Search results for: client loyalty

Authors: Abdullah Alhomidan

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This study is conducted to identify the main factors affecting accuracy of pretender cost estimate in building construction projects in Saudi Arabia from owners’ perspective. 44 factors affecting pretender cost estimate were identified through literature review and discussion with some construction experts. The results show that the top important factors affecting pretender cost estimate accuracy are: level of competitors in the tendering, material price changes, communications with suppliers, communications with client, and estimating method used.

Keywords: cost estimate, accuracy, pretender, estimating, bid estimate

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Authors: Jonathan Ogwal, Louis H. Kamulegeya, John M. Bwanika, Davis Musinguzi

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Introduction: Community retail Pharmacy drug distribution points (CRPDDP) were implemented in the Lango sub-region as part of the Ministry of Health’s response to improving access and adherence to antiretroviral treatment (ART). Clients received their ART refills from nearby local pharmacies; as such, the need for continuous engagement through mobile phone appointment reminders and health messages. We share learnings from the implementation of mobile text reminders and voice call follow-ups among ART clients attending the CRPDDP program in northern Uganda. Methods: A retrospective data review of electronic medical records from four pharmacies allocated for CRPDDP in the Lira and Apac districts of the Lango sub-region in Northern Uganda was done from February to August 2022. The process involved collecting phone contacts of eligible clients from the health facility appointment register and uploading them onto a messaging platform customized by Rapid-pro, an open-source software. Client information, including code name, phone number, next appointment date, and the allocated pharmacy for ART refill, was collected and kept confidential. Contacts received appointment reminder messages and other messages on positive living as an ART client. Routine voice call follow-ups were done to ascertain the picking of ART from the refill pharmacy. Findings: In total, 1,354 clients were reached from the four allocated pharmacies found in urban centers. 972 clients received short message service (SMS) appointment reminders, and 382 were followed up through voice calls. The majority (75%) of the clients returned for refills on the appointed date, 20% returned within four days after the appointment date, and the remaining 5% needed follow-up where they reported that they were not in the district by the appointment date due to other engagements. Conclusion: The use of mobile text reminders and voice call follow-ups improves the attendance of community retail pharmacy refills.

Keywords: antiretroviral treatment, community retail drug distribution points, mobile text reminders, voice call follow-up

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Authors: C. P. Autry, A.W. Roscoe

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Authentication protocols based on public key infrastructure (PKI) and trusted third party (TTP) are no longer adequate for industrial scale IoT networks thanks to issues such as low compute and power availability, the use of widely distributed and commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) systems, and the increasingly sophisticated attackers and attacks we now have to counter. For example, there is increasing concern about nation-state-based interference and future quantum computing capability. We have examined this space from first principles and have developed several approaches to group and point-to-point authentication for IoT that do not depend on the use of a centralised client-server model. We emphasise the use of quantum resistant primitives such as strong cryptographic hashing and the use multi-factor authentication.

Keywords: authentication, enterprise IoT cybersecurity, PKI/TTP, IoT space

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Authors: Altab Hossain, Shakerul Islam, Golamur R. Khan, Abu Zafar M. Salahuddin

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An effective identification of breakdowns is of premier importance for the safe and reliable operation of Nuclear Power Plants (NPP) and its associated facilities. A great number of monitoring and diagnosis methodologies are applied and used worldwide in areas such as industry, automobiles, hospitals, and power plant to detect and reduce human disasters. The potential consequences of several hazardous activities may harm the society using nuclear and its associated facilities. Hence, one of the most popular and effective methods to ensure safety and monitor the entire nuclear facility and imply risk-free operation without human interference during the hazardous situation is using a robot. Therefore, in this study, an advanced autonomous robot has been designed and developed that can monitor several parameters in the NPP to ensure the safety and do some risky job in case of nuclear disaster. The robot consisted of autonomous track following unit, data processing and transmitting unit can follow a straight line and take turn as the bank greater than 90 degrees. The developed robot can analyze various parameters such as temperature, altitude, radiation, obstacle, humidity, detecting fire, measuring distance, ultrasonic scan and taking the heat of any particular object. It has an ability to broadcast live stream and can record the document to its own server memory. There is a separate control unit constructed with a baseboard which processes the recorded data and a transmitter which transmits the processed data. To make the robot user-friendly, the code is developed such a way that a user can control any of robotic arm as per types of work. To control at any place and without the track, there is an advanced code has been developed to take manual overwrite. Through this process, administrator who has logged in permission to Dynamic Host Client Protocol (DHCP) can make the handover of the control of the robot. In this process, this robot is provided maximum nuclear security from being hacked. Not only NPP, this robot can be used to maximize the real-time monitoring system of any nuclear facility as well as nuclear material transportation and decomposition system.

