Business Commons^™

Organizational Assessment: Pathway To Improvement For Teen Challenge Of The Rocky Mountains, Kenneth G. Summers

Regis University Student Publications (comprehensive collection)

This professional project examines the growing focus on organizational evaluation and the use of assessment tools that contribute to organizational development and capacity-building. An extensive literature review addresses the background, framework and various approaches to organizational assessment. Three assessment tools reviewed in this project provided the basis for an organizational assessment of Teen Challenge of The Rocky Mountains. These tools along with interviews and an examination of records and organizational documents resulted in a wide spectrum of recommendations. The core recommendations address the need for sufficient and sustainable assets, deep and broad leadership, and a commitment to learning and self-reflection.

Perceived Service Quality, Emphasizing Empathy Of Service Providers And Retention Of Customers In A Commercial Bank In Bangkok, Thailand, Chaiyaset Promsri

Graduate Student Dissertations, Theses, Capstones, and Portfolios

Using emotional intelligence of service providers in the service industry has increasingly been considered as a strategy to satisfy and retain customers (Lynn, 2004). However, the research in this area is scant. This study is the fist to examine and explore the relationship between service quality emphasizing empathy as emotional intelligence competence and customer retention in a commercial bank in Bangkok, Thailand.

The specific purposes of this explanatory quantitative study were (a) to describe banking customers of the specific commercial bank headquarters in terms of socio-demographic characteristics, their perceptions of service quality of service providers, and customer retention (behavioral intentions …

An Empirical Investigation To Detect The Presence Of Confirmation Bias In The Decision-Making Strategies Used By Litigants In Tax Court Memorandum Cases, Mary M. Anderson

Doctoral Dissertations

Normative decision theory describes the judgment and decision-making process as a cost/benefit analysis based upon maximum utility. One assumption of the theory is full rationality for choices made throughout the process. Due to bounded rationality, however, mental shortcuts become necessary. Use of these shortcuts does not necessarily diminish the quality of the decision. However, a suboptimal use of a heuristic results in a biased decision.

Kahneman and Tversky (1979) identify three basic heuristics: availability, representativeness, and anchoring and adjusting. One suboptimal use of the anchoring and adjusting heuristic, confirmation bias, is the unconscious search for and evaluation of information that …

Individual, Managerial, And Organizational Antecedents And A Performance-Based Consequence Of Salesperson Organizational Citizenship Behavior, Barbara Janet Allison

Doctoral Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to extend the nomological network of the construct organizational citizenship behavior within a sales setting.

Statistical analyzes indicated that, contrary to the results hypothesized, trait competitiveness was significantly and positively related to organizational citizenship behavior and two of its dimensions. However, the relationships among trait competitiveness and the global measure of organizational citizenship behavior and the dimensions of namely helping behavior and civic virtue were found to be significant and positive.

No significant relationships were found between outcome-based control systems and organizational citizenship behavior and its dimensions. One significant relationship was observed between activity …

Three Essays On International Transmission Mechanism, Volatility And Spillovers On American Depositary Receipt Returns, Priti Verma

Theses and Dissertations - UTB/UTPA

This dissertation is a collection of three inter-related essays that examine spillovers from interest rates, exchange rates, regional markets, and the U.S. market to the American Depositary Receipt (ADR) returns. The ADRs investigated in this study are from Brazil, Chile, Mexico (Latin America), U.K., Germany, France, Italy (Europe), and Japan, Hong Kong, and Taiwan (Asia).

Essay 1 investigates the price and volatility spillovers as well as the asymmetric impact of positive and negative innovations from interest and exchange rates to ADR returns. Unlike previous studies which use bivariate statistics, the multivariate extension of Nelson's (1991) Exponential Generalized Autoregressive Conditional Heteroscedasticity …

The Impact Of Cultural And Religious Values On Television And Newspaper Advertising Content And Appeal: A Cross-Cultural Study Of The United States And The Arab World, Morris A. Kalliny

Theses and Dissertations - UTB/UTPA

Standardization versus adaptation of advertising has been a subject of great controversy that has been debated for more than 50 years. Scholars have pointed out the increasing demand for more cross-cultural research on advertising content that can contribute to the standardization versus adaptation debate. Scholars have also pointed out that although the Arab world offers great opportunities for multinational corporations, the Arab world has been severely neglected in academic research. To comply with this demand, this study investigates the similarities and differences of the manifestation of cultural and religious values in the U.S. and the Arab world (Egypt, Lebanon, Kuwait, …

Overreaction, Seasonality And Relationship Among Middle East And North Africa National Stock Markets, Yaser A. Al-Kulaib

Theses and Dissertations in Business Administration

This dissertation examines overreaction, seasonality, and relationship among Middle East and North Africa (MENA) stock markets. The dissertation is organized in five chapters. The first chapter is introduction to the dissertation and its importance. The second chapter will discuss the MENA capital market developments in the last few years, examine the human and economic development for countries in MENA, and try to find similarities and differences between them. Then the discussion will shift to an overview of the GCC, Levant, and NA regions. Finally, there will be a discussion about economic reform and development in MENA capital markets.

