bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Exploring Environmental Factors in Virtual Teams
Authors: Torres-Coronas Teresa
Published: May 2010

In today’s competitive business world, global competition forces companies to continually seek ways of improving their products/services. The hypercompetitive business environment has been the catalysts for new organizational forms—the virtual organization and its smaller version the virtual team (Jarvenpaa & Ives, 1994). The advent of new communication technologies has given organizations an opportunity to bring together their distributed workforce. The creation of distributed teams makes possible the incorporation of a wide range of both individual knowledge and expertise into a collective body of knowledge needed to conduct effective group problem-solving activities.
Extended Enterprise Integration vs. Market B2B Integration
Authors: Goethals Frank G. , Lemanhieu Wilfried , Snoeck Monique
Published: May 2010

The human communication processes that are involved in analyzing and designing a business and in designing, implementing, and maintaining information systems are affected by the fact that the information technology (IT) department of one company nowadays has to create software to fulfill requirements of people not only in their own company but in other companies too. In this context, the term “extended enterprise” is often used. The concept “extended enterprise” is, however, not unequivocally defined. This article first discusses the concept of the extended enterprise and opposes this form of economic organization to the two other basic forms of economic organization, namely, the firm and the market. Next, we derive from organization theory (see, e.g., Hatch, 1997; Morgan, 1996) two basic types of business-to-business integration (B2Bi), namely, extended enterprise integration and market B2Bi. We show that the extended enterprise constitutes a specific context within which information systems are being developed, integrated, and maintained, and that this context allows for/needs specific ways of integration. We discuss the role of standards and coordination for both types of B2Bi.
Extent of Network Effects and Social e Interaction Effects
Authors: den Hartigh Erik
Published: May 2010

In economics and management science, there has been increasing interest in network effects and social interaction effects. Network effects occur when to an economic agent (e.g., a consumer of a firm), the utility of using a product or technology becomes larger as its network of users grows in size (Farrell & Saloner, 1985; Katz & Shapiro, 1985). The network effect may set in motion a positive feedback loop that will cause a product or technology to become more prevalent in the market. Social interaction effects occur when an economic agent’s preference for a product or technology is dependent upon the opinions or expectations of other economic agents. The social interaction effect may set in motion a positive feedback loop that will cause agents to expect that a certain product or technology will become more prevalent in the market. In markets, network effects and social interaction effects appear for example in the emergence of fashions and fads (e.g., Abrahamson & Rosenkopf, 1997; Bikhchandani, Hirschleifer, & Welch, 1992) and in technology adoption and standardization (e.g., Arthur, 1989; Katz et al., 1985). Theory and existing research suggest that the presence of network effects and social interaction effects in markets has important implications for market structure, for market outcomes and, as a consequence, for the behavior and the performance of firms that are active in those markets (e.g., Arthur, 1996; Schilling, 1998; Shapiro & Varian, 1999). An important question is therefore under which conditions these network effects and social interaction effects occur in markets.
Formal Modeling and Verification of Virtual Community Systems
Authors: Oliveira Elthon , Almeida Hyggo , Silva Leandro , Milena Nadia , Bublitz Frederico , Perkusich Angelo
Published: May 2010

In the last years, virtual community systems (VCS) (Bublitz, Barbosa, & Costa, 2004) have been used as one of the main mechanisms for communication and collaboration among people throughout the world--the people whom use this kind of system compose the socalled virtual community. Several systems providing different features and tools such as forums, e-mails, and videoconference, among others, represent a revolution in the way that people interact with others.
A Fuzzy Multi-Agent System for Combinatorial Optimization
Authors: Corona Carlos Cruz , González Juan R. , Royo Alejandro Sancho , Pelta David
Published: May 2010

NP-complete problems, like many of those arising in industry, cannot be approached with exact tools in reasonable time, so, approximation approaches are required. Among such approaches, heuristics and metaheuristics methods are considered as very useful tools to obtain reasonably good solutions in limited time for such complex problems, but their application is far from trivial.
Geography of the Information Society
Authors: Ferreira Jorge Ricardo Costa
Published: May 2010

All everyday activities take place in space, and it is upon this that all information and knowledge revolve. The latter are the key elements in the organization of territories. Their creation, use, and distribution should therefore occur in a balanced way throughout the whole territory in order to allow all individuals to participate in an egalitarian society, in which the flow of knowledge can take precedence over the flow of interests.
Guidelines for Deploying a Knowledge Management System
Authors: Ares J. , Rodríguez-Patón A. , Suárez S.
Published: May 2010