Keywords: nuclear power plant, radiation, dynamic host client protocol, nuclear security

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Authors: Hend Alrasheed

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Due to their different properties that have led to avoid several limitations of classic client/server systems, there has been a great interest in the development and the improvement of different peer to peer systems. Understanding the properties of complex peer to peer networks is essential for their future improvements. It was shown that the performances of peer to peer protocols are directly related to their underlying topologies. Therefore, multiple efforts have analyzed the topologies of different peer to peer systems. This study presents an overview of major findings of close experimental analyses to different topologies of three unstructured peer to peer systems: BitTorrent, Gnutella, and FreeNet.

Keywords: peer to peer networks, network topology, graph diameter, clustering coefficient, small-world property, random graph, degree distribution

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Authors: Danuta Szwajca

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Image is a very important intangible asset of a contemporary enterprise, especially, in case of a bank as a public trust institution. A positive, demanded image may effectively distinguish the bank among the competition and build the customer confidence and loyalty. PKO BP is the biggest and largest bank functioning on the Polish financial market. Within the years not a very nice image of the bank has been embedded in the customers’ minds as an old-fashioned, stagnant, resistant to changes institution, what result in the customer loss, and ageing. For this reason, in 2010, the bank launched a campaign of radical image change along with a strategy of branches modernization and improvement of the product offer. The objective of the article is to make an attempt of effectiveness assessment of the brand repositioning campaign that lasted three years. The foundations of the assessment are the results of the questionnaire research concerning the way of bank’s perception before and after the campaign.

Keywords: advertising campaign, brand repositioning, image of the bank, repositioning

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Authors: Tayyab Ahmad, Gerard Healey

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Sustainability in built environment sector is subject to many development constraints. Building projects are developed under different requirements of deliverables which makes each project unique. For an owner organization, i.e., a higher-education institution, involved in a significant building stock, it is important to prioritize some of the sustainability initiatives over the others in order to align the sustainable building development with organizational goals. The point-based green building rating tools i.e. Green Star, LEED, BREEAM are becoming increasingly popular and are well-acknowledged worldwide for verifying a sustainable development. It is imperative to synthesize a multi-criteria decision-making tool that can capitalize on the point-based methodology of rating systems while customizing the sustainable development of building projects according to the individual requirements and constraints of the client organization. A multi-criteria decision-making tool for the University of Melbourne is developed that builds on the action-learning and experience of implementing Green Buildings at the University of Melbourne. The tool evaluates the different sustainable building initiatives based on the framework of Green Star rating tool of Green Building Council of Australia. For each different sustainability initiative the decision-making tool makes an assessment based on at least five performance criteria including the ease with which a sustainability initiative can be achieved and the potential of a sustainability initiative to enhance project objectives, reduce life-cycle costs, enhance University’s reputation, and increase the confidence in quality construction. The use of a weighted aggregation mathematical model in the proposed tool can have a considerable role in the decision-making process of a Green Building project by indexing the Green Building initiatives in terms of organizational priorities. The index value of each initiative will be based on its alignment with some of the key performance criteria. The usefulness of the decision-making tool is validated by conducting structured interviews with some of the key stakeholders involved in the development of sustainable building projects at the University of Melbourne. The proposed tool is realized to help a client organization in deciding that within limited resources which sustainability initiatives and practices are more important to be pursued than others.

Keywords: higher education institution, multi-criteria decision-making tool, organizational values, prioritizing sustainability initiatives, weighted aggregation model

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Authors: Alexander Glebovskiy

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Practitioners charged with fraud prevention and investigation strongly rely on the Fraud Triangle framework developed by Joseph T. Wells in 1997 while analyzing the causes of fraud at business organizations. The Fraud Triangle model explains fraud by elements such as pressure, opportunity, and rationalization. This view is not fully suitable for effective fraud prevention as the Fraud Triangle model provides limited insight into the causation of fraud. Fraud is a multifaceted phenomenon, the contextual factors of which may not fit into any framework. Employee criminal behavior in business organizations is influenced by environmental, individual, and organizational aspects. Therefore, further criminogenic factors and processes facilitating fraud in organizational settings need to be considered in the root-cause analysis: organizational culture, leadership style, groupthink effect, isomorphic behavior, crime of obedience, displacement of responsibility, lack of critical thinking and unquestioning conformity and loyalty.

