The ability to harness Information Communication Technologies (ICTs) is increasingly at the heart of competitiveness and sustainable growth. As countries engage in an increasingly competitive global economy, they are trying to weave ICT into their development strategies, in the same way enterprises have learned to use ICT to transform their business models and strategies. This integration offers a new path to development that is responsive to the challenges of our times.

In National Strategies to Harness Information Technology, Nagy Hanna and Peter Knight provide a framework for assessing the opportunities, challenges, and prospects for "e-transformation"and for analyzing the options and innovations adopted to manage the e-transformation process. They ask hard questions: what does it take to harness ICT to transform an economy? Why some countries accelerate their development journey with ICT while others fail? How did successful countries balance the need for strategic leadership with bottom up innovation? Can countries reduce the risks of digital divide? What have been the roles of government and private sectors? What lessons can be learned for countries at different levels of development?

Featuring contributions from country experts, the editors and authors provide in-depth case studies of ICT deployment in Singapore, Finland, the Philippines, and South Africa, and asses the progress of such efforts. The result is an essential resource for academic researchers, policy analysts, policymakers, and industry leaders interested in the role of ICT in national development, innovation, and economic growth.In National Strategies to Harness Information Technology, Nagy Hanna and Peter Knight provide a framework for assessing the opportunities, challenges, and prospects for "e-transformation"and for analyzing the options and innovations adopted to manage the e-transformation process. They ask hard questions: what does it take to harness ICT to transform an economy? Why some countries accelerate their development journey with ICT while others fail? How did successful countries balance the need for strategic leadership with bottom up innovation? Can countries reduce the risks of digital divide? What have been the roles of government and private sectors? What lessons can be learned for countries at different levels of development?

Featuring contributions from country experts, the editors and authors provide in-depth case studies of ICT deployment in Singapore, Finland, the Philippines, and South Africa, and asses the progress of such efforts. The result is an essential resource for academic researchers, policy analysts, policymakers, and industry leaders interested in the role of ICT in national development, innovation, and economic growth."

This book examines how and why collaborative quality assurance techniques, particularly pair programming and peer code review, affect group cognition and software quality in agile software development teams. Prior research on these extremely popular but also costly techniques has focused on isolated pairs of developers and ignored the fact that they are typically applied in larger, enduring teams. This book is one of the first studies to investigate how these techniques depend on and influence the joint cognitive accomplishments of entire development teams rather than individuals. It employs theories on transactive memory systems and functional affordances to provide answers based on empirical research. The mixed-methods research presented includes several in-depth case studies and survey results from more than 500 software developers, team leaders, and product managers in 81 software development teams. The book's findings will advance IS research and have explicit implications for developers of code review tools, information systems development teams, and software development managers.

Lifelong learning can occur both in and out of the classroom, but the most valuable instruction takes place on the job. Remote Workforce Training: Effective Technologies and Strategies investigates methods, techniques, and systems used in employee training programs. The tools and technologies surveyed within these pages will help employers take their workers beyond the transient skill sets offered by university degrees and into a constant state of learning and practice that will enhance both their productivity and technical abilities on a regular basis. In particular, the knowledge offered by this reference book will be of use to educators and students as well as managers, leaders, administrators, and personnel.

In the past, services had a strong local and national focus. Professional services were very likely to be independently and autonomously organized from country to country in order to cater to local needs and local legal requirements. This has since changed radically, and highly integrated business and delivery models around the globe have become the status quo in clients' businesses and strategies. Serving clients on a global level requires professional services firms to adopt a structural change from local to distributed global sales and delivery.

This book brings together many years of experience, current perspectives and future ideas of international business practitioners, academics, and market researchers. Along those lines it is structured into four parts. Part I "Winning Strategies and Innovative Ideas" lays the book's foundation: it discusses core strategies behind the globalization movement and introduces the major paradigms and ideas. Part II "Successful Processes for Realization" provides solutions for how to establish successful processes for delivering global professional services. Part III "Inspired Talent Management" goes to the core of the professional services industry: attracting, developing, and keeping the right talent in the right locations. Finally, Part IV offers "Experiences and Case Studies" on all aspects related to successfully building a globalized professional services firm.

In short, this handbook provides professional services firms and their clients alike with a sound foundation for responding strategically to fundamental global changes and turning them into business advantages. It offers a comprehensive perspective of why and how to successfully globalize a professional services firm.

