These proceedings gather a selection of peer-reviewed papers presented at the 6th Thailand Rail Academic Symposium (TRAS 2019), held at Mahidol University, Bangkok, Thailand on 21-22 November 2019. The focus is on presenting recent research on issues related to rail and metro, with a specific focus on metro performance and system design undertaken in Thailand, South East Asia and beyond. Topics presented are divided into three themes and cover topics towards sustainable transportation related to: Metro operations and system performance; Rail engineering and vehicles; Rail education and training.

This book introduces readers to advanced data science techniques for signal mining in connection with agriculture. It shows how to apply heuristic modeling to improve farm-level efficiency, and how to use sensors and data intelligence to provide closed-loop feedback, while also providing recommendation techniques that yield actionable insights. The book also proposes certain macroeconomic pricing models, which data-mine macroeconomic signals and the influence of global economic trends on small-farm sustainability to provide actionable insights to farmers, helping them avoid financial disasters due to recurrent economic crises. The book is intended to equip current and future software engineering teams and operations research experts with the skills and tools they need in order to fully utilize advanced data science, artificial intelligence, heuristics, and economic models to develop software capabilities that help to achieve sustained food security for future generations.

This book discusses the aspects of global competition in terms of the strategies that could be applied to improve the competitive position of businesses and consolidate gains particularly in the Thai market. The book is composed of 10 chapters focusing on topics related to business strategy, such as competition, marketing, innovation, utilizing information, technology, human resources, strategic alliances, customer service, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of strategies, and corporate social responsibility. This book will serve as a useful guide for those already in business in Thailand as well as for businesses that hope to expand their existing operations in Thailand to the global market.

This book discusses common management and work practices in professional service organizations. Alvehus opens important discussions on what it means to work, manage, and be managed in such professional organizations, casting light on classic conflicts. He takes everyday work as a starting point and adopts a critical view that focuses on challenges and struggles in both public and private settings. He offers new perspectives and key insights for the future of professionalism. Providing a comprehensive overview of the field, this book is an important guide for understanding how professionalism is maintained in today's organizations. It will be essential reading for students and scholars of management and leadership.

This book provides a critical review of the impact of international academics on teaching practices in higher education. As borders and boundaries become increasingly blurred and virtual citizenship starts to impact on ways of working, being able to teach seamlessly across cultures and political divides will be critical to ensuring a thriving higher education sector. This book captures the impact of academic mobility on teaching practices which have been informed by academics' original cultures being modified to align with those of a host culture. The book comprises three thematic sections which take the reader through the various stages of the internationalisation of higher education teaching practice. It starts with how teaching identities are constructed and influenced by culture and geopolitical factors and concludes with an exploration into the emergence of the global teaching practitioner who is able to work seamlessly across borders and boundaries. The core sections include: i) the geopolitics of teaching identities, ii) a sense of belonging and the lived experience of the academic nomad and iii) academic transition, from migration to integration. Providing practical tools for improving both students' learning experiences and academics' classroom practices this volume will be of use to researchers, students, and practitioners from the social sciences (specially business, management, and education) as well as foreign language tutors and TEFL practitioners. Human resource professionals, recruiters, and trainers responsible for recruiting, training, and developing international higher education staff will also find this book to be of interest.

When the pressure is on to resolve an elusive software or hardware glitch, what's needed is a cool head courtesy of a set of rules guaranteed to work on any system, in any circumstance. Written in a frank but engaging style, this book provides simple, foolproof principles guaranteed to help find any bug quickly. Recognized tech expert and author David Agans changes the way you think about debugging, making those pesky problems suddenly much easier to find and fix. Agans identifies nine simple, practical rules that are applicable to any software application or hardware system, which can help detect any bug, no matter how tricky or obscure. Illustrating the rules with real-life bug-detection war stories, Debugging shows you how to: Understand the system: how perceiving the ""roadmap"" can hasten your journey Quit thinking and look: when hands-on investigation can't be avoided Isolate critical factors: why changing one element at a time can be an essential tool Keep an audit trail: how keeping a record of the debugging process can win the day Whether the system or program you're working on has been designed wrong, built wrong, or used wrong, Debugging helps you think correctly about bugs, so the problems virtually reveal themselves.