Despite the current upsurge of the knowledge management discipline (KM) and the benefits that this discipline offers organizations, there are still substantial deficiencies in this field. In this respect, the KM schemes of most organizations are ad hoc initiatives, set up to meet a specific internal need. Similarly, many organizations have taken a mistaken view of KM, deploying a software tool, and expecting employees to be motivated more or less by design to share knowledge. In actual fact, however, KM has to be undertaken by means of an all-embracing process through which the knowledge that is in the organization is discovered and used correctly. However, those organizations that are aware of the need to enact such a process to effectively incorporate KM into their business activities come up against what is really the most important and worrying obstacle: there is no commonly accepted approach to guide the deployment of a knowledge management system (KMS) in an organization (Rubenstein-Montano, Liebowitz, Buchwalter, McCaw, Newman, & Rebeck, 2001). This state of affairs is due to the fact that there are a great many proposals for setting up this class of systems; none of which, however, are detailed enough to be directly applicable.
Industry and Academia Networks
Authors: Romero Fernando
Published: May 2010

Universities have historically been a source of fundamental knowledge, and the premier source of technologies that have found innumerable applications (in the economy, in the military, in health care, etc.) that have shaped the trajectory, the direction and the nature of social and economic development. The contribution of universities towards the economic fabric of a region, nation or supranational entity is manifold, and is recognised as essential to the creation of wealth. It is because of that recognition that there has been a growing need to understand in what ways knowledge created at the universities is transferred and it impacts upon society at large. Knowledge can take many forms, and the resources devoted to knowledge creation can themselves be allocated to different levels and degrees of activities related to that endeavour. However, resources are scarce and resource allocation to knowledge must be essentially of a long- range perspective. The distribution of resources in terms of short-range and long-range investment in knowledge is inextricably linked to the phenomena of university-industry relations. Many initiatives fostering linkages between universities and industry, with a view to increase or facilitate rates of technology transfer, implemented innovation and economic development. However, the contexts in which these relations occur vary broadly and presently, because resources for investment in knowledge creation are scarce and differentiated there is a need for a comprehensive understanding of the variety of initiatives and relationships that exist, and the need for a deeper conceptualization of the forms, configurations, roles and expectations that shape and define existing relationships.
The Innovative Production Machines and Systems Network of Excellence
Authors: Pham D. T. , Eldukhuri E. E. , Soroka A. , Zlatanov V. , Packiananther M. S. , Setchi R. , Pham P. T.N. , Thomas A. , Dadam Y.
Published: May 2010

This article presents the essence of the Innovative Production Machines and Systems (I*PROMS) Network of Excellence. It gives the rationale for networks of excellence, outlines the scope and structure of I*PROMS, and summarizes its program of activities.
Interaction in Cooperative Learning
Authors: Martins Hélder Fanha , Ferro Maria João
Published: May 2010

This article discusses the question of interaction in corporate e-learning. I will define the three kinds of interaction in Moore’s model, explain the value of interactivity in learning, evaluate the benefits and limitations of using interactions, discuss the differences and similarities among learning through computers, learning from computers and learning with computers. Interaction takes on distinctive meanings in different contexts. Interaction is found in computer games, e-commerce sites, user-interface designs, online media, and education. Users have experienced interactions that set their expectations and definitions. The different experiences create challenges for instructional design experts because they muddy the definition and establish expectations regarding interactions that may not have direct transference to interactive online learning.
Knowledge Transfer and Sharing in Globally Distributed Teams
Authors: Oshri Ilan , Kotlarsky Julia , van Fenema Paul C.
Published: May 2010

Recent years have witnessed the globalisation of many industries. Consequently, globally distributed and virtual teams have become increasingly common in many areas, for example, in new product development and information systems (IS) development. Achieving successful collaborations has become a key challenge for globally distributed organizations, and it is largely dependent on teams’ ability to transfer and share knowledge.
Knowledge-Based E-Learning in Virtual Enterprises
Authors: Andrés del Valle Ana C.
Published: May 2010

Virtual enterprises, like their traditional counterparts, face the challenge of surviving in an ever evolving market. Virtual enterprises are characterized by their distributed nature. Processes and resources are assigned over a network of specialized enterprises. Their survival is dependent on individual performances as well as the performance of the global network. Knowledge is the most valuable resource in adapting to technological change. Sainz (2002) clearly states it saying: the human capital is not only a factor utilized for goods production but also the agent that generates and implements the technological change in a company. So managing this “human capital” involves understanding their capabilities (knowledge) and fostering their technical skills (training) (Allee, 1997). This paper develops the concept of knowledge-based e-learning. We will go over the basics of e-learning and will offer the reader some of the latest joint knowledge- management/e-learning strategies to ensure high performance by virtual enterprises.
The Living Labs Approach to a Virtual Lab Environment
Authors: Ponce de Leon Miguel , Hribernik Karl A. , Eriksson Mats
Published: May 2010

