Business Commons^™

The Possibilities Are Limitless: A Case Study Of The Best Practices Of User Experience For Apple Inc., Chloe Richardson

Experience Industry Management

In recent years, society has followed the development of user experience practices in technology companies. User experiences contribute to emotional connections between the company and the consumer, memorable experiences associated with the brand, and the design of products. The purpose of this study was to examine the best practices of user experience for Apple Inc. The research for this study was conducted using a best practice case study guide developed by the researcher that examined the user experience Apple provides. The results of this study indicate there are numerous ways Apple creates user experiences. Apple was recognized as a leading …

Managing The Performing Arts Center: Best Practices For University-Based Performing Arts Centers, Lori Cobo

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

University-based performing arts centers are an asset not only for the institutions where they exist, but also the community that it serves. This thesis takes a brief look at the following topics; reporting structure, billing practices, presenting, and student tickets/fees. The University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV) Performing Arts Center has been a part of the university since 1976 and the focal point of this paper. Nineteen other similar institutions were surveyed with results from eleven others used as comparison. University-based performing arts centers can and should be seen as a strong financial partner for the institution.

A Pilot Study On The Retention And Turnover Of Ncaa Division Ii Sports Information Directors, David Albrecht

Leadership Education Capstones

This study reports on sports information directors (SID) at the collegiate level limited to NCAA Division II athletic programs. An online survey was used for all participants, and select respondents completed follow-up interviews. Surveys were intended to determine the impact of work-life balance and overall workload of the SID role. Survey questions sought to find perceptions of SIDs by athletic administrators, including the athletic director (AD), and if their role provided opportunities for career advancement within collegiate athletic administration. The results of the study showed that institution/department culture, family, and professional growth factored heavily on retention. Adversely, turnover was linked …

How Does Choosing Fitness Labeled Food Affect Consumer’S Intention To Forgo Exercise, Mei Han

Theses and Dissertations

As one of the most widely used marketing techniques, the role and effects of food labels have received significant attention from researchers. Different labels have very different influences and implications. This dissertation focuses on a unique persuasive language label: fitness label. This dissertation starts with a discussion on self-regulation mechanisms and research on goals, and their implications on how choosing fitness labeled food affects subsequent intention to forgo exercise.

This dissertation finds that the existence of response conflict in food choice, as well as the magnitude of the response conflict affect consumer’s reaction mechanisms, which in turn affect consumer’s exercise …

A Darker Shade Of Gray: An Empirical Examination Of Gray Swans In The Supply Chain, Tony N.K. Lynch

Theses and Dissertations

The complexity and interconnectedness of markets creates risks in the global supply chain and may lead to various types of disruptions. Prior research in the supply chain management literature has focused on some aspect of disruption and firm performance. However, the effect of Gray Swans on various aspects of firms’ operational or financial performance is an under-research area. Understanding why managers often underestimate and overlook Gray Swans contributes to ongoing conversation of risk in the global supply chain. Gray Swans are defined as low probability risk events that if/when they occur can have a severe or catastrophic impact on a …

Online Strategies For Small Businesses Affected By Covid-19: A Social Media And Social Commerce Approach, Julianne Itliong

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

The Covid-19 pandemic has altered the way many US citizens work, live, and interact with one another. Many rules and regulations have been put in place by government officials to slow the spread of the virus because of how contagious it is in social settings. Because of these rules and regulations, many small businesses were forced to temporarily close their doors to the public in order to comply with the rules of social distancing and the ban on large gatherings. For some businesses, this shift from physical sales to digital sales has always been a part of their business models, …

Sustainability Balanced Scorecard Architecture And Environmental Investment Decision Making: The Mediating And Moderating Effects Of Knowledge And Risk Indicators, Suaad Jassem

Student Works (2020-2029)

According to a survey by Bain and Company, the majority of the sustainability programs undertaken by global companies fail to meet their objectives. A part of the reason for such a dilemma is possibly due to the dearth of sufficient research on how investment and performance evaluation tools such as sustainability balanced scorecards architecture impact decisions taken by managerial decision-makers. Hence, this doctoral research endeavor extends the literature on sustainability balanced scorecards (SBSC) architecture by examining how they influence decision-makers when they attempt to achieve environmental goals of their organization through evaluation of environmental investment options. An experimental research model …

The Role Of Employee Proactive Behaviors In Influencing Supervisors’ Trust In Employees, Ngai Meng Ho

Dissertations and Theses Collection (Open Access)

In organizations, proactive employees make things happen. They anticipate, initiate, and drive meaningful changes for a better future. Such proactive behaviors can be manifested in different forms. Initiating work improvements and voicing for changes are examples of the different proactive behaviors commonly demonstrated by employees.