Designed with flexibility and readers' needs in mind, this purpose driven book offers new UX practitioners succinct and complete intructions on how to conduct user research and rapidly design interfaces and products in the classroom or the office. With 16 challenges to learn from, this comprehensive guide outlines the process of a User Experience project cycle from assembling a team to researching user needs to creating and veryifying a prototype. Practice developing a prototype in as little as a week or build your skills in two-, four-, eight-, or sixteen-week stretches. Gain insight into individual motivations, connections, and interactions; learn the three guiding principles of the design system; and discover how to shape a user's experience to achieve goals and improve overall immediate experience, satisfaction, and well-being. Written for professionals looking to learn or expand their skills in user experience design and students studying technical communication, information technology, web and product design, business, or engingeering alike, this accessible book provides a foundational knowledge of this diverse and evolving field. A companion website will include examples of contemporary UX projects, material to illustrate key techniques, and other resources for students and instructors. Access the material at uxonthego.com.

This open access book provides an overview of the building blocks necessary for managing, steering and guiding the establishment of a research infrastructure (RI). It offers valuable insights into RI investment, access and management at the academic, grants management, agency and policy level, and serves as a useful guide for the research community, students, and those in the private sector wishing to understand the approaches and opportunities involved in the establishment, maintenance and management of research infrastructure platforms. Presenting a holistic view of RI investment and granting cycles from a South African perspective, the book's target audience includes those working in science diplomacy, policymaking and science grants councils (especially in Africa) as well as funders and donors.

This volume represents the proceedings of the Second International Conference on Innovation through Knowledge Transfer, InnovationKT'2010, organised jointly by KES International and the Institute of Knowledge Transfer, and taking place in Coventry, UK on 7&8 December 2010. Featuring world-class invited speakers and contributions from a range of backgrounds and countries, the conference provided an excellent opportunity to disseminate, share and discuss the impact of university-business interaction through knowledge transfer in all its forms.

There were two main motivations in initiating the Innovation through Knowledge Transfer series. The first aim was to provide the chance for publication on a subject where few opportunities exist already. The second motivation was to foster the development of a community from the diverse range of individuals practicing knowledge transfer. It is becoming clear that the delegates of the conference are drawn from a diverse community of practice. InnovationKT'2010 has succeeded in bringing together contributions from both the academic and practitioner sections of the knowledge transfer community.

The programme contained seven invited keynote talks, 40 oral presentations grouped into eight sessions, and one interactive workshop. The proceedings contain 29 chapters drawn from this material. There were 91 registered delegates drawn from 10 countries of the world. The field of knowledge transfer is still immature, but these proceedings demonstrate that InnovationKT conference is making a significant contribution to its academic development.

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This open access book shows the breadth and various facets of e-Science, while also illustrating their shared core. Changes in scientific work are driven by the shift to grid-based worlds, the use of information and communication systems, and the existential infrastructure, which includes global collaboration. In this context, the book addresses emerging issues such as open access, collaboration and virtual communities and highlights the diverse range of developments associated with e-Science. As such, it will be of interest to researchers and scholars in the fields of information technology and knowledge management.

Using site-specific optimization approaches in international manufacturing networks is increasingly proving insufficient. To solve this problem, several holistic and integrated alternatives have been developed to reflect a global perspective. This book presents advances in the St. Gallen Global Manufacturing Network Model and its application in numerous industry-, benchmarking- and research projects. The contents combine data-driven solutions with qualitative management frameworks for the strategic optimization of international manufacturing networks. In the first part, the book addresses the foundation of manufacturing network management and further describes the St. Gallen Operational Excellence approaches to manage plant performance. On this basis, the authors show how plant- and network-level performance can be enhanced via key improvement domains (e.g., strategy, configuration, coordination, performance management, digitalization). In turn, the second part demonstrates the application of the constructs in manufacturing companies from various industries. By combining research and practice, the book offers unique perspectives on the management of global production striving toward higher performance on manufacturing site and network level.

This is the first book that deals with technological innovation in Japanese animation industry from a management perspective. In reviewing prior research and explaining the history of the technology, the author raises the difficulty of dealing with new technologies. In particular, the focus is on systems that combine analog technology (drawing by hand) and digital technology (3D computer graphics or 3DCG) to create a product. This combined technology is referred to as "hybrid technology" in this book, and the development and management of "hybrid products" using this technology are studied. The study was conducted in two stages. The first stage was to determine the engineers' (animators') perception of hybrid technology. The results showed that in terms of potential, the hybrid technology of hand-drawn animation combined with 3DCG was rated more highly by engineers than hand-drawn alone. However, in terms of the assessment at that time, hybrid technology was rated higher than 3DCG alone but lower than hand-drawn. Therefore, it was assumed that hybrid technology, while useful, would pose challenges with respect to systematic implementation. The second stage was the development management of hybrid products. The results showed that the "adaptive engineer," who openly accepts other new technologies in the early stages of their emergence contributed to the integration of new and existing technologies.