The papers in volume 6 of Research in Competence-Based Management identify, elaborate theoretically, and investigate empirically a number of new kinds of dynamics in industries and product markets. In so doing, the papers develop some important new competence perspectives on both traditional and contemporary industry dynamics. Most approaches to developing competence theory have adopted an "inside-out" approach, i.e. micro-level analyses of sources of organizational competence lead to theory that predicts industry-level interactions and outcomes. The papers in this volume, however, largely adopt an "outside-in" approach to theory development that suggests how further understanding of firm-level competences may be enabled through macro-level analyses of the resources and capabilities organizations must develop to participate in new kinds of industry and product-market dynamics.

This book is about elicitation: the facilitation of the quantitative expression of subjective judgement about matters of fact, interacting with subject experts, or about matters of value, interacting with decision makers or stakeholders. It offers an integrated presentation of procedures and processes that allow analysts and experts to think clearly about numbers, particularly the inputs for decision support systems and models. This presentation encompasses research originating in the communities of structured probability elicitation/calibration and multi-criteria decision analysis, often unaware of each other's developments. Chapters 2 through 9 focus on processes to elicit uncertainty from experts, including the Classical Method for aggregating judgements from multiple experts concerning probability distributions; the issue of validation in the Classical Method; the Sheffield elicitation framework; the IDEA protocol; approaches following the Bayesian perspective; the main elements of structured expert processes for dependence elicitation; and how mathematical methods can incorporate correlations between experts. Chapters 10 through 14 focus on processes to elicit preferences from stakeholders or decision makers, including two chapters on problems under uncertainty (utility functions), and three chapters that address elicitation of preferences independently of, or in absence of, any uncertainty elicitation (value functions and ELECTRE). Two chapters then focus on cross-cutting issues for elicitation of uncertainties and elicitation of preferences: biases and selection of experts. Finally, the last group of chapters illustrates how some of the presented approaches are applied in practice, including a food security case in the UK; expert elicitation in health care decision making; an expert judgement based method to elicit nuclear threat risks in US ports; risk assessment in a pulp and paper manufacturer in the Nordic countries; and elicitation of preferences for crop planning in a Greek region.

Sixty years after its birth, contemporary tourism is at crossroads. It has grown to become a key element of economic well-being, but it is threatened and threatening. Its enemies are congestion, destruction of natural and cultural environments, and social unrest. However, it also contributes its fair share to these evils. How can tourism really become a fulcrum for development and sustainability in the 21st century? This is a matter of crucial importance for entrepreneurs, governments, and civil society stakeholders, and Knowledge Management in Tourism: Policy and Governance Applications provides these key players with answers and queries, and above all with the strategic tools to understand and act. Knowledge Management in Tourism: Policy and Governance Applications is an indispensable instrument for everyone interested in the theory and practice of this very important human pursuit: the quest for effectiveness, efficiency, and equity of tourism activities in helping build the future of mankind.

Volume 22 includes two main chapters in both Part A and B. It appears in two parts because all chapters offer great depth in coverage of core issues senior executives must address for long-term survival of the firm: business intelligence, knowledge management, and understanding of the systems dynamics of interfirm behavior. In the first main chapter of Part A Azizah Ahmad demonstrates that high-performing firms must achieve useful on-going business intelligence (BI). Ahmad shows how plans are designed and implemented for viable BI operations. The main contribution of the study is the identification of the firm's internal resources of BI governance that influences successful BI deployment. In the second chapter Md Nuruzzaman shows how country risk, different political actions from the government, and bureaucratic behavior influence the activities in industry supply-chains in emerging markets. The outcomes of the study are useful for various stakeholders of the Bangladeshi RMG industry sector ranging from the government to various private organizations. The applications of this study are extendable through further adaptation in other industries and various geographic contexts.

The 21st century economy is fuelled by knowledge. Today, knowledge is more than an idea - it is an economic commodity. An organization's knowledge capital is a competitive and comparative advantage. Every organization must now invest in the knowledge assets of all its employees. Learning is the engine that creates and renews knowledge capital. Learning Organizations delves into why learning is an essential business operation; how modern learning is different from industrial-era training; how to discover learning sources and opportunities; how to design a learning environment and learning strategies that optimize the potential of every employee. This is essential reading for business managers, human resource professionals, and academic researchers studying knowledge economies, knowledge, and intellectual capital.

Written by the world's leading academics in the outsourcing field, this books gives the most recent overview of developments in research and practice. It focuses on new practices in innovation, offshoring, onshoring, capabilities, project management and cloud services, offering a distinctive theory of outsourcing.

