Helge Dohn, Quentin Gausset, Ole Mertz, Torsten Müller, Peter Oksen and Peter Triantafillou
In 1998 three Danish universities developed an interdisciplinary, problem‐oriented curriculum in order to strengthen capacity‐building capabilities in the area of environmental…
Abstract
In 1998 three Danish universities developed an interdisciplinary, problem‐oriented curriculum in order to strengthen capacity‐building capabilities in the area of environmental education, training and research at universities and research organisations in Malaysia and Thailand earmarked for environment and development assistance by the Danish government. The programme, which was partly implemented in developing countries as periods of fieldwork, represented important educational innovations. The purpose of this study was to evaluate these activities. The distinct principles forming the educational foundation of the programme were identified. These related to the curriculum organization, the learning tasks and the learning environment. The first step in a cogent evaluation process was to examine how the educational principles were oprerationalized into practical teaching/learning steps. In the next step, they formed the criteria for the evaluation. On the basis of quantitative and qualitative data it was shown that the programme fulfilled the stipulated accademic requirements.
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Travel and tourism have had a long history in the Nordic countries, but research on tourism has a relatively short tradition in the region. Recently, academic interest in the…
Abstract
Travel and tourism have had a long history in the Nordic countries, but research on tourism has a relatively short tradition in the region. Recently, academic interest in the Nordic tourism space has grown and diversified especially as a result of increasing numbers of academics and institutions involved with tourism geographies and studies and education in the region. The Nordic context has provided thematic focus areas for empirical studies that characterize tourism geographies in the region, with topics including nature-based tourism, utilization of wilderness areas, second-home and rural developments, impacts in peripheries, and tourism as a tool for regional development. In addition, there are emerging research themes outside of the traditional core topics, such as urban, events, and heritage tourism.
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Ann-Kristin Achleitner, Christian Figge and Eva Lutz
The purpose of this paper is to identify specific drivers of value creation in secondary buyouts. While this type of private equity deal has risen in importance in recent years…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to identify specific drivers of value creation in secondary buyouts. While this type of private equity deal has risen in importance in recent years, it is not yet well understood. Through an in-depth analysis of the acquisition of Brenntag by BC Partners, we develop propositions on the value creation profile of secondary buyouts.
Design/methodology/approach
We use a single case study design to explore the information-rich context of a secondary buyout. The Brenntag case epitomizes the development of a company from forming part of a large conglomerate to being private-equity owned after the primary and secondary buyout, to its final disposition of public listing. Our analysis is based on ten semi-structured interviews with key protagonists and observers, as well as analysis of primary company data and additional secondary data sources.
Findings
We propose that even if the investment management and monitoring skills of the primary and secondary private equity group are similar, there is still potential to realize operational improvements in a secondary buyout, due to either early exit of the primary private equity group or measures that further enhance management incentives. In addition, the Brenntag case shows that low information asymmetries can lead to higher leverage and that opportunities for multiple expansions are limited in secondary buyouts.
Originality/value
While a secondary buyout has become a common exit route in recent years, we are the first to undertake an in-depth case analysis of a secondary buyout. Our study helps researchers and practitioners enhance their understanding of drivers behind the value creation profile of secondary buyouts.
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Thomas Frädrich, Julia Pachow‐Frauenhofer, Fiege Torsten and Peter Nyhuis
The purpose of this paper is to transfer the idea of changeability to a concrete technical application.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to transfer the idea of changeability to a concrete technical application.
Design/methodology/approach
Based on the definition of changeability on a factory level, a transformation of the five change enablers specified therein for the work station level using the example of an aerodynamic feeding system takes place in this paper.
Findings
The observed aerodynamic feeding system can be determined as changeable.
Practical implications
Changeable systems are able to react with low effort to exterior influences, e.g. of the market, and thus represent a considerable competitive advantage.
Originality/value
The new element in this paper is the observation of change enablers on the work station level. This point of view enables the concrete figuration of changeable technical systems.
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Torsten Schlesinger, Michael Barth, Matti Bartsch and Werner Pitsch
The comparatively high salaries of professional players during their active athletic career should allow them to accumulate an adequate level of precautionary savings for a…
Abstract
Purpose
The comparatively high salaries of professional players during their active athletic career should allow them to accumulate an adequate level of precautionary savings for a financially autonomous post-sport career. However, not all players succeed in accumulating sustainable financial assets. Therefore, the question arises how professional players' financial precaution within the social setting football is shaped. As no empirical analyses have yet been carried out on this issue, the study study examines football players' precautionary practices and motives.
Design/methodology/approach
Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 25 German (former) professional football players. The authors used qualitative content analysis to analyse the data, expanding the analysis to include reconstructive elements to create different precautionary types.