Today, new ways of constructing and delivering complex voice and data communication services require more elaborate and distributed design, prototyping, testing, and validation facilities. The idea of a test bed which is remotely accessible (De, Raniwala, Sharma, & Chiueh Tzi-cker, 2005), can provide an open and integrated test site infrastructure, and has associated development and testing environment for validating research (OPIUM 2002), is not new and has been used in many research projects.
Long-Term Contracts in the Cellular Phone Industry
Authors: Barnes Donald , Ring John Kirk
Published: May 2010

A service company’s major goal often tries to identify profitable customers and to retain those customers through long-term relationships (e.g., Reinartz & Kumar, 2003). Retention has been shown as a sound strategy for long-term success (e.g., Reichheld & Sasser, 1990). Frequently, companies employ a market orientation strategy to reach their retention goals. Market orientation occurs when organizations base their procedures and structures around the customer (Narver & Slater, 1990), with the intention of garnering customer loyalty through superior customer satisfaction. The importance of the customer and the delivery of quality service has been illustrated in many literature sources, (e.g., Zeithaml, Berry, & Parasuraman, 1996) yet many companies continue to use policies that exploit the customer or service quality in favor of bottom line profits. Long-term contracts may be such a policy.
Market of Resources for Health Care Teleservices Management
Authors: Cunha Maria Manuela , Putnik Goran D. , Simões Ricardo
Published: May 2010

According to a report on e-marketplaces for the health sector (Kuller, 2005), the European Health and Social Services sector is a complex web of “businesses” and “customers,” characterized by a combination of public and private providers who control the strategic direction and finances. The services are delivered by microbusinesses, that is, hospitals, clinics, general practitioners, and specialists, and delivered through government, public, or nonprofit bodies, not the private sector (although this is slowly changing in some countries) (Kuller, 2005). The resulting absence of the profit goal means that the motivation for changing business processes and implementing tools is driven by a need to improve “patient care,” and not a desire to make or save money. This partly explains why the Health and Social Services sector lags behind others with regard to IT infrastructure in place and e-business usage.
Market of Resources for Virtual Enterprise Integration
Authors: Cunha Maria Manuela , Putnik Goran D. , Ávila Paulo Silva
Published: May 2010

Most definitions of virtual enterprise (VE) incorporate the idea of extended and collaborative outsourcing to suppliers and subcontractors in order to achieve a competitive response to market demands (Webster, Sugden, & Tayles, 2004). As suggested by several authors (Browne & Zhang, 1999; Byrne, 1993; Camarinha-Matos & Afsarmanesh, 1999; Cunha, Putnik, & Ávila, 2000; Davidow & Malone, 1992; Preiss, Goldman, & Nagel, 1996), a VE consists of a network of independent enterprises (resources providers) with reconfiguration capability in useful time, permanently aligned with the market requirements, created to take profit from a specific market opportunity, and where each participant contributes with its best practices and core competencies to the success and competitiveness of the structure as a whole. Even during the operation phase of the VE, the configuration can change, to assure business alignment with the market demands, traduced by the identification of reconfiguration opportunities and continuous readjustment or reconfiguration of the VE network, to meet unexpected situations or to keep permanent competitiveness and maximum performance (Cunha & Putnik, 2002, 2005a, 2005b).
Multi-Criteria Partner Selection in Virtual Organizations
Authors: Jarimo Toni , Ljubic Peter , Hodík Jiri , Salkari Iiro , Bohanec Marko
Published: May 2010

Virtual organization partner selection has recently attracted the attention of researchers from various fields. The need for partner selection arises when a broker (e.g., Katzy & Dissel, 2001) identifies a collaboration opportunity and is willing to form a virtual organization (VO). Several researchers have suggested that a pool of proactively cooperating organizations would be an efficient platform for creating VOs (Lau & Wong, 2001; Camarinha-Matos & Afsarmanesh 2003; Tølle & Bernus, 2003). Here, we follow the terminology of Camarinha-Matos and Afsarmanesh (2003), who call this pool a virtual organization breeding environment (VBE). The idea is that a VBE provides a common structure for repeated VO creation, hence decreasing the costs related to ad hoc VO creation. Such a VBE structure includes, for instance, a common ICT infrastructure, contract templates and decision-support tools for agile VO creation.
Networks of Excellence as Virtual Communities
Authors: Draghici A. , Matta N. , Molcho G. , Draghici G.
Published: May 2010

