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1 – 10 of 17
Article
Publication date: 10 April 2009

Qiaoying Zheng and Shaoping Wang

The aim of this paper is to focus on the formulation of a Library 2.0 program that will guide the realization of a “user‐centered” service pattern.

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Abstract

Purpose

The aim of this paper is to focus on the formulation of a Library 2.0 program that will guide the realization of a “user‐centered” service pattern.

Design/methodology/approach

In‐depth user investigations are the first step toward a successful Library 2.0 program, which will reflect what users really hope to achieve through Library 2.0. Three user investigations were carried out with the purpose to get users' opinions and suggestions about Library 2.0 services. Then the target was formed on the basis of analysis and evaluation of users' needs. The Library 2.0 programming was analyzed in four tiers of management ideas, service patterns, technical support, and content development.

Findings

User investigations are of primary importance in programming Library 2.0, and a program formulated on such investigations will not miss its aim, and be more realistic.

Originality/value

The paper does not dwell on technical particularities of Library 2.0, but focuses on the key role of a program in realization of the concept of Library 2.0, and the methodology of programming.

Details

The Electronic Library, vol. 27 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0264-0473

Keywords

Content available
Article
Publication date: 10 April 2009

Jin Chen and Jing Guo

659

Abstract

Details

The Electronic Library, vol. 27 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0264-0473

Article
Publication date: 13 November 2017

Jihui Qiu, Shaoping Shen and Zhibin Li

The purpose of this paper is to improve the control precision of the station-keeping control for a stratosphere airship through the feedforward-feedback PID controller which is…

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to improve the control precision of the station-keeping control for a stratosphere airship through the feedforward-feedback PID controller which is designed by the wind speed prediction based on the incremental extreme learning machine (I-ELM).

Design/methodology/approach

First of all, the online prediction of wind speed is implemented by the I-ELM with rolling time. Second, the feedforward-feedback PID controller is designed through the position information of the airship and the predicted wind speed. In the end, the one-dimensional dynamic model of the stratosphere airship is built, and the controller is applied in the numerical simulation.

Findings

Based on the conducted numerical simulations, some valuable conclusions are obtained. First, through the comparison between the predicted value and true value of the wind speed, the wind speed prediction based on I-ELM is very accurate. Second, the feedforward-feedback PID controller designed in this paper is very effective.

Originality/value

This paper is very valuable to the research of a high-accuracy station-keeping control of stratosphere airship.

Details

International Journal of Intelligent Computing and Cybernetics, vol. 10 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1756-378X

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 22 September 2021

Lei Xie, Shaoping Qiu and Mary Jo Garcia Biggs

This study aims to examine the relationship between supervisor’s altruistic leadership behavior (ALB) and family-to-work development (FWD) in the context of Chinese small and…

Abstract

Purpose

This study aims to examine the relationship between supervisor’s altruistic leadership behavior (ALB) and family-to-work development (FWD) in the context of Chinese small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs); and test the mediation effect of learning organization culture (LOC) between ALB and FWD.

Design/methodology/approach

A non-experimental, quantitative, cross-sectional survey research approach was applied. A structural equation modeling technique was used to test all hypotheses.

Findings

Results indicated that ALB is positively and significantly correlated with FWD. Additionally, the relationship between ALB and FWD is mediated by LOC.

Practical implications

This study suggests that building and maintaining an effective LOC requires leaders to champion, human resource (HR) professionals to strengthen and employees to support learning as a system. Thus, HR professionals should implement altruistic leadership mentoring and coaching programs. In the case of Chinese SMEs, altruistic leaders are especially instrumental in generating followers’ positive outcomes in both work and family domains.

Originality/value

This study looks into the influence of organizational factors on the direction of FWD. In particular, this study seeks to examine organizational factors that relate to spillover from family to work.

Details

Industrial and Commercial Training, vol. 54 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0019-7858

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 18 December 2023

Søren Munch Lindhard, Astrid Heidemann Lassen, Yang Cheng, Matteo Musso, Geng Wang and Shaoping Bai

Exoskeletons are moving into industries with the potential to reduce muscle strains and prevent occupational injuries. Although exoskeletons have been designed and tested in…

Abstract

Purpose

Exoskeletons are moving into industries with the potential to reduce muscle strains and prevent occupational injuries. Although exoskeletons have been designed and tested in laboratory settings, rare empirical studies of their application in construction have been reported. Therefore, the purpose of this study is on in a real-life setting testing the applicability of adopting exoskeletons in the construction industry.