Keywords: criminogenesis, fraud triangle, fraud prevention, organizational culture

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Authors: Alexandra Roy

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Building on literature on cognitive matching and social categorization and using the correspondence testing method, we test the interaction effect of person characteristics (Gender with physical attractiveness) and job context (client contact, industry status, coworker contact). As expected, while findings show a strong impact of gender with beauty on hiring chances, job context characteristics have also a significant overall effect of this hiring outcome. Moreover, the rate of positive responses varies according some of the recruiter’s characteristics. Results are robust to various sensitivity checks. Implications of the results, limitations of the study, and directions for future research are discussed.

Keywords: correspondence testing, discrimination, hiring, physical attractiveness

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Authors: David Suson

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In today's work environment, it becomes harder and harder to attract top talent, motivate them to achieve your goals, create a collaborative work environment and then retain them. It is especially challenging when you have remote employees, manage virtually, have different personalities, ages, work ethics and especially when there is a lure of better opportunities elsewhere. Leaders want results. All the strategies and tactics in the world won't make a difference if your people don't execute and "follow you into battle". The key to better leadership is motivating your teams to want to execute, want to work harder, want to work as a team, all while improving morale. Anyone can force employees by threatening them. This session teaches a 180-degree approach. Objectives/Outcomes: 1. Learn the 3 ways this leadership approach differs from traditional leadership, 2. Use a simple process to increase engagement and loyalty, 3. Implement strategies to drive performance. The approach being taught inspires, motivates, engages, and helps to attract better employees.

Keywords: leadership, success, communication, skills

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Authors: Charawee Butbumrung

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This research aim to study the financial service of the Thailand financial Institution, second is to identify "best practices" offered by four financial institutions, namely, Kasikornthai Bank, Bangkok Bank, Siam Commercial Bank, and Thanachart Bank. In-depth interviews with managers of financial institution and borrowers reveal best practices from each financial institution. Close monitoring of and a close relationship with borrowers appear to be important for early detection of any problem. Another aspect that may be important is building up loyalty and developing reliability among members. A close and informal relationship with borrowers may also help in monitoring and early detection of problems that may arise in non-repayment of loans. Other factors that may be considered important to the success of a financial service scheme are cooperation and coordination among various agencies that provide additional support to borrowers. Indirectly, these support systems contribute to the success of a SME in Thailand.

Keywords: best practices, financial service, financial institution, SME in Thailand

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Authors: Shubham Banerjee

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The paper focuses on, how the business model of the Indian multi brand ecommerce industry is unstable and is headed towards an e-commerce bubble burst. Due to multiple players in the industry and little or no product differentiation, the Indian multi brand ecommerce industry has turned into an oligopoly market where there is hardly any brand loyalty of the customers. Companies have been rapidly increasing their selling cost in the forms of discounts and advertisements to retain and grow its customer base. This is resulting into higher revenues, but is driving the companies further away from their break-even point. With close to half a decade into the industry, none of the companies have been able to generate profits. With private investors losing patience and devaluing companies, the paper will throw light on how the multi brand e-commerce industry will change in the coming years.

Keywords: bubble burst, finance, multi brand ecommerce, product differentiation, private investor

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Authors: Carolina Beltran, Carlos De Los Reyes