The “Communities of Practice” concept was first used in relation to the learning process in 1991 by Jean Lave and Etienne Wenger (1991) at the Institute for Research on Learning as part of an attempt to “rethink learning.” In 1998, Wenger extended this concept and applied it to other contexts, including organizational settings (Wenger, 1998).
New Computer Network Paradigms and Virtual Organizations
Authors: Ibáñez Fernández Guillermo Agustín
Published: May 2010

A computer network consists of computers that communicate via any physical media through a network formed by links and nodes, the nodes being the computers. Computer networks have evolved along their short history. Computer networks have changed drastically in mission and implementation from the early projects supported by the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) and from other organizations, tracing back the origins to 1962. The ARPA network (ARPANET) consisted initially of a small set of nodes at research centres and universities, connected with links at 56 kbps across the United States. ARPANET was the core of the early Internet, a network for research centres and universities. Computer networks are based on the concept of packet switching within a shared communication medium, as opposite to circuit switching, the dominant paradigm for the precedent telegraph and telephone networks. In 1968 Paul Baran proposed a network system based on nodes that forward datagrams or packets from different users over a common line between computer systems from origin to destination. The packet switching paradigm provides resiliency of network against network node failures, the independent routing of datagrams per node makes possible that the datagrams reach their destination even in presence of multiple node failures.
A New Way of Conjoint Added Value N Generation in Collaborative Business Processes
Authors: Werth Dirk
Published: May 2010

Nowadays, economic organizations are dramatically changing towards networked structures (Österle, Fleisch, & Alt, 2000). These are characterized by core competence specialized value units (Prahalad & Hamel, 1990) that intensively interact along the added value in order to cooperatively generate the intended product. This intensification of exchanges leads to strong, collaborative relationships (also called collaborative business (cf. Camarinha-Matos, 2002). In these structures, the generation of added value is highly distributed through the network. In this respect, the relationships between such enterprises are more than simple supplier-purchaser-relations. They represent a crucial part of the output generation chain, or in other words, of the collaborative business process. The latter means the sequence of activities within this collaborative network that result in the generation of the intended output. However, the conventional understanding of business processes is limited to a single enterprise (e.g,. in Davenport, 1993; Hammer & Champy, 1993; Scheer, 1999). Attempts to extend the business process concept to inter-enterprise environments only substitute the department of an enterprise by a whole enterprise itself (e.g., Hirschmann, 1998). However, this understanding does not reflect the special properties of collaborations that cannot be considered as a huge corporation-like enterprise. Therefore, this article investigates the collaboration in regards to the business process aspects and reveals the special properties that differentiate collaborative business processes from “simple” crossorganizational ones and others.
Online Corporate Collaborative Teams
Authors: Martins Hélder Fanha , Ferro Maria João
Published: May 2010

Given the growing demand for the use of teams as fundamental building blocks in organizations (Furst, Blackburn, & Rosen, 1999), particularly geographically distributed teams, it is essential to establish a means to ensure their high performance and productivity. The first step to improve our understanding of what makes these teams effective is to identify a series of best practices that should be followed by all those involved in what we call online collaborative teams (OCT): their organizations, leaders and members. OCT are groups of individuals who work on interdependent tasks, share responsibility for outcomes, and join their efforts from different locations. These teams are now being used by many organizations to enhance the productivity of their employees and to reach a diversity of skills and resources. Information technology can support their activities by reducing travel costs, enabling expertise to be captured where it is located, and speeding up team communication and coordination processes. Unfortunately, these distributed teams are not always productive.
The Open University of Catalonia as a Virtual University
Authors: Morales
Published: May 2010

Electronic Web-based campus information systems and e-learning educational delivery became increasingly important for higher education practice in the late 20th and early 21st century (Bates, 2000; Cobarsí, 2005). These emergent information technologies brought about changes in the traditional face-to-face campus and paper-based communication and teaching (Brown & Duguid, 2000). There are several trends in the introduction of information technology in universities that can be summarised into three main types (Duderstadt, 2000; Folkers, 2005). Firstly, most universities gradually adopted electronic campus information systems and e-learning to reinforce functionalities offered by their physical campus, with no intention of substituting the traditional campus but simply to strengthen their capabilities. Secondly, other institutions, the so-called first generation distance universities, had no physical campus from the very beginning, such as the institutions founded in the 1970s: the British Open University http://www3.open.ac.uk or Spain’s Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia http://www.uned. es/portal/index.htm. Thus, they incorporated electronic media to complement their usual means of communication by post or periodical face-to-face tuition. Thirdly, the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (Open University of Catalonia, hereinafter the OUC) is a quite different case: it was created from the very beginning (the academic year 1995-1996) as a wholly e-learning and Internet-based higher education institution, where a virtual campus with wide-ranging functionalities supports most of the day-to-day activities. As a result of these original premises, this university has some important organizational and information system features, which are summarised and discussed in the sections below, from the chronological perspective offered by its having been in operation for 10 years.
Performance Measurement of Computer Networks
Authors: Pouzols Federico Montesino , Barros Angel Barriga , Lopez Diego R. , Sánchez-Solano Santiago
Published: May 2010