Design/methodology/approach

A feasibility study of exoskeletons in construction is conducted by testing a passive exoskeleton, designed for shoulder support. Five bricklayers tested in a two-month period the exoskeleton, each wearing it for a three-day period while carrying out normal work activities. Test data in terms of interviews were collected and analyzed using qualitative content analysis.

Findings

The application of exoskeletons in construction revealed several limitations, where the two primary ones are the exoskeleton is not designed while considering the tasks of a bricklayer causing several challenges and the exoskeleton only supports a single upward motion while limiting other movements and even counteracted when a downward movement was necessary.

Originality/value

The identified challenges could easily have been revealed by coupling the design and testing of exoskeletons to actual application. Thus, the design approach needs to be reversed. Instead of designing an exoskeleton to support a specific body part or motion and then identifying where it is applicable, it should target specific industries and focus on the actual work and movements and the necessary support. As part of the change, the design metrics should be reevaluated to reflect the work to support.

Details

Construction Innovation , vol. ahead-of-print no. ahead-of-print
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1471-4175

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 5 May 2023

Shaoping Ye, Shaoyu Wang, Nuo Chen, An Xu and Xiujin Shi

Existing clothing parsing methods make little use of dataset-level information. This paper aims to propose a novel clothing parsing method which utilizes higher-level outfit…

Abstract

Purpose

Existing clothing parsing methods make little use of dataset-level information. This paper aims to propose a novel clothing parsing method which utilizes higher-level outfit combinatorial consistency knowledge from the whole clothing dataset to improve the accuracy of segmenting clothing images.

Design/methodology/approach

In this paper, the authors propose an Outfit Memory Net (OMNet) that augments original feature by aggregating dataset-level prior clothing combination information. Specifically, the authors design an Outfit Matrix (OM) to represent clothing combination information of single image and an Outfit Memory Module (OMM) to store the clothing combination information of all images in the training set, i.e. dataset-level clothing combination information. In addition, the authors propose a Multi-scale Aggregation Module (MAM) to aggregate the clothing combination information in a multi-scale manner to solve the problem of large variance in the scale of objects in the clothing images.

Findings

Experiments on Colorful Fashion Parsing Dataset (CFPD) dataset show that the authors' method achieves 93.15% pixel accuracy (PA) and 51.24% mean of class-wise intersection over union (mIoU), which are satisfactory parsing results compared with existing methods such as PSPNet, DANet and DeepLabV3. Moreover, through comparing the segmentation accuracy of different methods for each category, MAM could effectively improve the segmentation of small objects.

Originality/value

With the rise of various online shopping platforms and the continuous development of deep learning technology, emerging applications such as clothing recommendation, matching, classification and virtual try-on system have emerged in the clothing field. Clothing parsing is the key technology to realize these applications. Therefore, improving the accuracy of clothing parsing is necessary.

Details

International Journal of Clothing Science and Technology, vol. 35 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0955-6222

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 8 June 2021

Lei Xie, Shaoping Qiu and Xinyi Bian

Building on social exchange theory and selection, optimization and compensation theory, this study aims to examine a moderated curvilinear relationship between servant leadership…

Abstract

Purpose

Building on social exchange theory and selection, optimization and compensation theory, this study aims to examine a moderated curvilinear relationship between servant leadership (SL) and work-family conflict (WFC).

Design/methodology/approach

Participants were 329 female workers recruited from a Chinese small business in the service Industry. A three-step hierarchical regression was conducted to examine the relationships among the variables and the incremental contribution of SL and age and the squared term of SL.

Findings

Study results confirmed a curvilinear relationship between SL and WFC and the moderating effect of age. When younger female employees perceived a moderate range of SL from their supervisors, they reported higher WFC compared to the low or high level of perceived SL. On the contrary, senior female employees reported a lower level of WFC when they perceived a moderate level of SL than when they perceived very low or high levels.

Originality/value

SL research has experienced a period of exponential growth in the past decade. This study advanced the field of leadership by arguing that SL perceived by female employees is curvilinearly related to WFC and the curvilinear relationship is moderated by age.