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Acquired brain injury (ABI) is any physical and functional injury secondary to events that affect the brain tissue. It is one of the biggest causes of disability in the world and it has a high annual incidence in the pediatric population. There are several causes of ABI such as traumatic brain injury, central nervous system infection, stroke, hypoxia, tumors and others. The consequences can be cognitive, behavioral, emotional and functional. The cognitive rehabilitation is necessary to achieve the best outcomes for pediatric people with ABI. Cognitive orientation to daily occupational performance (CO-OP) is an individualized client-centered, performance-based, problem-solving approach that focuses on the strategy used to support the acquisition of three client-chosen goals. It has demonstrated improvements in the pediatric population with other neurological disorder but not in Spanish speakers with ABI. Aim: The main objective of this study was to determine the efficacy of cognitive orientation to daily occupational performances (CO-OP) adapted to Spanish speakers, in the level of independence and behavior in a pediatric population with ABI. Methods: Case studies with measure pre/post-treatment were used in three children with ABI, sustained at least before 6 months assessment, in school, aged 8 to 16 years, age ABI after 6 years old and above average intellectual ability. Twelve sessions of CO-OP adapted to Spanish speakers were used and videotaped. The outcomes were based on cognitive, behavior and functional independence measurements such as Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL), Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Function (BRIEF), The Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scales (VINELAND, Social Support Scale (MOS-SSS) and others neuropsychological measures. This study was approved by the ethics committee of Universidad del Norte in Colombia. Informed parental written consent was obtained for all participants. Results: children were able to identify three goals and use the global strategy ‘goal-plan-do-check’ during each session. Verbal self-instruction was used by all children. CO-OP showed a clinically significant improvement in goals regarding with independence level and behavior according to parents and teachers. Conclusion: The results indicated that CO-OP and the use of a global strategy such as ‘goal-plan-do-check’ can be used in children with ABI in order to improve their specific goals. This is a preliminary version of a big study carrying in Colombia as part of the experimental design.

Keywords: cognitive rehabilitation, acquired brain injury, pediatric population, cognitive orientation to daily occupational performance

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Authors: Mamouni Mohammed Dhiya Eddine

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This work aims at studying the exploitation of high-speed networks of clusters for distributed storage. Parallel applications running on clusters require both high-performance communications between nodes and efficient access to the storage system. Many studies on network technologies led to the design of dedicated architectures for clusters with very fast communications between computing nodes. Efficient distributed storage in clusters has been essentially developed by adding parallelization mechanisms so that the server(s) may sustain an increased workload. In this work, we propose to improve the performance of distributed storage systems in clusters by efficiently using the underlying high-performance network to access distant storage systems. The main question we are addressing is: do high-speed networks of clusters fit the requirements of a transparent, efficient and high-performance access to remote storage? We show that storage requirements are very different from those of parallel computation. High-speed networks of clusters were designed to optimize communications between different nodes of a parallel application. We study their utilization in a very different context, storage in clusters, where client-server models are generally used to access remote storage (for instance NFS, PVFS or LUSTRE). Our experimental study based on the usage of the GM programming interface of MYRINET high-speed networks for distributed storage raised several interesting problems. Firstly, the specific memory utilization in the storage access system layers does not easily fit the traditional memory model of high-speed networks. Secondly, client-server models that are used for distributed storage have specific requirements on message control and event processing, which are not handled by existing interfaces. We propose different solutions to solve communication control problems at the filesystem level. We show that a modification of the network programming interface is required. Data transfer issues need an adaptation of the operating system. We detail several propositions for network programming interfaces which make their utilization easier in the context of distributed storage. The integration of a flexible processing of data transfer in the new programming interface MYRINET/MX is finally presented. Performance evaluations show that its usage in the context of both storage and other types of applications is easy and efficient.

Keywords: distributed storage, remote file access, cluster, high-speed network, MYRINET, zero-copy, memory registration, communication control, event notification, application programming interface

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Authors: L. Agneni, F. Carta, C. Micheletta, V. Tersigni

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The development of a qualitative method to profile jobseekers is needed to improve the quality of the Public Employment Services (PES) in Italy. This is why the National Agency for Active Labour Market Policies (ANPAL) decided to introduce a Qualitative Profiling Service in the context of the activities carried out by local employment offices’ operators. The qualitative profiling service provides information and data regarding the jobseeker’s personal transition status, through a semi-structured questionnaire administered to PES clients during the guidance interview. The questionnaire responses allow PES staff to identify, for each client, proper activities and policy measures to support jobseekers in their reintegration into the labour market. Data and information gathered by the qualitative profiling tool are the following: frequency, modalities and motivations for clients to apply to local employment offices; clients’ expectations and skills; difficulties that they have faced during the previous working experiences; strategies, actions undertaken and activated channels for job search. These data are used to assess jobseekers’ personal and career characteristics and to measure their employability level (qualitative profiling index), in order to develop and deliver tailor-made action programmes for each client. This paper illustrates the use of the above-mentioned qualitative profiling service on the national territory and provides an overview of the main findings of the survey: concerning the difficulties that unemployed people face in finding a job and their perception of different aspects related to the transition in the labour market. The survey involved over 10.000 jobseekers registered with the PES. Most of them are beneficiaries of the “citizens' income”, a specific active labour policy and social inclusion measure. Furthermore, data analysis allows classifying jobseekers into a specific group of clients with similar features and behaviours, on the basis of socio-demographic variables, customers' expectations, needs and required skills for the profession for which they seek employment. Finally, the survey collects PES staff opinions and comments concerning clients’ difficulties in finding a new job and also their strengths. This is a starting point for PESs’ operators to define adequate strategies to facilitate jobseekers’ access or reintegration into the labour market.

