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1 – 10 of 56Xin Zou and Zhuang Rong
In repetitive projects, repetition offers more possibilities for activity scheduling at the sub-activity level. However, existing resource-constrained repetitive scheduling…
Abstract
Purpose
In repetitive projects, repetition offers more possibilities for activity scheduling at the sub-activity level. However, existing resource-constrained repetitive scheduling problem (RCRSP) models assume that there is only one sequence in performing the sub-activities of each activity, resulting in an inefficient resource allocation. This paper proposes a novel repetitive scheduling model for solving RCRSP with soft logic.
Design/methodology/approach
In this paper, a constraint programming model is developed to solve the RCRSP using soft logic, aiming at the possible relationship between parallel execution, orderly execution or partial parallel and partial orderly execution of different sub activities of the same activity in repetitive projects. The proposed model integrated crew assignment strategies and allowed continuous or fragmented execution.
Findings
When solving RCRSP, it is necessary to take soft logic into account. If managers only consider the fixed logic between sub-activities, they are likely to develop a delayed schedule. The practicality and effectiveness of the model were verified by a housing project based on eight different scenarios. The results showed that the constraint programming model outperformed its equivalent mathematical model in terms of solving speed and solution quality.
Originality/value
Available studies assume a fixed logic between sub-activities of the same activity in repetitive projects. However, there is no fixed construction sequence between sub-activities for some projects, e.g. hotel renovation projects. Therefore, this paper considers the soft logic relationship between sub-activities and investigates how to make the objective optimal without violating the resource availability constraint.
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Yu Zhuang, Shuili Yang, Supat Chupradit, Muhammad Atif Nawaz, Rong Xiong and Cihat Koksal
First, the current study contributes to the available debate by reinvestigating the impact of economic growth (EG), foreign direct investment (FDI), technological innovation (TI…
Abstract
Purpose
First, the current study contributes to the available debate by reinvestigating the impact of economic growth (EG), foreign direct investment (FDI), technological innovation (TI) and inflation (INF) on trade openness (TO). Second, the study tests the moderating role of institutional quality (INS) on the relationship among EG, FDI, TI and TO. Third, the study tests how TO contributes to EG efficiency.
Design/methodology/approach
The study collects the data from the group of twenty (G20) economies for the period of 1998–2020. The study applied the Kao (1999), Pedroni (2001), and Palamuleni (2017) cointegration tests to test the long-run association between variables. The study applied fully modified least square (FMOLS) and dynamic least square (DOLS) models to test the hypotheses.
Findings
Findings of the study showed the positive impact of EG, FDI and TI on TO, which becomes more positive in the presence of institutional quality. Results indicate that INS plays an enhancing role in the relationship between FDI and TO, EG and TO and TI and TO. The study showed a negative relationship between INF and TO, and institutional quality plays a buffering role in the relationship between INF and TO.
Originality/value
First, the study reinvestigates the empirical association among EG, FDI, TI, INF and TO. Second, the study tests the moderating role of INS on the relationship between the proposed variables by developing an index of all the indicators of INS. Third, the study tests the contributions of TO in economic efficiency (ECE). The contributions of the present study will increase the available literature of TO and help the policy makers of G20 nations to suggest important policies to promote TO and ECE.
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This study examines how informal business networks achieve marketing goals in socially uncertain contexts. Drawing from multiple historical sources, Shangbangs, a type of business…
Abstract
Purpose
This study examines how informal business networks achieve marketing goals in socially uncertain contexts. Drawing from multiple historical sources, Shangbangs, a type of business network that thrived in pre-1949 China, are analyzed.
Design/methodology/approach
The Critical Historical Research Method (CHRM) undergirds a study of Shangbangs’ historicity (i.e. their socio-historically embedded multiplicity, including organizational forms, activities and connotations.
Findings
As informal regional, professional, project-based, special-product-based or mixed marketing networks, Shangbangs relied on “flexible specialization” and coupled multiple business needs to market goods and services, business organizations, specific social values and, when necessary, to debrand business rivals.