Empirical studies have associated proactive behaviors at work with a range of positive workplace outcomes. However, only limited research has examined how proactive behaviors might be related to one particularly important outcome, trust, i.e., whether an employee’s proactive behaviors will influence the supervisor’s trust toward the employee. Accordingly, in this present research, I conducted two …

Nato And The Ifrc: A Comparative Case Study, Abigail Kosiak

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

This research analyzes the North Atlantic Treaty Organization's (NATO) Multinational Telemedicine System (MnTS) Project and works to answer five main questions:

1) What challenges did the NATO MnTS Project face that are directly related to the fact that the project included members from different countries and worked to create a system that operates across national borders?

2) How do these challenges compare to those faced by a non-governmental organization (NGO) like the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC)?

3) What successes has the IFRC had with its current operational model?

4) In what ways could …

Kids These Days: Corporate Social Responsibility And Generational Influence On Consumer Intention, Maya Mathis

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Millennials are known for being a unique generation that places a high value on improving their community. They are also unlike any other generation because they are harder to market to since they are more aware of common marketing strategies used by companies today. Millennials want to improve the community and expect others to do the same. Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is a popular topic and has gained momentum in research over the years; understanding the relationship between CSR and millennials is important due to the generational shifts. Therefore, this study examines the importance of CSR to different generations and …

Speaker Prototyping Design, Andrew Lathe

Undergraduate Honors Theses

Audio design is a pertinent industry in today’s world, with an extremely large market including leaders such as Bose, Harman International, and Sennheiser. This project is designed to explore the processes that are necessary to create a new type of product in this market. The end goal is to have a functioning, high–quality set of speakers to prove various concepts of design and prototyping.

The steps involved in this project go through the entire design process from initial choice of product to a finished prototype. Processes include the selection of outsourced components such as drivers and necessary connectors. The design …

Comparative Views On Age Discrimination Within Appellate Court Decisions: Utilizing Werner And Bolino’S Framework, Daniel Trinkle

Undergraduate Honors Theses

The manner by which courts view performance appraisals in relation to the outcome of case is certainly a topic worthy of discussion. Utilizing the framework used within the work of Werner and Bolino (1997), the following study was able to accomplish two main goals: (1) update the information of Werner and Bolino (1997) by evaluating modern cases, and (2) to evaluate new data regarding age discrimination utilizing the same framework as Werner and Bolino (1997). Utilizing chi-square analysis to test all of the hypotheses, it was demonstrated that there was statistical significance in performance appraisals with the presence of a …

Examination Of The Attribution Of Blame For Accounting Errors Under The Proposed 2024 Cpa Examination Structure, Laura Jean Kaufmann

Honors Program Theses

To adapt to the changing business environment, the accounting profession has proposed and ratified a significant change in the Certified Public Accountant (CPA) exam and licensing structure. The change is expected to be implemented in January 2024. The new exam will consist of two parts, a ‘core’ exam focusing on foundational elements of accounting, auditing, tax, and technology, and ‘expert’ exams in three sub-discipline areas: tax, technology, and assurance. Candidates are allowed to take one of the expert exams. Upon passing the core and one of the expert exams, a candidate is eligible to become a CPA, and eligible to …

A Novel Method To Commercialize Medical Devices Initially Developed At California Polytechnic State University San Luis Obispo, Christina Grigorian

Master's Theses

California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo is a university that encourages students to approach learning hands-on. As such, there is cutting-edge technology being developed by students in all departments on campus. Being that the university possesses an outstanding biomedical engineering department, there are groundbreaking medical devices that students are creating at Cal Poly SLO. These are devices that can better the lives of individuals suffering from ailments or fulfill needs in the medical industry. Subsequently, it is vital that these devices make it out of campus laboratories and into the hands of consumers. In order to move a product …

Docs_On_Blocks – A Defense In Depth Strategy For E-Healthcare, Saad Mohammed

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

With the increase in the data breaches and cyber hacks, organizations have come to realize that cyber security alone would not help as the attacks are becoming more sophisticated and complex than ever. E-Healthcare industry has shown a promising improvement in terms of security over the past, but the threat remains. Thus, the E-Healthcare industries are aiming towards a Defense in Depth Strategy approach.