Keywords: labour market transition, public employment services, qualitative profiling, vocational guidance

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Authors: Lewis Mehl-Madrona, Barbara Mainguy

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We describe the type of counseling done by traditional cultural healers in North America. We follow an autoethnographic course development through the first author’s integration of mainstream training and Native-American heritage and study with traditional medicine people. We assemble traditional healing elders from North America and discuss with them their practices and their philosophies of healing. We draw parallels for their approaches in some European-based philosophies and religion, including the work of Heidegger, Levin, Fox, Kierkegaard, and others. An example of the treatment process with a depressed client is provided and similarities and differences with conventional psychotherapies are described.

Keywords: indigenous approaches to counseling, indigenous bodywork, indigenous healing, North American indigenous people

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Authors: Gabriela Smeckova

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The entire world is becoming more and more diverse. The reasons why people migrate are different and unique for each family /individual. Professionals delivering services (including speech-language pathologists) must be prepared to work with clients coming from different cultural and/or linguistic backgrounds. Well-educated speech-language pathologists will consider many factors when delivering services. Some of them will be discussed during the presentation (language spoken, beliefs about health care and disabilities, reasons for immigration, etc.). The communication styles of the client can be different than the styles of the speech-language pathologist. The goal is to become culturally responsive in service delivery.

Keywords: culture, cultural competence, culturallly responsive practices, speech-language pathologist, cultural and linguistical variables, communication styles

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Authors: Hassan Abdelgadir

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Cost overruns have harmed the economies and reputations of several construction companies around the world. Many project management systems have been developed to keep track of a project's budget. However, due to several cost overrun difficulties in the construction industry, cost management is still deemed inadequate. As a result, the goal of this term paper is to identify and group prospective construction project cost overrun reasons based on their origin groups.Basically, all potential cost overrun elements were rigorously checked through 1iterature analysis before being divided into seven (7) groups of originating components, including project, contract, client, contractor, consultant, labor, and external. Each potential factor was completely defined with examples.

Keywords: construction projects, cost overruns, construction company, factors effect costoverruns

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Authors: Peter Heimerl, Alexander Plaikner, Mike Peters

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Background and Significance of the Study: Family-run businesses are a decisive economic factor in the Alpine tourism and leisure industry. Within the next years, it is expected that a large number of family-run small and medium-sized businesses will transfer ownership due to demographic developments. Four stages of succession processes can be identified by several empirical studies: (1) the preparation phase, (2) the succession planning phase, (3) the development of the succession concept, (4) and the implementation of the business transfer. Family business research underlines the importance of individual's and family’s values: Especially leadership values address mainly the first phase, which strongly determines the following stages. Aim of the Study: The study aims at answering the following research question: Which leadership values are dominating during succession processes in family-run businesses in Austrian Alpine tourism industry? Methodology: Twenty-two problem-centred individual interviews with 11 transferors and their 11 transferees were conducted. Data analysis was carried out using the software program MAXQDA following an inductive approach to data coding. Major Findings: Data analysis shows that nine values particularly influence succession processes, especially during the vulnerable preparation phase. Participation is the most-dominant value (162 references). It covers a style of cooperation, communication, and controlling. Discipline (142) is especially prevailing from the transferor's perspective. It addresses entrepreneurial honesty and customer orientation. Development (138) is seen as an important value, but it can be distinguished between transferors and transferees. These are mainly focused on strategic positioning and new technologies. Trust (105) is interpreted as a basic prerequisite to run the family firm smoothly. Interviewees underline the importance to be able to take a break from family-business management; however, this is only possible when openness and honesty constitute trust within the family firm. Loyalty (102): Almost all interviewees perceive that they can influence the loyalty of the employees through their own role models. A good work-life balance (90) is very important to most of the transferors, especially for their employees. Despite the communicated importance of a good work-life-balance, but however, mostly the commitment to the company is prioritised. Considerations of regionality (82) and regional responsibility are also frequently raised. Appreciation (75) is of great importance to both the handover and the takeover generation -as appreciation towards the employees in the company and especially in connection with the family. Familiarity (66) and the blurring of the boundaries between private and professional life are very common, especially in family businesses. Familial contact and open communication with employees which is mentioned in almost all handing over. Conclusions: In the preparation phase of succession, successors and incumbents have to consider and discuss their leadership and family values of family-business management. Quite often, assistance is needed to commonly and openly discuss these values in the early stages of succession processes. A large majority of handovers fail because of these values. Implications can be drawn to support family businesses, e.g., consulting initiatives at chambers of commerce and business consultancies must address this problem.

