017. This study follows what happened in both high schools after the author shared students' SEL data with district personnel.
Findings
Findings showed that participants were invested in increasing SEL programming. However, SEL data moved in different ways through the two schools, and all individuals had different ideas about which data were important. Each district dealt with a specific set of organizational norms, existing inequities, and beliefs systems that influenced which SEL data were noticed and how, if at all, data spurred action.
Originality/value
Specific aspects of organizational contexts support and constrain SEL data use. Both cases suggest researchers can guide data use practices that can advance students' SEL. However, each district dealt with a specific set of educational inequities, which influenced which data were noticed and how, if at all, data spurred action. Importantly, data-driven decision-making must be conducted from an equity lens, lest the process replicate existing inequities.