Research limitations/implications
This analysis extends theories about marketing networks by probing their subtypes, diverse marketing activities, multipronged channels and relationship building with social entities (including underground societies, business associations and guilds) in response to pre-1949 China’s market uncertainties. Substantiating an alternative approach to “flexible specialization” and marketing innovations within the pre-1949 Chinese economy shows how a parallel theoretical framework can complement western-based marketing theories.
Originality/value
This first comprehensive analysis of Shangbangs, an innovative historical Chinese marketing network outside the conventional market-corporate dichotomy, can inform theory building for marketing strategy-making and management conditioned by social contexts.
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Abstract
Purpose
The aim of the study was to investigate the differential effects of interpersonal relationships across functions on product and service innovation, and to examine the moderating role of market competition.
Design/methodology/approach
This study was based on a survey of senior and middle managers from 149 pharmaceutical firms in China.
Findings
Interpersonal relationships between employees across functions (IR-E) have a stronger impact on product innovation than do interpersonal relationships between managers across functions (IR-M), but IR-M have a stronger impact on service innovation. Market competition strengthens the effects of IR-M on both product and service innovation, but it attenuates the effect of IR-E on service innovation.
Originality/value
Although the effects of interpersonal relationships across functions are crucial to cross-functional interactions, these effects have received little attention in the literature. By identifying the potential “backfiring” effect of dual-level interpersonal relationships, this study contributes to knowledge of cross-functional relationships. It also deepens understanding of the relationship between cross-functional relationships and organizational innovation, especially in the service setting.
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Xutang Zhang, Gaoliang Peng, Xin Hou and Ting Zhuang
Fixture design is a complicated task requiring both intensive knowledge and experience. This paper aims to present a computer-aided fixture design (CAFD) system framework based on…
Abstract
Purpose
Fixture design is a complicated task requiring both intensive knowledge and experience. This paper aims to present a computer-aided fixture design (CAFD) system framework based on design reuse technology.
Design/methodology/approach
Fixture design domain ontology is constructed by analyzing fixture design document corpus. A design reuse engine is proposed to realize fixture design knowledge retrieval and fixture model retrieval based on ontology and find fixture design cases similar to fixture design problem, and then use evolutionary methods to modify the retrieved model to meet the design requirements and then generate a new fixture.
Findings
The paper finds that the proposed framework is an efficient tool to improve efficiency of fixture design.
Practical implications
Fixture design existing experience and cases can be used efficiently reused and to advance new fixture design processes.
Originality/value
This paper presents a CAFD system framework capable of carrying out fixture design through full using of the existing fixture design resource and experienced knowledge.
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Youjie Chen, Fei Gao, Rong Fu, Linlin Su, Xiaoming Han and Junying Yang
This study aims to clarify the relationship of friction material type and brake disc temperature through braking experiment.
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to clarify the relationship of friction material type and brake disc temperature through braking experiment.
Design/methodology/approach
The braking performances of resin materials (RM), semimetallic materials (SM) and copper-based powder metallurgy materials (PM) friction blocks mating with forged steel brake disc were examined based on TM-I-type reduced-scale inertial braking dynamometer. The brake disc surface temperature was recorded by infrared thermal camera during braking.
Findings
Experimental results indicate that the thermal wear resistance of three friction materials differs with mental content, resulting in the deviation of pad-disc system contact state during braking, thus forming different temperature distribution on the brake disc surface. The peak temperature on the disc face of RM (190°C) is 36.6% and 45.4% lower than that of PM (300°C) and SM (348°C) at 160 km/h. The maximum radial temperature deviation of PM (35°C) is approximately three times than that of RM (12°C) and 40% higher than that of SM (25°C) at 50 km/h, whereas the maximum temperature deviation of SM (97°C) is six times than that of RM (16°C) and 31% higher than that of PM (74°C) at 160 km/h.