Keywords: leadership values, family business, succession processes, succession phases

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Authors: Narong Anurak

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This study aimed to find out the hair-care purchasing behavior at hypermarkets and to investigate two factors, package design and advertising channels, that influenced hair-care purchasing behavior. The subjects of the study consisted of 100 housewives aged between 20-60 who usually shopped at Big C Tiwanon. They were selected by accidental sampling, and were asked to complete a questionnaire. The main findings of the survey were that the majority of respondents regarding their brand selection of hair-care products, they gave priority to the product quality followed by a reasonable price, and fragrance, respectively. Besides, more than half of the respondents had brand loyalty while the rest were attracted by an attractive package design and advertising promotion campaigns. The respondents who were attracted by the package design said that the information on the labels influenced their purchasing decision the most, and television was a medium that best reached them as well.

Keywords: advertising channels, consumer purchasing decisions, hair-care market, package design

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Authors: Besa Muthuri

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This paper examines the correlation between the organization's human resources (HR) and marketing entities and reviews the literature on customer acquisition and loyalty retention and the various aspects of employer branding. It will also explore how these concepts can be applied to the marketing and human resources departments. HR and marketing teams in the organization function to educate, attract and retain the attention and interests of the modern talent market. While the teams' target products, personas, or services tend to differ, their execution, desired results, and implementation of the respective activities are closely related. Therefore, promoting collaboration between HR and marketing enables the company to enhance business branding and recruitment of top-tier talents that will drive the much-needed change in the organization and promote a higher employee and customer retention rate. To achieve the ultimate HR and marketing relationship, organizations should build their external and internal awareness, track their performance and programs, and promote in-house meetings among employees from all interfacing departments.

Keywords: branding, employee retention, human resources, marketing

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Authors: Syed Umair Aziz, Muhammad Faheem, Sameer Hussain, Faraz Idris

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Content centric network is the network based on the mechanism of sending and receiving the data based on the interest and data request to the specified node (which has cached data). In this network, the security is bind with the content not with the host hence making it host independent and secure. In this network security is applied by taking content’s MAC (message authentication code) and encrypting it with the public key of the receiver. On the receiver end, the message is first verified and after verification message is saved and decrypted using the receiver's private key.

Keywords: content centric network, client-server, host security threats, message authentication code, named data network, network caching, peer-to-peer

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Authors: Vedat Coskun, Fahri Soylemezgiller, Busra Ozdenizci, Kerem Ok

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In recent years, several smart card solutions for transportation services of cities with different technical infrastructures and business models has emerged considerably, which triggers new business and technical opportunities. In order to create a unique system, we present a novel, promising system called Multifunctional City Smart Card System to be used in all cities that provides transportation and loyalty services based on the MasterCard M/Chip Advance standards. The proposed system provides a unique solution for transportation services of large cities over the world, aiming to answer all transportation needs of citizens. In this paper, development of the Multifunctional City Smart Card System and system requirements are briefly described. Moreover, performance analysis results of M/Chip Advance Compatible Validators which is the system's most important component are presented.

Keywords: smart card, m/chip advance standard, city transportation, performance analysis

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Authors: Tim Bakken

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The paper will discuss to what extent political polarization contributes to censorship, lack of civil discourse, and even violence. Most researchers have been unable to identify precisely what factors or processes contribute significantly to conflict. Absent such recognition, we have been unable to select effective remedies to address conflict. Through this paper, it will consider whether legal remedies can help to reduce conflict and polarization. My sense is that many current conflicts cannot be remedied primarily by law. But, there is little research on this hypothesis. Absent research and findings, nations may be looking to law for relief when, in fact, they should be looking at conditions underlying the formation of law or the absence of a more precise and effective legal remedy. It is hypothesized that the underlying reasons for conflict include sub-groups’ separation from the larger democratic society; misplaced loyalty to members of sub-groups; a culture of silence when recognizing wrongdoing; and retaliation against people who speak up. In sum, the greater distance citizens or institutions place between themselves and democratic norms, the more likely the members of a sub-group or institution will be to adopt conflict, even violence, as a method to obtain personal goals.