Then, the …

Valuation Effects Of Earnings Restatements Due To Accounting Irregularities, Tan Xu

Theses and Dissertations in Business Administration

This dissertation studies three financial topics using earnings restatement data. In the first topic, we discriminate between the market efficiency hypothesis and the underreaction hypothesis by examining their predictions on the stock performance of restating firms in the post-announcement period. Three approaches are used, namely, the cumulative abnormal return (CAR), buy-and-hold abnormal return (BHAR), and calendar time portfolio approaches. Consistent with the market efficiency hypothesis, we do not find significant abnormal performance in the post-restatement period. In the second topic, we test the extrapolation model (LSV, 1994) by examining the relationship between stock price reaction to earnings restatement and the …

The Effects Of Local And Global Risk Factors On Industry Stock Returns: Across Country Analysis, Mahdy Farag Elhossiny

Theses and Dissertations in Business Administration

This dissertation studies the local and global sources of risk and industries stock returns across national equity markets. We examine several local and global economic risk factors and ask whether and to what extent these risk factors can explain the variation in the industries' stock returns of five countries, namely Canada, Germany, Japan, the U.K., and the U.S. Specifically, the main objective of this dissertation is to find answers for three main questions: First, whether and to what extent do returns on local industries respond to changes in local macroeconomic risk factors? Second, whether and to what extent do returns …

Essays On Currency Risk Management, Nehad Elsawaf

Theses and Dissertations in Business Administration

In recent years a growing number of corporations have committed considerable resources to risk management, indicating the potential for risk management to protect and increase firm value. One can argue that most prior attempts to directly link the value of the firm to its hedging strategies are rather scant. Moreover, several questions with regards to firms' risk management activities remain unanswered. This study consists of two essays dealing with a series of questions regarding corporate risk management in modern U.S. multinational corporations.

In the first essay we first, test the valuation effects of currency hedging policies of firms around extraordinary …

Microeconomics Of Brand Loyalty: Learning, Switching, And Uncertainty, Ronia Ahmed Moustafa Hawash

Archived Theses and Dissertations

In a world of competition, loyalty to a particular brand has a significant role in the behaviour of economic agents and the outcome of markets. The objective of this thesis is to examine the microeconomics of brand loyalty from three dimensions: consumer learning by using markets with switching costs, and uncertainty in product quality. The various methodologies used are based on extensions, modeling, and integrative analysis of some works in the literature, most notably those of Klemperer, Pepall, Thisse, Gabszewicz, Schwartz and Wilde, and Tirole. Brand loyalty arising from the above mentioned perspectives is tackled via three models. The first …

Athletic Training And Sports Psychology: A Survey Of Texas High School Athletic Trainers, Sheridan Melson

Graduate Theses

As a result of their role in the athletes’ recovery, athletic trainers should have an understanding of the many aspects involved in the psychological effect of an injury, and how to assist an athlete in their psychological recovery. This includes the components of injury, factors affecting recovery, psychosocial intervention strategies, counseling, and referral. The purpose of this study was to survey licensed athletic trainers in Texas 5 A high schools relating to psychological issues and psychological techniques used in treating and rehabilitating injured athletes. 180 surveys were returned from 128 (51%) out of 250 Texas 5A high schools. Athletic trainers …

Creating Health And Abundance With Complementary Currencies, Victoria Temple

Regis University Student Publications (comprehensive collection)

This paper examines the ways in which the use of complementary currencies can help solve the current crisis in American health care and create abundance in the lives of those people who have been marginalized by both the prevailing health care and economic systems. It explores the positive effects that the use of these social currencies can have on the programs and financial stability of nonprofit health care organizations, as well as on the communities in which they operate. This paper looks at several implementations of complementary currencies in health care organizations, particularly those based on the Time Dollars model. …

The Factors Influencing The College Choice Of The Leaving Certificate Cohort, Patrick O Sullivan

Theses

This thesis examines the factors that influence the college choice and decision making behaviour adopted by Leaving Certificate Students choosing third level colleges in tertiary education. It attempts to understand the decision making process and associated influences that affect students when considering a third level college. The position adopted for this study is that of a consumer behaviour perspective.