Originality/value
The effect of friction material type on the disc surface temperature distribution is revealed, which provides a meaningful reference for the design of brake friction pairs and choice of brake pad materials.
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With the analysis of the causes of corruption, this study aims to investigate specific anti-corruption measures that can be implemented to reform the political system and the…
Abstract
Purpose
With the analysis of the causes of corruption, this study aims to investigate specific anti-corruption measures that can be implemented to reform the political system and the social climate of China.
Design/methodology/approach
This study examines 97 severe corruption cases of high-ranking officials in China, which occurred between 2012 and 2015. As this insinuates that both institutional and social corruption are major problems in China, the analysis delves into multiple facts of corruption, including different types, four primary underlying causes, and suggestions regarding the implementation of three significant governmental shifts that focus on investigation, prevention tactics and legal regulations.
Findings
China’s corruption is not only individual-based but also it has developed into institutional corruption and social corruption. Besides human nature and instinct, the causes of corruption can be organised into four categories, namely, social customs, social transitions, institutional designs and institutional operations. For the removed high-ranking officials, the formation of interest chains was an important underlying cause behind their corruption.
Originality/value
This study makes a significant contribution to the literature because this study provides a well-rounded approach to a complex issue by highlighting the significance of democracy and the rule of law as ways to regulate human behaviour to combat future corruption.
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Linhao Ouyang, Zijian Zhang, Xiaoling Huang and Shi Xie
The purpose of this study is to restore the spatial distribution of overseas remittance businesses in Shantou during the 1940s. It explores various socioeconomic factors that…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to restore the spatial distribution of overseas remittance businesses in Shantou during the 1940s. It explores various socioeconomic factors that influenced the concentration of local remittance business investment in real estate. By reconstructing the spatial distribution of remittance business activities in Shantou, this study hopes to lay a foundation for further analysis of the business strategies of Chaoshan merchants.
Design/methodology/approach
This research draws on information from the published Swatow Guide, archival sources and cadastral maps to identify the location of remittance enterprises and the native place and overseas networks of property owners.
Finding
This study reveals that the spatial distribution of the remittance enterprises was determined by the native place origins of local property owners, and that the inflow of overseas Chinese capital contributed to real estate development in Shantou.
Research limitations/implications
Despite the limited access to Chinese official archives, this paper manages to identify several building blocks and neighbors in Shantou for spatial analysis.
Practical implications
This study is the first attempt to use the geographical information system (GIS) method in Chinese urban history research and hopes to establish a larger historical database of Shantou as a sample for comparison.
Originality/value
This investigation advances the spatial study of urban history and overseas Chinese remittances in the maritime society of South China.
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The purpose of this research was to explore the stickiness of players' motivation in a virtual community and to explore the important factors for gamers.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this research was to explore the stickiness of players' motivation in a virtual community and to explore the important factors for gamers.
Design/methodology/approach
In this research, motivation was the independent variable; the virtual community was the mediator; and stickiness was the dependent variable. An online questionnaire survey was conducted, with users of augmented reality (AR) as the research objects. Statistical analysis was carried out using SPSS and AMOS software to verify the research model and research hypotheses, to understand the relation between player motivation and stickiness and to determine whether there were any changes in the virtual community.
Findings
The authors found that the relation between players' motivation in AR-based games and the virtual community had a significant positive impact. Ingress had a significant positive impact on the virtual community and stickiness, and Pokémon had a significant positive impact too. The virtual community of the Ingress game played a completely mediating role in motivation and stickiness, but the virtual community in Pokémon did not have a mediating effect.
Originality/value
The novel approach adopted in this study enabled us to determine the causal relation between player motivation, the virtual community and stickiness, on the basis of the theoretical framework formulated, and the latter was used to construct a path analysis model diagram. The correlation between motivation and the virtual community, between the virtual community and stickiness, and the causal relation between all three was verified. The study results and conclusions may help companies understand how to use virtual communities in AR games to improve stickiness and motivate gamers to continue playing.
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