This new edition focuses on three crucial areas of retail supply chain management: (1) empirical studies of retail supply chain practices, (2) assortment and inventory planning and (3) integrating price optimization into retail supply chain decisions. The book has been fully updated, expanding on the distinguishing features of the original, while offering three new chapters on recent topics which reflect areas of great interest and relevance to the academic and professional communities alike - inventory management in the presence of data inaccuracies, retail workforce management, and fast fashion retail strategies. The innovations, lessons for practice, and new technological solutions for managing retail supply chains are important not just in retailing, but offer crucial insights and strategies for the ultimate effective management of supply chains in other industries as well. The retail industry has emerged as a fascinating choice for researchers in the field of supply chain management. It presents a vast array of stimulating challenges that have long provided the context of much of the research in the area of operations research and inventory management. However, in recent years, advances in computing capabilities and information technologies, hyper-competition in the retail industry, emergence of multiple retail formats and distribution channels, an ever increasing trend towards a globally dispersed retail network, and a better understanding of the importance of collaboration in the extended supply chain have led to a surge in academic research on topics in retail supply chain management. Many supply chain innovations (e.g., vendor managed inventory) were first conceived and successfully validated in this industry, and have since been adopted in others. Conversely, many retailers have been quick to adopt cutting edge practices that first originated in other industries. Retail Supply Chain Management: Quantitative Models and Empirical Studies, 2nd Ed. is an attempt to summarize the state of the art in this research, as well as offer a perspective on what new applications may lie ahead.

Advanced Topics in Information Resources Management features the most current research findings in all aspects of information resources management. From successfully implementing technology change to understanding the human factors in IT utilization, this important volume addresses many of the managerial and organizational applications to and implications of information technology in organizations. Volume three will prove to be instrumental in the improvement and development of the theory and practice of information resources management while educating organizations on how they can benefit from and improve their information resources and all the tools utilized to gather, process, disseminate, and manage this valuable resource. *Note: This book is part of a new series entitled "Advanced Topics in "Information Resources Management." This book is Volume Three within this series (Vol. III, 2004).

1. 1 Motivation and Scope of Research Container terminals in seaports constitute interfaces between sea and land tra- port of goods in global transport chains. These logistics facilities face an increasing demandof service capacity, as is re ected by a tremendousgrowthin the worldwide container transshipments per year. For example, the top 20 terminals in the world showed an average relative increase of 14% with respect to the number of handled container units from 2006 to 2007, see Port of Hamburg Marketing (2008). In spite of this development, competition is high among container terminals within the same region. A terminal's customers, rst and foremost the vessel op- ators, expect a high level of service quality where reliability is one of the most importantdimensions, seeWiegmansetal. (2001). Regardingtheserviceofavessel, reliability means to realize all transshipment operations within its projected service time interval. The reliability of terminal operations impacts the reliability of v- sels in meeting their liner schedules. According to Notteboom (2006) unexpected waiting times of vessels before berthing and unexpected low transshipment prod- tivity at terminals are responsible for about 86% of liner schedule disturbances, see Fig. 1. 1. Currently, many terminal operators counteract this situation by extending their transshipment capacities. They build new terminals or enlarge existing ter- nals and purchase new or upgrade existing equipment. Ilmer (2005) provides an overview of current projects for building terminal capacity in northern Europe.

This book presents a systematic literature review of 156 published papers on business model innovation (BMI). The aim is to identify and integrate the different theoretical perspectives, analytical levels, and empirical contexts in order to deepen understanding of this complex phenomenon. The authors conduct an inductive thematic analysis based on an informal ontological classification that identifies 56 key themes. Within each theme, discussion focuses on thematic patterns, potential inconsistencies and debates, and future directions and opportunities for research. The book makes a number of significant contributions to the field. First, it offers a deeper understanding of the evolution of research on BMI through an ontological map that identifies the key thematic areas in the literature. Second, a multilevel model is developed that clarifies the concept of BMI by identifying its drivers, contingencies, and outcomes. Third, the authors identify clear and specific directions for further research and offer suggestions on research design, creating an informative road map for the future. The book will be of value both to scholars and researchers and to practitioners.

This book covers the elements involved in achieving sustainability in textiles and clothing sector. The chapters covered in three volumes of this series title cover all the distinctive areas earmarked for achieving sustainable development in textiles and clothing industry. This third volume highlights the areas pertaining to the regulatory aspects and sustainability standards applicable to textiles and clothing supply chain. There are various standards earmarked for measuring the environmental impacts and sustainability of textile products. There are also plenty of certification schemes available along with the index systems applicable to textile sector. Brands and manufactures are also venturing into new developments to achieve sustainable development in textile sector. This third volume addresses all these important aspects.