Whether or not the potential students operate a systematic process, logically thinking throughout each step, is worthy of research. Secondary research confirms the many variables influencing the decision-making process, particularly in the USA and UK. However, in-depth knowledge regarding the criteria …

Comparing F-16 Maintenance Scheduling Philosophies, Konstantinos Iakovidis

Theses and Dissertations

In the F-16 fighter community it is believed that the flying schedule can make or break a wing's maintenance effort. Nevertheless, there is no published scientific support behind many commonly used maintenance scheduling philosophies. The problem is that a generally accepted overall scheduling philosophy to improve the long term health of the fleet does not exist. The purpose of this research is tri-fold: to identify the most important scheduling philosophies, to identify the most meaningful metrics that capture the long term health of the fleet and maintenance effectiveness, and to compare the various philosophies using the performance measures to help …

Effects Of Career Plateauing On Turnover: A Test Of A Model, Christine Y. Rilovick

Theses and Dissertations

The structure of most organizations dictates that only 1% of the employees will retire before they reach a career plateau. It is estimated that the number of people perceiving they are career plateaued will only increase in the future since more unusually well-qualified candidates will be competing for a diminishing number of positions. Given that an estimated 80% of the work conducted in organizations is performed by employees who are career plateaued, it would be beneficial to better understand if these plateaued individuals are likely to remain with the organization despite being plateaued. Therefore adding career plateauing to an existing …

Privatization Slow-Down: Government Reluctance Or Economic Failure?, Sara Alam El-Din

Archived Theses and Dissertations

This research is trying to disclose the reasons behind the slow down of the privatization program in Egypt. It does so by assessing the government's policy with regard to privatization by reference to secondary material and two case studies: the banking and the maritime sectors. These two case studies were carefully chosen in order to highlight particular issues related to the slow down of the process of privatization and the government's policies. The banking sector, for example, is one of the sectors that the government seems reluctant to privatize and only last January did the government announce the willingness to …

International Development Donors And Non-Governmental Organizations: "An Exploratory Pilot Study For The Relationship Dynamics Within The Egyptian Development Context", Dalia Salah El-Noury

Archived Theses and Dissertations

This thesis attempts to explore the relationship, both real and perceived, between international development donors and NGOs within the Egyptian development context, and examines how the relation affects development work. The interaction with governmental organizations, and how these influence the relationship is also reflected in this study. The research traces the evolution of development theories and foreign aid prior to examining foreign aid in the local Egyptian context and the NGOs working environment.

This research fieldwork was conducted through semi structured interviews and a formal questionnaire, though only a part of the sample answered the questionnaire, on two foreign donors …

The Effects Of Digital Audio On Social Presence, Motivation And Perceived Learning In Asynchronous Learning Networks, Eunhee Kim

Dissertations

This study explores the possibilities of applying digital audio to the ALN environment, so that students can speak and listen rather than type and read. Two sets of 1x2 field experiments (text vs. digital audio) were conducted with two formats of digital audio -recorded voice messages and narrated Microsoft PowerPoint presentation - used in several NJIT courses conducted via ALN. The perceptions of communication media were measured from two different user perspectives: active use when the subjects created their assignments using prescribed communication media (audio or text) and passive use when the subjects viewed/listened to other students' work.

The perceptions …

Collaborative Examinations In Asyncronous Learning Networks : Field Experiments On Collaborative Learning Through Online Assessments, Jia Shen

Dissertations

With the proliferation of computer networks and the emergence of virtual teams, learning and knowledge sharing in the online environment has become an increasingly important topic. Applying constructivism and collaborative learning theories to assessment, the collaborative online exam is designed featuring students' active participation in various phases of the exam process through small group activities online. A participatory online exam process is designed featuring similar procedures except that students' involvement in each phase of the exam is individual. The collaborative online exam and the participatory online exam are investigated regarding student exam study strategies, group process, exam outcomes, faculty satisfaction, …

Improving Document Representation By Accumulating Relevance Feedback : The Relevance Feedback Accumulation (Rfa) Algorithm, Razvan Stefan Bot

Dissertations

Document representation (indexing) techniques are dominated by variants of the term-frequency analysis approach, based on the assumption that the more occurrences a term has throughout a document the more important the term is in that document. Inherent drawbacks associated with this approach include: poor index quality, high document representation size and the word mismatch problem. To tackle these drawbacks, a document representation improvement method called the Relevance Feedback Accumulation (RFA) algorithm is presented. The algorithm provides a mechanism to continuously accumulate relevance assessments over time and across users. It also provides a document representation modification function, or document representation learning …

Sharing The Big Apple : A Survey Study Of People, Place And Locatability, Samer Nadim Karam

Theses

Over the past half century social trends and new technologies have weakened local social ties and thus, the fabric of civil society itself. Mobile location-aware community systems offer one path to redress these problems by enhancing community cohesion and the formation of social capital by helping people to meet each other and coordinate their actions. However, little is known about the general population's desire and attitude towards these systems.