In this article, general findings about Internet traffic models are first reviewed, with emphasis on two important invariants or characteristics that are observed with some reproducibility and independently of the precise settings of the network under consideration: self-similarity and heavy-tail marginal distributions. Then metrics and measurement techniques and tools will be discussed. This article deals with generic network performance measurement systems and outlines models, measurement techniques and tools that measure performance at the network and transport layers and can thus be applied regardless of the application layer protocols being employed. These systems are useful for analyzing performance of any network application and are an important foundational tool for enabling advanced virtual organizations (Foster, Kesselman, & Tuecke, 2001). Note, however, that application-level (or specific application details aware) measurements are commonly needed to complement generic tools so as to achieve a clear understanding of overall applications performance, which cannot be synthesized from lower level data with ease (Andrews, Cao, & McGowan, 2006).
PMA Supplier Selection Using the Mahalanobis Taguchi System
Authors: Wong T.T.
Published: May 2010

Most hi-tech industries owe at least some of their success to being in the right place at the right time. This is especially true for the aircraft parts manufacturer approval (PMA) industry. A PMA is both a design approval and a production approval. It is issued for the production of modification or replacement parts for aircraft, which includes materials, parts, processes, and appliances. In the current economic climate, airlines throughout the world are looking for partners with financial stability. The reason is simple, they want partners that will continue to support them with extra savings opportunities in the short and long-term future. As more and more PMA companies are advertising through the Internet, a supplier performance measurement model applying to each of these networked organizations will facilitate the airline selection of long-term PMA partners. In this chapter, the Mahalanobis Taguchi System (MTS) approach, a multivariate data based selection system, will be used to identify the promising PMA suppliers. Suppliers who are known to be promising are called promising groups and their performance data sets are used to create a reference metric for the promising PMA supplier population. In view of the synergetic performance of neural network and data mining technologies, it is expected that this MTS-based PMA partner selection method, implementing through a neural data mining system (NDMS) will provide a practical solution in the identification of the promising PMA suppliers.
Post-Modern Tribes as a Marketing Tool
Authors: Ripamonti Laura A. , Cirrincione Armando
Published: May 2010

In 1994, Peters (1994) claimed that we are experiencing crazy times and that calls for crazy organizations. As a matter of fact, we are embedded into a complex and “transitional” historical phase, that philosophers and social scientists define “post-modernity.” This phase is characterized by a progressive skepticism towards the exasperated individualism generated by the liberation movements and towards the rationalism of the modern period. This shifting of perspective does not crystallize in any specific movement, but, on the contrary, it is a mosaic composed by a plurality of different ideologies.
Public Private Networks
Authors: Bohl Oliver , Schaefer Ruth , Winand Udo
Published: May 2010

The provision of services and the production of wares and services nowadays often require the cooperation of partners from different sectors. These cooperations can comprise public and private organizations, companies, universities, NGOs, and other groupings as well as individuals. The cooperative collaboration is esteemed as a core element of democratic social systems within a free market economy (Kirsch, 1996; Pongsiri, 2001). As one relevant method of organizing such collaborations, public private networks (PPN) extend the concept of public private partnerships (PPP) by adding the idea of networking and its core elements. From a scientific point of view as well as from the business perspective there is a shortcoming in the systematic processing of ideas, motivations, and forms as well as implications for internal and external participants of PPPs/PPNs. In the following, partnerships between partners from public and private business environments will be discussed. (Pongsiri, 2001) In particular, PPPs and PPNs in the field of academic education will be portrayed, since the cooperation in knowledge intensive areas is seen as an important issue. (Inkpen, 1996; Seufert, von Krogh, & Back, 1999) In the following the concepts of PPPs and PPNs will be explained. This will be done by an extensive literature review. The aim is to provide the required definitions and to discuss the incorporated views of others.
The Quality of Service Issue in Virtual Environments
Authors: Morillo Pedro , Orduña Juan Manuel , Fernandez Marcos
Published: May 2010