The project here describes how a Defense in Depth Strategy for E-Healthcare system can provide an environment for better security of the data and peer-to-peer interaction with stakeholders. The legacy systems have at some point failed …

More Than Just A Tie: The Role Of Content And Context In Firm Alliance Networks, Holly Loncarich

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Researchers often rely on social network theory to understand both the structural antecedents and outcomes of strategic alliances. However, many alliance studies only emphasize the existence of a tie and rarely theorize further about their efficacy. This failure to consider the role and variation of content in alliance ties (e.g. resource commitment, trust, information exchange) may hinder the application of various network theories at the interorganizational level. Further, interorganizational network studies have largely neglected the role of the external environment, or context, in interfirm collaboration and often fail to consider how the external environment shapes firm network actions and outcomes. …

Economic Analysis Of Backgrounding Calves, Jayden Gunnell

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

The purpose of this thesis is to allow beef producers a better insight into the costs and benefits associated with carrying over fall calves to yearling weight and selling them the following spring. Producers are usually seen as risk-averse when it comes to selling their livestock. (Feuz, Fausti 1995) Cattle producers face several decisions during the year when it comes to calf input costs and the premium to be received for fall calves, with the final decision coming at the last minute, when making the decision to keep or sell calves. Said calves might be sold in the fall or …

The Potential Of Ivf, Jae Anderson

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

As in-vitro fertilization (IVF) has become more available and more affordable, it has become one of the top breeding technologies in the beef and dairy industry. Intermountain Embryonics of Twin Falls, Idaho has made it an available technology for producers in Idaho and parts of surrounding states. Intermountain Embryonics has struggled to show potential clients the financial potential IVF has to offer. This study shows the revenues, expenses, and risks involved in IVF. This study looks at the comparison of breeding natural service with a bull, artificial insemination, and in-vitro fertilization. The comparison shows that natural service comes with the …

Retaining Ownership Of Calves- Obendorf Farms, Gabrielle Bishop

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

Retaining Ownership is when a producer chooses to obtain ownership of their calves until they have reached a finished weight and are ready to be sent to slaughter. Cow-calf producers generally sell their calves at weaning time or within a few months of weaning. Every operation as their own way of doing things and sometimes change is hard to come by. Obendorf Farms wanted to evaluate, at what point in time would it be best to sell their 2020 calf crop? Four different scenarios were analyzed. The first scenario involved no change from previous years which, is selling their calves …

Testing Investment Strategies For Superior Predictive Ability, Jack K. Baldwin

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

When different models are tested on one data sample and repeatedly altered in order to be found significant, the results are likely spurious. This is data-snooping – an ever-growing problem in the finance industry likely due to fierce competition and developments in data processing capacity. In academia, although recognized as a deplorable practice, data-snooping is likewise pervasive perhaps as a result of poor incentive structures at both the university and publisher levels. I manifest the problem of data-snooping through multiple academic and industry examples and then summarize Halbert White and Peter Hansen’s offered solutions, White’s Reality Check and Hansen’s Test …

Critical Followership: Faculty And Leader Relations Impact On Leadership Turnover At A California Community College, Erik William Christianson

Doctoral Dissertations

Community colleges are experiencing higher levels of executive leader (chancellor, vice chancellor, and dean) turnover than four-year universities. Many different factors account for the high turnover and low retention: the need for dynamic leaders, the leadership succession process, the lack of professional training and development, as well as stakeholders and outside forces. The relationship dynamic between faculty and leaders as a contributing factor has not been previously studied. The purpose of this mixed methods study was to examine leaders’ misperceptions of faculty’s needs. Surveys and interviews were utilized to cross-examine data and perceptions from faculty and leaders. Through the lens …

Employee Engagement As A Shared Responsibility: A Study Of Engagement Strategies Employed By Legal Assistants, Thomas A. Steele

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to identify strategies used by legal assistants to engage, stay engaged, and reengage, when appropriate, in their work, in particular when common organizational efforts fall short or do not exist. Constructivism and job demands-resources (JD-R) were the primary frameworks for understanding and analyzing the phenomenon of developing engagement strategies.

Qualitative data were drawn through semi-structured interviews with 16 legal assistants. The interviews were recorded and transcribed. Trustworthiness and validity were enhanced by using multiple respondents and allowing each to review the transcripts for accuracy, fairness, and clarity. The transcriptions were then analyzed for themes. …

Employees Support As A Determinant Of Merger Success: Exploring The Organizational Context And Its Interventions During Post-Merger Integration, Abdulla Humaid Saif Aljarwan Alshamsi

Dissertations

Mergers is an extreme form of organizational change, which usually has an adverse impact on the merging organizations employees’ wellbeing. In literature it was argued that organizational integration after merger, which is referred to as Post-Merger Integration (PMI) is usually resisted by employees, which is considered as a major contributor to the high failure rates of mergers. It was further argued that employees’ resistance toward integration is attributed to stress, uncertainty, ambiguity and lack of clarity on the changes that merger and integration initiate. Therefore, PMI activities were assumed to psychologically traumatize employees and jeopardize their sense of belonging, attachment, …

An Economic Analysis Of Using Retired Vessels To Create Artificial Reefs In Costa Rica, Josué González

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

ABSTRACT

The Republic of Costa Rica is a Central American country with only 0.03% of the world’s landmass, but 5% of the world’s biodiversity, making it a leading ecotourism destination. Ecotourism is one of the main sources of revenue for the country, but the degradation of coastal reefs has resulted in a significant loss of financial income for developing areas. As a result, many of these areas are searching for methods to revert the degradation of coral reefs.