Findings
The results reveal that players deal with both career-specific as well as precaution-related risks quite heterogeneously. Accordingly, three precautionary types characterised by distinct forms of precautionary saving practices are identified. The authors also find that although the players are aware of the uncertainties and risks related to their professional football careers, it does not say much about the concrete implementation of adequate precautionary practices.
Practical implications
The findings contribute to a better understanding of precautionary saving practices among football players.
Social implications
Moreover, the findings contribute to a better understanding of precautionary saving practices not only specifically among (former) football players, but generally among individuals that face high occupational career risks and earn high salaries to develop preventative concepts and approaches to sustainable financial planning.
Originality/value
This paper is the first empirical study that analyses precautionary savings practices of the specific population of elite athletes in high income sports professional football.
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Mohammadreza Akbari and Thu Nguyen Anh Do
This paper presents a review of the existing state-of-the-art literature on machine learning (ML) in logistics and supply chain management (LSCM) by analyzing the current…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper presents a review of the existing state-of-the-art literature on machine learning (ML) in logistics and supply chain management (LSCM) by analyzing the current literature, contemporary concepts, data and gaps and suggesting potential topics for future research.
Design/methodology/approach
A systematic/structured literature review in the subject discipline and a bibliometric analysis were organized. Information regarding industry involvement, geographic location, research design and methods, data analysis techniques, university, affiliation, publishers, authors, year of publications is documented. A wide collection of eight databases from 1994 to 2019 were explored using the keywords “Machine Learning” and “Logistics“, “Transportation” and “Supply Chain” in the title and/or abstract. A total of 110 articles were found, and information on a chain of variables was gathered.
Findings
Over the last few decades, the application of emerging technologies has attracted significant interest all around the world. Analysis of the collected data shows that only nine literature reviews have been published in this area. Further, key findings show that 53.8 per cent of publications were closely clustered on transportation and manufacturing industries and 54.7 per cent were centred on mathematical models and simulations. Neural network is applied in 22 papers as their exclusive algorithms. Finally, the main focuses of the current literature are on prediction and optimization, where detection is contributed by only seven articles.
Research limitations/implications
This review is limited to examining only academic sources available from Scopus, Elsevier, Web of Science, Emerald, JSTOR, SAGE, Springer, Taylor and Francis and Wiley which contain the words “Machine Learning” and “Logistics“, “Transportation” and “Supply Chain” in the title and/or abstract.
Originality/value
This paper provides a systematic insight into research trends in ML in both logistics and the supply chain.
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This article aims to explain why geography is a prime discipline for analysing globalisation and a multicultural view of Global Studies. The generic approach of human geography to…
Abstract
Purpose
This article aims to explain why geography is a prime discipline for analysing globalisation and a multicultural view of Global Studies. The generic approach of human geography to first select an appropriate methodology is taken as a key approach.
Design/methodology/approach
Concepts from aggregate disciplines such as history, economics, and geography are scanned through during a short description of the historical genesis of these sciences and the paradigmatic shifts they have encountered.
Findings
There are four main theses: (1) values are created by appreciation; (2) development is growing jointly with responsibility; (3) accumulation of material value is seen as expenditure to achieve non‐material values; and (4) spatial relations are interrelated with social relations.
Research limitations/implications
Conceptual considerations have to be further corroborated by quantitative analyses using suitable metrics of “development”.
Practical implications
“Social and cultural geography” should contribute to any curriculum of “Global Studies”.
Social implications
Dialogue and discourse between world views is the essential, ideology‐free approach for understanding globalisation.
Originality/value
Unlike other scientific articles focusing on “facts”, this article focuses on perspectives. Thus, it explains “multi‐perspectivity” and a multi‐paradigmatic approach.
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The United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UN CRPD) (UN, 2006) obliges its signatory states to establish inclusive school systems. Germany ratified…
Abstract
The United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UN CRPD) (UN, 2006) obliges its signatory states to establish inclusive school systems. Germany ratified the document in 2008. This international steering impulse triggered a real “inclusion shock” (Heinrich, 2015, p. 235) when it came into force, because hardly any other country in Europe has worse conditions for implementing the convention than Germany. The school structure with up to nine special schools was called upon to fundamentally changes or adaptations by the CRPD. Since 2008, it has been observed that the various federal states in Germany react very differently to this impulse according to their own development. From an empirical point of view, this raises the question of the concrete “steering” of these inclusion-oriented transformations. The chapter examines the question of how the actors in the school system of the federal state Schleswig-Holstein reacted to this challenge between 2008 and 2014. The focus of the research interest is above all on the collective coordination of action by state and non-state actors in the multi-level system, the intentions of regulatory impulses and the effects of steering efforts in the process of implementing the CRPD. With regard to the implementation of Art. 24 of the CRPD, the “Governance-perspective“ makes it possible to conceive state activities and hierarchical forms of coordination as an integrative component of political regulatory processes, so that the complex mechanisms of influence, the intention to change, steering decisions and steering effects can be examined from an overarching perspective.