Networked virtual environments (NVEs) have become a major trend in distributed computing, mainly due to the enormous popularity of multi-player online games in the entertainment industry. Nowadays, NVE systems are considered as the supporting technology for many networked and virtual organizations (NVO) (Singhal & Zyda, 1999), especially to those classified within the field of computer supported cooperative work (CSCW), where networked computer can be seen as a standard to provide the technological means to support the team design (Ott & Nastansky, 1997). These highly interactive systems simulate a virtual world where multiple users share the same scenario. The system renders the images of the virtual world that each user would see if he was located at that point in the virtual environment. Each user is represented in the shared virtual environment by an entity called avatar, whose state is controlled by the user through the client computer. Hundreds and even thousands of client computers can be simultaneously connected to the NVE system through different networks, and even through the Internet. NVE systems are currently used in many different applications (Singhal & Zyda, 1999) such as civil and military distributed training (Miller & Thorpe, 1995), collaborative design (Salles, Galli, Almeida et al., 1997) and e-learning (Bouras, Fotakis, & Philopoulos, 1998). Nevertheless, the most extended example of NVE systems are commercial multi-player online game (MOG) environments. These systems use the same simulation techniques that NVE systems do, and they are predicted to make up over 25 percent of local area network (LAN) traffic by 2010 (McCreary & Claffy, 2000).
Tools for Collaborative Business Process T Modeling
Authors: González Paz Perez , Framinan Jose M.
Published: May 2010

A business process can be defined as a set of related tasks that are carried out within a business or organization in order to obtain certain output that should add value for the business client or organization (Gunasekaran & Kobu, 2002). An enterprise can be then analyzed and integrated through its business processes. Thus, business process modeling (BPM) becomes a fundamental part of business process management, as it enables a common understanding and analysis of a company’s business processes. Particularly, BPM using computer-aided design tools and a standard visual form of notation to describe, validate, and simulate business processes has taken on a new importance (Jonah, 2002).
Foundations of Business Process Modeling
Authors: Mendling Jan
Published: May 2010

This chapter provides an overview of business process management and business process modeling. We approach business process management by giving a historical classification of seminal work, and define it by the help of the business process management life cycle. Business process models play an important role in this life cycle, in particular, if information systems are used for executing processes. We deduct a definition for business process modeling based on a discussion of modeling from a general information systems point of view. In the following, we detail business process modeling techniques, in particular, modeling languages and modeling procedures for business process modeling. Finally, we discuss some future trends with a focus on the business process execution language for Web services (BPEL), and conclude the chapter with a summary. The chapter aims to cover business process modeling in a comprehensive way such that academics and practitioners can use it as a reference for identifying more specialized works.
Process Mapping for Electronic Resources
Authors: Afifi Marianne
Published: May 2010

The number of electronic resources is continually growing and the processes associated with managing them are ever more complex. Consequently, completely new ways of managing these resources efficiently and effectively must be invented or borrowed from industries that also must manage complex processes. This chapter describes how a method generally employed in business and industry can be applied in managing electronic resource-related processes in libraries. Specifically, a technique called process mapping and its potential application to electronic resource management in libraries is described. Existing electronic resource management guidelines are conceptually linked to actual management situations. A case study is presented which is intended to illustrate the process.
Designing the Virtual Classroom for Management Teaching
Authors: Haghirian Parissa , Simon Bernd
Published: May 2010

With the modern business environment becoming increasingly dependent on technology, management teaching in higher education faces the challenging task of effectively leveraging technology in diverse learning environments. This chapter discusses the use of virtual classrooms, namely collaborative, information technology-mediated teaching endeavours in management education at universities. The overall aim of this chapter is to provide insights for those who are responsible for the development of management curricula and to give specific guidelines to management educators interested in integrating IT-based teaching to increase teaching effectiveness when designing virtual classrooms.
Strategic Management, Evolutionary Economics, and Complex Adaptive Systems
Authors: Reschke Carl Henning , Kraus Sascha
Published: May 2010

This chapter sketches a strategic map of a selection of the relevant issues at the intersection of economics, psychology, sociology, and evolutionary theories applied to strategic management. It takes an evolutionary complexity perspective, based on a (manageable) selection of the relevant literature. The discussion focuses on evolutionary processes of change and their implications for strategic planning and related issues of organisation. The chapter concludes by discussing practical and research issues.
Data Mining in the Telecommunications Industry
Authors: Weiss Gary
Published: May 2010