The design space described by the People-to-People-to-Geographical-Places Framework (P3-Framework), was used to guide a survey study of the impact of 'place' on people's social information needs and their willingness to share …

Mtv: Sounds Of A Generation, Amanda Evens

Honors Capstones

Capstone submitted as a graduation requirement for the BSU Honors Program.

Leadership Orientation And Effectiveness Of Chief Information Officers In Higher Education, Kenneth Janz

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

With the complex dynamics of higher education and the ever changing nature of information technology, Chief Information Officers (CIO) are finding it difficult to effectively lead the effort to integrate technology into the academic and administrative culture of higher education institutions. This in part is caused by the multiple perceptions brought to the institution by its various stakeholders. One of the more useful tools for viewing organizations and studying leadership was developed by Bolman and Deal. Bolman and Deal (1997) have categorized organizational perspectives or leadership orientations into four frames. These include the structural, human resource, political, and symbolic frames. …

A Case Study On Implementation Of Quality Function Deployment Into The Design Process Of A Small Job Shop, Benjamin A. Thomson

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The majority of research involving Quality Function Deployment (QFD) was focused on large consumer based companies and not small job shop business-to-business companies. This case study involved the implementation of QFD into the design process at Reynolds & Co., a small job shop in Terre Haute, IN. The specific objectives of the research were to find the QFD concepts that apply to the improvement of Reynolds & Co.'s (small job shop) design process. The next objective was to reduce the average design time associated with Reynolds & Co.'s design process. The final objective of this case study was to reduce …

Job Satisfaction Among United States Air Force Security Forces Personnel Post-1997 Career Field Merger, James Harrison Popphan

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Research was conducted to determine factors contributing to job satisfaction among US Air Force Security Forces personnel. Previous research conducted prior to major structural changes within the career field in 1997 and increased operations tempo due to the Global War on Terror was of questionable current pertinence. Job satisfaction has been shown to directly affect retention and performance. Retention is extremely important within the career field due to a personnel shortage of 8,000 troops. The current research closely followed the research design used by Michael Reiner to assess job satisfaction in the career field in 1997, and compares current findings …

An Integrated Conflict Management System For The Private Sector Workplace, Jessica Kettle

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

This thesis begins with an examination inside the private sector workplace and the manner in which the corporate environment currently manages conflict. Upon defining the methods that seem to be best practices, this thesis will analyze what is valuable and what changes should be implemented for a more effective system. The model that is projected serves as a preliminary proposal of the content of an integrative conflict management system. It does not discuss in detail the cost / benefit analysis of a current structure versus what the costs the new system would assume. Also, its purpose is not to yet …

A Quantitative And Qualitative Analysis Of The Use Of Sex In Advertising In American And British Women’S Magazines, Kathleen Ruddy

Renée Crown University Honors Thesis Projects - All

Sex and decency in advertising is an international issue, and different nations allow different degrees of sexually explicit material (Boddewyn, 1991). This study compares the use of sex in advertisements in American and British editions of Cosmopolitan, Elle, Glamour, and Marie Claire. The degree of sexual content in the advertisements was analyzed using measures of nudity, sexual behavior, sexually attractive models, sexual referents, and sexual embeds. The variables of nudity and sexual behavior were examined in a content analysis, and the variables of sexual attractiveness, sexual referents, and sexual embeds were examined in a qualitative analysis. Analysis of variance between …

Product Placement On Television: An Effective Means Of Breaking Through The Clutter?, Alyssa Gold

Renée Crown University Honors Thesis Projects - All

Over the last few years product placement has become an important tool for advertisers trying to break through the clutter. This thesis investigates whether product placement on television is effective in reaching the college market.

Currently we live in a society in which people have learned to block out the hundreds of advertisements they are inundated with everyday. Product placement attempts to solve this problem by integrating products into various forms of entertainment, in which people can’t avoid the advertisement.

The main problem with the practice is that there is no standard industry method of measuring the value of a …

Uncontrolled Earnings Management-Financial Enhancement Or Downfall?, Kevin A. Costello

Renée Crown University Honors Thesis Projects - All

Since the turn of the century it has become undeniably apparent that many corporations, regardless of their size, have resorted to falsifying financial records in an attempt to mask the true financial health of the company. The reasons for such actions vary from attempts to shore up investor confidence to ensuring perks for corporate executives. These scandalous acts are not a characteristic of a certain type of business. They have occurred across a wide array of businesses including, but not limited to, power and energy, insurance, and telecommunications.

The most common form of record falsification comes in the form of …