Continuous improvements in digitized practices have created opportunities for businesses to develop more streamlined processes. This not only leads to higher success in day-to-day production, but it increases the overall success of businesses. Always-On Enterprise Information Systems for Modern Organizations is a critical scholarly resource that examines how EIS implementations support business processes and facilitate this in today's e-business environment. Featuring coverage on a broad range of topics such as customer relations management, supply chain management, and business intelligence, this book is geared towards professionals, researchers, managers, consultants, and university students interested in emerging developments for business process management.

The yard block of a container terminal is the central point of synchronisation for asynchronous container flows between deep-sea vessels and transport to the hinterland. The structure of the block stipulates that containers are stacked on top of each other with only the topmost container directly accessible by a yard crane. This book describes a holistic and integrative approach to container handling in yard blocks to optimise productivity by minimising re-handling operations. The results provide insights for academic scholars as well as for experts from practical terminal planning and operations. The approach presented is two-fold: first, a theoretical foundation of the interdependencies in decision-making is established using mathematical programming. Secondly, operations involving uncertain container arrival information are examined on the basis of a simulation with a rigorous experimental design and statistical evaluation. In this context, the book develops container-handling strategies and analyses the impact of a system for vehicle arrival management - the "Terminal Appointment System". The findings presented in this book are the result of a close cooperation with experts at the port of Hamburg and build on previous research.

This book introduces readers to the main traffic flow modelling approaches and discusses their features and applications. It provides a comprehensive and cutting-edge review of traffic flow models, from their roots in the 1930s to the latest developments in the field. In addition, it presents problem sets that offer readers further insights into the models and hands-on experience with simulation approaches. The simulations used in the exercises can be built upon for readers' own research or other applications. The models discussed in this book are applied to describe, predict and control traffic flows on roads with the aid of rapid and accurate estimations of current and future states. The book shows how these models are developed, what their chief characteristics are, and how they can be effectively employed.

This contributed volume focuses on the management and governance of international business networks (IBN). Specifically, the chapters refer to theoretical, conceptual, empirical, and case study papers from all areas in economics and management of IBN. These include cooperatives, franchising, retail chains, strategic alliances, public-private partnerships and new network forms in the digital economy. This book is ideal for researchers and strategists who are keen to improve their understanding of the latest developments in the field.

This book offers a political analysis and sociological critique of the UK government's response to the novel coronavirus outbreak, interpreting the inadequacies of government policy with regard to COVID-19 as the results of neoliberal ideology, the protection of corporate interests, Brexit nationalism, and the peculiarities of a British model of capitalism based on international trade and labour market precarity. Arguing that institutionalised corporate-capitalist control of state and science generates new and growing public health risks, and that consumer-driven individualism has eroded community life and the protections this might offer against pandemics, it contends that the UK government's catastrophic response to the COVID-19 pandemic was the result of peculiarly British socioeconomic and political phenomena. The Pandemic in Britain will appeal to scholars of sociology, philosophy and politics with interests in the COVID-19 pandemic as well as neoliberal ideology and its manifestation in political life.

This book offers a political analysis and sociological critique of the UK government's response to the novel coronavirus outbreak, interpreting the inadequacies of government policy with regard to COVID-19 as the results of neoliberal ideology, the protection of corporate interests, Brexit nationalism, and the peculiarities of a British model of capitalism based on international trade and labour market precarity. Arguing that institutionalised corporate-capitalist control of state and science generates new and growing public health risks, and that consumer-driven individualism has eroded community life and the protections this might offer against pandemics, it contends that the UK government's catastrophic response to the COVID-19 pandemic was the result of peculiarly British socioeconomic and political phenomena. The Pandemic in Britain will appeal to scholars of sociology, philosophy and politics with interests in the COVID-19 pandemic as well as neoliberal ideology and its manifestation in political life.