The telecommunications industry was one of the first to adopt data mining technology. This is most likely because telecommunication companies routinely generate and store enormous amounts of high-quality data, have a very large customer base, and operate in a rapidly changing and highly competitive environment. Telecommunication companies utilize data mining to improve their marketing efforts, identify fraud, and better manage their telecommunication networks. However, these companies also face a number of data mining challenges due to the enormous size of their data sets, the sequential and temporal aspects of their data, and the need to predict very rare events—such as customer fraud and network failures—in real-time. The popularity of data mining in the telecommunications industry can be viewed as an extension of the use of expert systems in the telecommunications industry (Liebowitz, 1988). These systems were developed to address the complexity associated with maintaining a huge network infrastructure and the need to maximize network reliability while minimizing labor costs. The problem with these expert systems is that they are expensive to develop because it is both difficult and timeconsuming to elicit the requisite domain knowledge from experts. Data mining can be viewed as a means of automatically generating some of this knowledge directly from the data.
Basic Concepts of Mobile Radio Technologies
Authors: Kaspar Christian , Resatsch Florian , Hagenhoff Svenja
Published: May 2010

Mobile radio technologies have seen a rapid growth in recent years. Sales numbers and market penetration of mobile handsets have reached new heights worldwide. With almost two billion GSM users in June 2006, and 74.7 million users of third generation devices, there is a large basis for business and product concepts in mobile commerce (GSM Association, 2006). Penetration rates average 80%, even surpassing 100% in some European countries (NetSize, 2006). The technical development laid the foundation for an increasing number of mobile service users with high mobile Web penetrations. The highest is seen in Germany and Italy (34% for each), followed by France with 28%, while in the U.S., 19% account for mobile internet usage (ComScore, 2006). One of the largest growing services is mobile games, with 59.9 million downloaded in 2006 (Telephia, 2006). Compared to the overall availability of handsets, the continuing high complexity and dynamic of mobile technologies accounts for limited mobile service adoption rates and business models in data services. Therefore, particular aspects of mobile technologies as a basis of promising business concepts within mobile commerce are illustrated in the following on three different levels: First on the network level, whereas available technology alternatives for the generation of digital radio networks need to be considered; second, on the service level, in order to compare different transfer standards for the development of mobile information services; third, on the business level, in order to identify valuable application scenarios from the customer point of view.
Dark Optical Fiber Models for Broadband Networked Cities
Authors: Chochliouros Ioannis , Spiliopoulou Anastasia S. , Lalopoulos George K. , Chochliouros Stergios P.
Published: May 2010

The world economy is currently moving in transition from the industrial age to a new set of rules, that of the so-called “Information Society,” which is rapidly taking shape in different multiple aspects of the everyday life. In fact, the exponential growth of the Internet, the penetration of mobile communications, the rapid emergence of electronic commerce, the restructuring of various forms of businesses in all sectors of the economic activity, the contribution of digital industries to growth and employment, and so forth, are among the current features of the new global reality, and they are all considered significant dynamic factors for further evolution and development (Commission of the European Communities, 2005). Changes are usually underpinned by technological progress and globalization, while the combination of worldwide competition and digital technologies is having a crucial sweeping effect. Digital technologies facilitate transmission and storing of information, while they offer multiple access facilities, in most cases without implying subsequent extra costs. As digital information may be easily transformed into economic and social value, this can offer huge opportunities for the development of new products-offerings, services, or applications. Thus, information becomes the “keyresource” and the prime “engine” of the new e-economy (Crandall, Jackson, & Singer, 2003). Companies in different sectors have already started to adapt to the new economic situation in order to become e-businesses (Commission of the European Communities, 2001c). In addition, the full competitiveness of the state in the current high-tech digitally converging environment is strongly related to the existence of modern digital infrastructures of high capacity and of high performance, rationally deployed and properly priced, capable of providing easy, cost-effective, secure, and uninterrupted access to the international “digital web” of knowledge and commerce without imposing any artificial barriers and/or restrictions (Wallsten, 2005). Broadband development is nowadays an essential strategic priority (Chochliouros & Spiliopoulou, 2005), not only for the European Union (EU) but for the global environment. More specifically, broadband can be considered an “absolutely necessary prerequisite” in order to materialize all potential benefits from information society facilities and so to improve living standards (Commission of the European Communities, 2001b). The availability, access, and ultimate use of broadband in both business and residential settings are critical issues. Both businesses and consumers can derive increased benefits from the availability of broadband connection to the Internet, as the technology speeds up some applications and creates entirely new possibilities (Hu & Prieger, 2007).
IT Management in Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises
Authors: Suraweera Theekshana
Published: May 2010

Computer-based information systems have grown in importance to SMEs, and are now being used increasingly to help them compete. For example, many SMEs have turned to the Internet to support their endeavours. Although the technology that is being used is relatively well understood, its effective management is not so well understood. A good understanding of IT management is important, as the management of IT is an attribute that has the potential to deliver a sustainable competitive advantage to a firm (Mata, Fuerst, & Barney, 1995). This article shows that there is no one accepted view of the term “IT management” for either large or small firms. However, the term “management” is often considered to include the four functions of planning, organising, leading, and controlling. This framework has been applied to SMEs and specifically to their IT management. The article also shows that recent studies have shown significant links between IT management and both IT adoption and IT success. Resource-based theory is helping researchers gain a greater understanding of IT competences. These advances look likely to improve our understanding of the relationship between IT use and SME performance.
Security of Web Servers and Web Services
Authors: Hockmann Volker , Knoell Heinz D. , Leiss Ernst L.
Published: May 2010