With this book, distinguished and notable contributors wish to honor Professor Charles S. Tapiero s scientific achievements. Although it covers only a few of the directions Professor Tapiero has taken in his work, it presents important modern developments in theory and in diverse applications, as studied by his colleagues and followers, further advancing the topics Tapiero has been investigating. The book is divided into three parts featuring original contributions covering the following areas: general modeling and analysis; applications to marketing, economy and finance; and applications to operations and manufacturing.

Professor Tapiero is among the most active researchers in control theory; in the late sixties, he started to enthusiastically promote optimal control theory along with differential games, successfully applying it to diverse problems ranging from classical operations research models to finance, risk and insurance, marketing, transportation and operations management, conflict management and game theory, engineering, regional and urban sciences, environmental economics, and organizational behavior. Over the years, Professor Tapiero has produced over 300 papers and communications and 14 books, which have had a major impact on modern theoretical and applied research. Notable among his numerous pioneering scientific contributions are the use of graph theory in the behavioral sciences, the modeling of advertising as a random walk, the resolution of stochastic zero-sum differential games, the modeling of quality control as a stochastic competitive game, and the development of impulsive control methods in management. Charles Tapiero s creativity applies both in formulating original issues, modeling complex phenomena and solving complex mathematical problems."

In the last ten years IT has brought fundamental changes to the way the world works. Not only has it increased the speed of operations and communications, but it has also undermined basic assumptions of traditional business models and increased the number of variables. Today, the survival of major corporations is challenged by a world-wide marketplace, international operations, outsourcing, global communities, a changing workforce, security threats, business continuity, web visibility, and customer expectations. Enterprises must constantly adapt or they will be unable to compete.

Fred Cummins, an EDS Fellow, presents IT as a key enabler of the agile enterprise. He demonstrates how the convergence of key technologies-including SOA, BPM and emerging enterprise and data models-can be harnessed to transform the enterprise. Cummins mines his 25 years experience to provide IT leaders, as well as enterprise architects and management consultants, with the critical information, skills, and insights they need to partner with management and redesign the enterprise for continuous change. No other book puts IT at the center of this transformation, nor integrates these technologies for this purpose.
Shows how to integrate and deploy critical technologies to foster agilityDetails how to design an enterprise architecture that takes full advantage of SOA, BPM, business rules, enterprise information management, business models, and governanceOutlines IT's critical mission in providing an integration infrastructure and key services, while optimizing technology adoption throughout the enterpriseIllustrates concepts with examples and cases from large and small commercial enterprisesShows how to create systems that recognize and respond to the need for changeIdentifies the unique security issues that arise with SOA and shows how to deploy a framework of technologies and processes that address them

This book examines recent developments in semantic systems that can respond to situations and environments and events. The contributors to this book cover how to design, implement and utilize disruptive technologies. The editor discusses the two fundamental sets of disruptive technologies: the development of semantic technologies including description logics, ontologies and agent frameworks; and the development of semantic information rendering and graphical forms of displays of high-density time-sensitive data to improve situational awareness. Beyond practical illustrations of emerging technologies, the editor proposes to utilize an incremental development method called knowledge scaffolding -a proven educational psychology technique for learning a subject matter thoroughly. The goal of this book is to help readers learn about managing information resources, from the ground up and reinforcing the learning as they read on.

Collaborative Search and Communities of Interest: Trends in Knowledge Sharing and Assessment provides a comprehensive collection of knowledge from experts within the Information and Knowledge Management field. Outlining various concepts from an application and technical stand point and providing insight on the various dimensions (sociological, psychological, technical, etc.) of social Internet collaboration. This book provides solutions to the detection of interest communities, as well as the study of how tools and knowledge sharing impact the environment where they are used.

This book deals with transportation processes denoted as the Real-time Distribution of Perishable Goods (RDOPG). The book presents three contributions that are made to the field of transportation. First, a model considering the minimization of customer inconvenience is formulated. Second, a pro-active real-time control approach is proposed. Stochastic knowledge is generated from past request information by a new forecasting approach and is used in the pro-active approach to guide vehicles to request-likely areas before real requests arrive there. Various computational results are presented to show that in many cases the pro-active approach is able to achieve significantly improved results. Moreover, a measure for determining the structural quality of request data sets is also proposed. The third contribution of this book is a method that is presented for considering driver inconvenience aspects which arise from vehicle en-route diversion activities. Specifically, this method makes it possible to restrict the number of performed vehicle en-route diversion activities.