Artificial reefs play an important ecological role in marine ecosystems due to their complexity and size. They help in the development of …

Disrupting Education: High School Principals’ Efforts To Lead Disruptive Innovation And The Influence Of Isomorphic Mechanisms, Katie Cummings Catania

Educational Leadership & Workforce Development Theses & Dissertations

Students today require skills and dispositions different from those of the past. Despite ongoing efforts to initiate change in schools through reform efforts, little has changed within educational institutions. Current reform efforts do, however, create conditions for principals to lead disruptive innovation within their schools. Research is limited on innovation implementation in education and the various ways isomorphic forces may hinder or contribute to the design and adoption of disruptive innovations. The purpose of this study was to examine how high school principals lead disruptive innovation. Additionally, this study sought to understand how the mechanisms of isomorphism influence the adoption …

An Investigation On The Effectiveness Of A Problem Structuring Method In A Group Decision-Making Process, Ying Thaviphoke

Engineering Management & Systems Engineering Theses & Dissertations

There is no shortage of methods to address messy problems. A messy problem is a system of problems with multiple stakeholders who may hold different views of what is feasible or desirable. Decision-makers in a messy problem are prone to committing an error – especially the Type III error. One of the ways to mitigate the chance of committing the error in a messy problem is to reach a group consensus. Problem Structuring Methods (PSM) are the collections of participatory modeling methods that aim to tackle a messy problem. Despite the positive reports, literature indicates some challenges and criticisms of …

Noise Traders, Fintech, And Equity Market Volatility, William T. Collins

Honors College Theses

The literature provides ample evidence that the last decades have seen an increase in noise trader activities, in part driven by the development of fintech. This paper strives to educate readers on the term noise traders as well as fintech. Moreover, it argues that the evolvement of noise trader activities accompanied with fintech has increased equity market volatility over time. The study finds that equity market volatility has indeed increased over time and is not driven by periods of crisis. Furthermore, this increase in volatility is more severe for small stocks versus large stocks, which is in line with the …

Phenomenological Study On Lived Experiences Of Assigned Expatriates, John Alan Hennings

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The academic community has researched expatriate work for over five decades, but the problems identified in the 1960s persist. This study focuses on the assigned expatriate, defined as an individual on overseas assignment for his or her employer. It uses qualitative semi-structured interviews and a phenomenological approach to answer questions research has largely ignored: What are the distinctive characteristics of life and work as an assigned expatriate? How do assigned expatriates perceive their expatriate experience? The scope includes selection, preparation, life and work abroad, and repatriation, investigating the experiences of expatriates on assignments for the U.S. military, civil government, and …

Shedding Light On Sales Relationships: What Effect Does The Sunshine Act Have On Salesperson Ethical Behavior And Customer Response?, Rebecca Burcham

PhD in Business Administration Dissertations

The financial relationship between physicians and pharmaceutical salespeople has long been scrutinized for the potential ethical issues that may arise from the influence that financial incentives have on physician prescribing behavior. Until recently, details of these financial incentives were only available to physicians and salespeople. In order to shed light on this relationship, Congress passed legislation, known as the Sunshine Act, with the intent to make transparent financial information. By shedding light on this information, the legislation’s intent is to mitigate the potential ethical issues that such a financial relationship poses. While previous studies examined the impact that the Sunshine …

The Challenges And Opportunities Created By A Global Pandemic's Effects On Consumer Shopping Behavior Within The Fashion Retail Industry, Kate O'Connor

Undergraduate Honors Theses

The fashion retail industry has already been undergoing an extensive transformation since the introduction of e-commerce in the late 1990s. However, changes in consumer shopping behavior caused by the COVID-19 pandemic have fundamentally altered the industry in a matter of months. Because the COVID-19 pandemic is relatively recent, there is a lack of literature regarding the challenges and opportunities for fashion retailers in light of these changes in consumer behavior. This project will illuminate the challenges and opportunities created by the COVID-19 pandemic for the different distribution modes in the fashion retail industry: brick and mortar stores, e-commerce, and omnichannel …