Keywords: constitutional law, conflict, criminal law, polarization

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Authors: Habab Ahmed Hassan Abuzeid

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Organizations are social systems. If one wishes to work in them or to manage them, it is necessary to understand how they operate. Organizations combine science and people–technology and humanity. Unless we have qualified people to design and implement, techniques alone will not produce desirable results. Human behavior in organizations is rather unpredictable. It is unpredictable because it arises from people’s deep-seated needs and value systems. However, it can be partially understood in terms of the framework of behavioral science, management and other disciplines. There is no idealistic solution to organizational problems. All that can be done is to increase our understanding and skills so that human relations at work can be enhanced. In this paper, we consider management of organization behavior utilizing human resources. Study the elements of organization behavior, the effectiveness of mechanism to enhance staff relationships. Many approaches could be applied for healthy organizational environment, it’s highlighted more details in this paper. Organization behavior can raise the employees’ engagement, loyalty and commitment; to accomplish the goal.

Keywords: environment, engagement, human resources, organization behavior

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Authors: Girija Madhavanprabhakaran, Frincy Franacis, Sheeba Elizabeth John

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Introduction: A wide range of prenatal genetic screening is introduced with increasing incidences of congenital anomalies even in low-risk pregnancies and is an emerging standard of care. Being frontline caretakers, the role and responsibilities of nurses and midwives are critical as they are working along with couples to provide evidence-based supportive educative care. The increasing genetic disorders and advances in prenatal genetic screening with limited genetic counselling facilities urge nurses and midwifery nurses with essential competencies to help couples to take informed decision. Objective: This integrative literature review aimed to explore nurse midwives’ knowledge and role in prenatal screening and genetic counselling competency and the challenges faced by them to cater to all pregnant women to empower their autonomy in decision making and ensuring psychological comfort. Method: An electronic search using keywords prenatal screening, genetic counselling, prenatal counselling, nurse midwife, nursing education, genetics, and genomics were done in the PUBMED, SCOPUS and Medline, Google Scholar. Finally, based on inclusion criteria, 8 relevant articles were included. Results: The main review results suggest that nurses and midwives lack essential support, knowledge, or confidence to be able to provide genetic counselling and help the couples ethically to ensure client autonomy and decision making. The majority of nurses and midwives reported inadequate levels of knowledge on genetic screening and their roles in obtaining family history, pedigrees, and providing genetic information for an affected client or high-risk families. The deficiency of well-recognized and influential clinical academic midwives in midwifery practice is also reported. Evidence recommended to update and provide sound educational training to improve nurse-midwife competence and confidence. Conclusion: Overcoming the challenges to achieving informed choices about fetal anomaly screening globally is a major concern. Lack of adequate knowledge and counselling competency, communication insufficiency, need for education and policy are major areas to address. Prenatal nurses' and midwives’ knowledge on prenatal genetic screening and essential counselling competencies can ensure services to the majority of pregnant women around the globe to be better-informed decision-makers and enhances their autonomy, and reduces ethical dilemmas.

Keywords: challenges, genetic counselling, prenatal screening, prenatal counselling

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Authors: Mitrajit Biswas

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This paper is trying to understand the issues related to maintaining a fan base over a period of time. The paper would be trying to look into how the fan base can be actually engaged. That is what are the attributes of keeping a fan base interested and not feeling fatigued or tired. It would also try to understand that what are the key elements required for a franchise to be active and keep the fans engaged. The paper would look to understand the primary elements of a franchise like Marvel to keep the fans engaged for such a long period of time. This will help to improve the scope of literature on consumer engagement and consumption behaviour in modern times of unpredictability. It will also help to understand how the consumers take in a longer period of engagement. This would help to understand that despite huge success and investment in fan engagement and what could be the possible reasons for disengagement? This would include in-depth interviews with a global sample of around 50 people, which would be connected through purposive, convenient, and snowball sampling. It will help to understand whether the customer lifetime value as a theory can be sustained based on customer relationship management. If yes, how can products from certain companies predict and keep up the strategy for the prediction of the consumer engagement process?