Web servers and the Web services associated with them have become increasingly important in the last few years. Online banking, e-mail, and money, business- to-business (B2B), and business-to-client (B2C) transactions are growing rapidly. It is difficult to imagine modern business without these forms of networking. However, there are also significant negative aspects. In many cases, due to competitive pressures, companies and government agencies had to implement these services very fast, often too fast and without any appreciation of the concepts of security and protection. As a consequence, it turns out that a hacker can misuse with little effort these Web services or compromise the underlying database (e.g., to obtain access to credit cards numbers or social insurance information). A very significant percentage of the population in developed and developing countries is using wired and wireless connections for reading e-mails, accessing newsgroups, or using Internet banking. All these services are running on a Web server. Most Web servers are running the Apache or the Microsoft Internet Information Server (IIS) (all versions of both servers [Apache 1.3.x/2.x, IIS 3-6]) (Netcraft, 2006). Of these, older versions of the Internet Information Server are especially vulnerable to numerous attacks. Therefore, an attacker is in a position to break, with little effort, into many Web servers running IIS 4 or 5. However, the Apache Web server (running on Windows systems) is also vulnerable to similar attacks. Moreover, using a Web server based on UNIX or Linux is not a guarantee for a secure system. UNIX and Linux systems are also affected by inherent weaknesses and vulnerabilities such as buffer overflows and the handling of format strings (ZDNet, 2006). Readers who like to have more general insight are referred to works by Leiss (1990) and Garfinkel and Spafford (2002). These books give broader perspectives on Internet security.
eCRM Marketing Intelligence in a Manufacturing Environment
Authors: Borders Aberdeen Leila , Johnston Wesley J. , Young Brett W. , Morpurgo Johnathan Yehuda
Published: May 2010

This article examines the issue of electronic customer relationship management (eCRM) in a manufacturing context. ECRM has been described as the fusion of a process, a strategy, and technology to blend sales, marketing, and service information to identify, attract, and build partnerships with customers (Bettis-Outland & Johnston, 2003; Jaworski & Jocz, 2002). Although some customers still pay a premium for face-to-face or voice-to-voice interaction in today’s hightech world, through external (e.g., advertising) and internal (e.g., word-of-mouth) influence, the diffusion of the use of eCRM to build and sustain customer loyalty as a firm’s strategy is on the rise. Manufacturers use the knowledge of their customers’ needs and preferences to manage profitable customer interactions. This increased use of eCRM as a new manifestation (technological consolidation) of firmly established customer relationship management techniques has been shown to improve customer relationships and enhance customization (Kennedy, 2006).
Effects of Extrinsic Rewards on Knowledge Sharing Initiatives
Authors: Woo Bock Gee , Way Siew Chen , Jung Kang Youn
Published: May 2010

In the field of motivation, incentives are seen as a means of motivating people. Incentives are usually applied in the form of a scheme, such as piece-rate and fixed-rate monetary rewards. Since the field of knowledge management involves a certain measure of motivation, a number of organizations have used incentives to encourage their employees to share knowledge. Research to date concerning the role of incentives in knowledge sharing seems to contradict one another. Furthermore, when an incentive is sufficiently large, some individuals are inspired to increase their performance to reflect the incentive received (London & Oldham, 1976). Along with this negative disposition, intrinsically motivated individuals would experience a deterioration of such motivation due to the introduction of incentives, thus jeopardizing the whole knowledge sharing initiative (Deci, Koestner, & Ryan, 1999; Jordan, 1986). Some research (Bock & Kim, 2002; O’Dell & Grayson, 1998) has suggested a trigger effect that comes from implementing incentives. Empirical evidence concerning the long-term effects of incentives in the field of knowledge sharing is also lacking (Fossum, 1979; O’Dell & Grayson). This research seeks to consolidate the many different views of past research, investigating areas that are lacking. Is it possible to consolidate the different views of incentives in knowledge sharing? Are there differences between having fixed-rate, piece-rate, or no incentive schemes in knowledge sharing initiatives? Do incentives exhibit a triggering effect in motivating individuals to share their knowledge? Would the removal of incentives after the trigger period affect a knowledge sharing initiative? Will the continual increase of incentives remain effective in the long term for knowledge sharing initiatives? These research questions will be answered as the article progresses.