In the aftermath of the Global Financial Crisis, corporate collapses, accounting scandals and concerns around competition and auditor choice, the European Commission (EC) promoted the preparation of various reports on audit policy to support a harmonisation process of European auditing regulation. Consequently, the European Union Audit Regulation and Directive was implemented from 2016. This book provides a timely picture of the audit sector and how it responds to regulatory and technological challenges. It analyses the impact of EU reforms on audit practices by comparing the U.K. and Italy, which, representing two very different regulatory and cultural contexts, will offer insight into how the efforts at standardising audit regulation may lead to very different organisational firm responses within Europe. It addresses issues relating to public policy work and the concerns faced by the market for audit and assurance services, in promoting audit quality, better communication about the role of the auditor, capital market stability and confidence, and auditor independence. Moreover, it highlights what the future of auditing might look like in the EU particularly after the U.K. has left, and how meeting public expectations will continue to be a struggle for the accounting profession given the many problems ahead. The book encourages a deeper awareness of the challenges faced by those that monitor and certify the financial statements of the world's largest public companies and contributes to the general understanding of this controversial industry. It will serve as a useful guide to the recent EU audit reforms, not only for academics, and research students but also to regulators, policymakers, standard setters, industry professionals, and business executives worldwide.

Until now, change leadership has lacked a theoretical basis for use by leaders as a starting point when implementing change processes. This tactical text addresses this. Think of the tightrope walker; they must constantly change the position of their arms and legs to remain 'stable' on the tightrope. Stability depends on change, and change depends on the existence of a stable core. If everything is in a state of flux, the result will be chaos. If everything is stable, the result will be rigid. Rigid systems will collapse if there is the slightest change. Meanwhile, chaotic systems use all their energy to maintain stability. This book is split into two parts. In the first part, we consider our theoretical basis. In the second part, we describe the leadership tools we have developed for use in change processes. We have designed a leader's toolbox for planned change processes. This toolbox consists of 18 leadership tools. These can be used by any leader to ensure the effective communication and implementation of planned change processes. Perfect for undergraduate and postgraduate students who wish to expand their knowledge of change leadership focusing on both the theory and the tools needed to implement changes.

This book provides state-of-the-art descriptions of smart service innovations in the industry, supported by novel scientific approaches. It gathers findings and insights presented at the fourth Smart Services Summit, held in Zurich, Switzerland, in October 2021, which primarily focused on how smart services have enabled companies to adapt during and to the COVID-19 pandemic. The book includes examples of remote and collaborative working that actively involve customers in service processes, requiring a change in mindset for more traditional firms. Moreover, it explores how services can be delivered faster and more affordable with the aid of new technologies and in collaboration with the customers, leading to new value propositions and business models and thus an evolution of smart services. Given its scope, the book offers an essential guide for practitioners and advanced students alike.

Your Complete Guide to Digital Transformation A Field Guide to Digital Transformation is the definitive book on digital transformation. Top-selling IT author Thomas Erl and long-time practitioner Roger Stoffers combine to provide comprehensive, yet easy-to-understand coverage of essential digital transformation concepts, practices, and technologies in the format of a plain-English tutorial written for any IT professionals, students, or decision-makers. With more than 160 diagrams, this guide provides a highly visual exploration of what digital transformation is, how it works, and the techniques and technologies required to successfully build modern-day digital transformation solutions. Learn from the experts and: Discover what digital transformation is, why it emerged and when to apply it Identify the significant business benefits that successful digital transformations can deliver and how to turn your organization into a "disruptive" force Prepare for and overcome the common challenges associated with digital transformation initiatives Understand the data-driven nature of digital transformation solutions and how they use and continually accumulate data intelligence Understand how digital transformation solutions can utilize AI technology for intelligent automated decision-making Gain insight into customer-centricity and how its practices are applied as part of digital transformations Explore key digital transformation automation technologies, such as Robotic Process Automation (RPA), Internet of Things (IoT), Blockchain. and Cloud Computing Explore key digital transformation data science technologies, such as Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning, and Big Data Analysis and Analytics The book concludes with a uniquely detailed and highly visual real-world business scenario that provides step-by-step insights into how a digital transformation solution works, how it utilizes data intelligence to improve customer relationship building, and how it collects new data intelligence in support of enhancing future business capabilities.

This book is in honor of Yasuhiko Takahara, a first-class researcher who has been active for some 50 years at the global level in systems research. Researchers and practitioners from Japan and other countries who have been influenced by Takahara have come together from far and wide to contribute their major research masterpieces in the field of systems research in the broadest sense. While the roots of Takahara's systems research are in general systems theory and systems control theory, he developed his research and teaching in diverse directions such as management information science, engineering, social simulation, and systems thinking. As a result, many of the researchers and practitioners he supervised or influenced have established their own positions and are now active around the world in a wide range of systems research. Volume II is a collection of their masterpieces or representative works in the fields of systems management theory and practice.