Keywords: consumption, fatigue, brand loyalty, sustainable consumption

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Authors: Shadan Dwairi

Abstract:

Defining proper requirements is one of the key factors for a successful construction projects. Although there have been many attempts put forward in assist in identifying requirements, but still this area is under developed. In Buildings Information Modelling (BIM) projects. The Employer Information Requirements (EIR) is the fundamental requirements document and a necessary ingredient in achieving a successful BIM project. The provision on full and clear EIR is essential to achieving BIM Level-2. As Defined by PAS 1192-2, EIR is a “pre-tender document that sets out the information to be delivered and the standards and processes to be adopted by the supplier as part of the project delivery process”. It also notes that “EIR should be incorporated into tender documentation to enable suppliers to produce an initial BIM Execution Plan (BEP)”. The importance of effective definition of EIR lies in its contribution to a better productivity during the construction process in terms of cost and time, in addition to improving the quality of the built asset. Proper and clear information is a key aspect of the EIR, in terms of the information it contains and more importantly the information the client receives at the end of the project that will enable the effective management and operation of the asset, where typically about 60%-80% of the cost is spent. This paper reports on the research done in developing the Ontology-based tool for Employer Information Requirements (OntEIR). OntEIR has proven the ability to produce a full and complete set of EIRs, which ensures that the clients’ information needs for the final model delivered by BIM is clearly defined from the beginning of the process. It also reports on the work being done into transforming OntEIR into a smart tool for Defining Employer Information Requirements (smartEIR). smartEIR transforms the OntEIR tool into enabling it to develop custom EIR- tailored for the: Project Type, Project Requirements, and the Client Capabilities. The initial idea behind smartEIR is moving away from the notion “One EIR fits All”. smartEIR utilizes the links made in OntEIR and creating a 3D matrix that transforms it into a smart tool. The OntEIR tool is based on the OntEIR framework that utilizes both Ontology and the Decomposition of Goals to elicit and extract the complete set of requirements needed for a full and comprehensive EIR. A new ctaegorisation system for requirements is also introduced in the framework and tool, which facilitates the understanding and enhances the clarification of the requirements especially for novice clients. Findings of the evaluation of the tool that was done with experts in the industry, showed that the OntEIR tool contributes towards effective and efficient development of EIRs that provide a better understanding of the information requirements as requested by BIM, and support the production of a complete BIM Execution Plan (BEP) and a Master Information Delivery Plan (MIDP).

Keywords: building information modelling, employer information requirements, ontology, web-based, tool

Procedia PDF Downloads 102

Authors: Subhadeep Mandal, Sujoy Bhattacharya, Pabitra Mitra, Diya Guha Roy, Seema Bhattacharya

Abstract:

E-commerce firms allow customers to evaluate and review the things they buy as a positive or bad experience. The e-commerce transaction processes are made up of a variety of diverse organizations and activities that operate independently but are connected together to complete the transaction (from placing an order to the goods reaching the client). After a negative shopping experience, clients frequently disregard the critical assessment of these businesses and submit their feedback on an all-over basis, which benefits certain enterprises but is tedious for others. In this article, we solely dealt with negative reviews and attempted to distinguish between negative reviews where the e-commerce firm is explicitly blamed by customers for a bad purchasing experience and other negative reviews.

Keywords: e-commerce, online shopping, customer reviews, customer behaviour, text analytics, n-grams classification

Procedia PDF Downloads 223

Authors: Nicodemus M. J. Mbwambo, Yu-Shan Sun, Murali Sitaraman, Joan Krone

Abstract:

This paper presents a generic data abstraction that captures a navigable tree position. The mathematical modeling of the abstraction encapsulates the current tree position, which can be used to navigate and modify the tree. The encapsulation of the tree position in the data abstraction specification avoids the use of explicit references and aliasing, thereby simplifying verification of (imperative) client code that uses the data abstraction. To ease the tasks of such specification and verification, a general tree theory, rich with mathematical notations and results, has been developed. The paper contains an example to illustrate automated verification ramifications. With sufficient tree theory development, automated proving seems plausible even in the absence of a special-purpose tree solver.

Keywords: automation, data abstraction, maps, specification, tree, verification

Procedia PDF Downloads 134