Details

Industrial and Commercial Training, vol. 53 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0019-7858

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 13 February 2019

Shaoping Qiu and Larry Dooley

The purpose of this paper is to develop and validate an instrument intended to measure servant leadership behavior in the Chinese hospitality industry.

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Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to develop and validate an instrument intended to measure servant leadership behavior in the Chinese hospitality industry.

Design/methodology/approach

After reviewing the literature, a scale of nine dimensions with 81 items was generated and then subjected to exploratory factor analysis (EFA) using a sample of 600 participants from a polytechnic college and hospitality industry, resulting in 6-factor-33-item solution. The derived measure was then shortened to 24 items by using item response theory (IRT). Drawing on the data from 440 respondents in the hospitality industry, this 6-factor-24 item measure was subsequently validated with confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and the test of construct validity.

Findings

Difference in factors has been found between this instrument and western-developed scales. This study resulted in 6-dimension-24-items scale. These dimensions were named integrity, self-sacrifice, building community, empowering people, emotional healing and visioning. This servant leadership scale was demonstrated to have good internal consistency reliability and strong construct validity.

Originality/value

This is the first study that used IRT as a statistic tool to shorten a servant leadership scale and also this study provided additional support to cultural psychology theory.

Details

Leadership & Organization Development Journal, vol. 40 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0143-7739

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 27 August 2020

Ruijuan Zhang, Shaoping Qiu, Larry M. Dooley and Tamim Choudhury

The purpose of this study is to explore how gender and gender role identity separately and jointly affect managerial aspirations.

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this study is to explore how gender and gender role identity separately and jointly affect managerial aspirations.

Design/methodology/approach

The study was cross-sectional in nature. Survey data were collected from Chinese Government sectors. Two-way analysis of variance was used to test the research hypotheses.

Findings

The results showed that gender role identity and combination of gender and gender role identity predict management aspirations while gender alone does not affect management aspirations. Androgynous individuals self-reported higher scores of managerial aspirations. Female managers who perceive themselves as androgynous and masculine tend to possess higher management aspirations. However, when they perceive themselves to exhibit feminine traits, they are more likely to hold lower management aspirations. Moreover, male managers with androgynous and feminine traits are inclined to have higher management aspirations.

Research limitations/implications

Due to cross-sectional survey data, research results may be biased by common method variance. In addition, because of a convenient sample, the research results may lack generalizability. Moreover, with participants from different organizations, the percentage of men and women in the organization and participants’ role conflicts between work and family life would impact the gender role identity of individuals. Future research should control for the gender composition of the workplace and participants’ role conflicts between work and family life.

Practical implications

The findings can help narrow the gender gap of managerial aspirations through focusing on gender role identity in selecting managers and designing the leadership training program, ultimately resulting in diminishing disparity in top leadership positions between men and women.

Originality/value

This study examines how gender and gender role identity separately and jointly affects managerial aspirations in the Chinese context.

Details

Gender in Management: An International Journal , vol. 36 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1754-2413

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 29 November 2019

Lei Xie, Khalil M. Dirani, Michael Beyerlein and Shaoping Qiu

Learning and development are critical to a business’s success. This paper aims to focus on organizational factors at multiple organizational levels that facilitate learning…

Abstract

Purpose

Learning and development are critical to a business’s success. This paper aims to focus on organizational factors at multiple organizational levels that facilitate learning culture in a small- and medium-sized enterprise (SME) in northwestern China.

Design/methodology/approach

This study is qualitative in nature. A single case study method is used to explore an SME’s organizational factors that facilitate learning culture.

Findings

This paper categorizes the organizational factors into seven dimensions: shared vision, creating continuous learning opportunities, informal learning that promotes inquiry and dialogue, collaboration and team learning, knowledge management systems, work–family enrichment and encouragement and support. This paper also compares the findings with learning culture models from Western research.

Research limitations/implications

Chinese culture has far-reaching and fundamental effects on many East Asian countries and regions. For SMEs in similar cultural settings with a collectivist orientation, future research may focus on the effect of the work–family enrichment on learning culture.

Originality/value

Work–family enrichment was found to be an important factor that influences learning effectiveness in this Chinese small business based on traditional values in Chinese culture.

Details

European Journal of Training and Development, vol. 44 no. 2/3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2046-9012

Keywords

1 – 10 of 17