Showing papers on "Resource management published in 2003"

Boards of Directors and Firm Performance: Integrating Agency and Resource Dependence Perspectives

Abstract: Boards of directors serve two important functions for organizations: monitoring management on behalf of shareholders and providing resources. Agency theorists assert that effective monitoring is a function of a board's incentives, whereas resource dependence theorists contend that the provision of resources is a function of board capital. We combine the two perspectives and argue that board capital affects both board monitoring and the provision of resources and that board incentives moderate these relationships.

Managing Resources: Linking Unique Resources, Management and Wealth Creation in Family Firms

Abstract: The appropriate resources are necessary but insufficient to achieve a competitive advantage. Resources must also be managed effectively. Herein, we develop a resource management process model composed of three components that can lead to a competitive advantage. These components include the resource inventory (evaluating, adding, and shedding), resource bundling, and resource leveraging. We examine resource management in family firms and thus explore the unique characteristics of five resources and attributes of family firms that provide potential advantages over nonfamily firms. The resources are human capital, social capital, patient capital, survivability capital, along with the governance structure attribute.

Managing Resources: Linking Unique Resources, Management, and Wealth Creation in Family Firms

Abstract: The appropriate resources are necessary but insufficient to achieve a competitive advantage. Resources must also be managed effectively. Herein, we develop a resource management process model composed of three components that can lead to a competitive advantage. These components include the resource inventory (evaluating, adding, and shedding), resource bundling, and resource leveraging. We examine resource management in family firms and thus explore the unique characteristics of five resources and attributes of family firms that provide potential advantages over nonfamily firms. The resources are human capital, social capital, patient capital, survivability capital, along with the governance structure attribute.

Social Capital and the Collective Management of Resources

Abstract: The proposition that natural resources need protection from the destructive actions of people is widely accepted. Yet communities have shown in the past and increasingly today that they can collaborate for long-term resource management. The term social capital captures the idea that social bonds and norms are critical for sustainability. Where social capital is high in formalized groups, people have the confidence to invest in collective activities, knowing that others will do so too. Some 0.4 to 0.5 million groups have been established since the early 1990s for watershed, forest, irrigation, pest, wildlife, fishery, and microfinance management. These offer a route to sustainable management and governance of common resources.

[The balanced scorecard. "Tool or toy" in hospitals].

Abstract: The change in hospital funding with diagnosis related groups (DRG), medical advances as well as demographic changes will call for new quantitative and qualitative standards imposed on German hospitals. Increasing costs and competition in the health care sector requires new and innovative strategies for resource management. Today's policy is mainly defined by rationing and intensified workload. The introduction of DRGs will presumably further constrict management perspectives on pure financial aspects. However, to ensure future development, compassionate services and continued existence of hospitals, a balance of seemingly conflicting perspectives, such as finance, customer, process, learning and growth are of utmost importance. Herein doctors and nurses in leading positions should play a key role in changing management practice. For several years the balanced scorecard has been successfully used as a strategic management concept in non-profit organizations, even in the health care sector. This concept complies with the multidimensional purposes of hospitals and focuses on policy deployment. Finally it gives the opportunity to involve all employees in the original development, communication and execution of a balanced scorecard approach.

SLURM: Simple Linux Utility for Resource Management

Abstract: A new cluster resource management system called Simple Linux Utility Resource Management (SLURM) is described in this paper. SLURM, initially developed for large Linux clusters at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), is a simple cluster manager that can scale to thousands of processors. SLURM is designed to be flexible and fault-tolerant and can be ported to other clusters of different size and architecture with minimal effort. We are certain that SLURM will benefit both users and system architects by providing them with a simple, robust, and highly scalable parallel job execution environment for their cluster system.

Strategic human resource practices, top management team social networks, and firm performance: the role of human resource practices in creating organizational competitive advantage

Abstract: In this article, we begin to explore the black box between human resources (HR) practices and firm performance. Specifically, we examine the relationships between a set of network-building HR pract...

Social Learning for Collaborative Natural Resource Management

Abstract: This article contributes to understanding about the potential and limitations of social learning for collaborative natural resource management. Participants in a deliberative planning process involving a state agency and local communities developed common purpose and collaborative relationships, two requisites of comanagement. Eight process characteristics fostered social learning: open communication, diverse participation, unrestrained thinking, constructive conflict, democratic structure, multiple sources of knowledge, extended engagement, and facilitation. Social learning is necessary but not sufficient for collaborative management. Other requisites for comanagement, including capacity, appropriate processes, appropriate structures, and supportive policies, are necessary to sustain joint action.

Sustainable tourism in protected areas : guidelines for planning and management

Abstract: The main purpose of these Guidelines is to assist protected area managers and other stakeholders in the planning and management of protected areas, visitor recreation and the tourism industry, so that tourism can develop in a sustainable fashion, while respecting local conditions and local communities. A key message is the importance of managing resources and visitors today, so that tomorrow’s visitors can also experience quality sites, and the conservation values that these places represent. The Guidelines also have a number of more detailed objectives: � To discuss the role of visitor management, including techniques that control and limit impacts of use, while allowing maximum enjoyment of as many visitors as can be accommodated within the limits set by environmental and social conditions; � To outline approaches to the planning and development of tourism infrastructure and services in protected areas; � To provide guidance on the definition, measurement, management and use of park tourism data; � To outline ways of enhancing the quality of the tourism experience; � To describe positive examples, through a variety of case studies, of how tourism can effectively contribute to the conservation of natural and cultural diversity; and � To give positive examples, again through the use of case studies, of how tourism can contribute to the development of local communities. This is a handbook, not a cookbook. The major questions and issues involved in managing tourism in protected areas are developed for the reader, but the publication does not set out to provide all the detailed answers. Thus a framework is provided to establish principles and guide decisions. There is no “one-size-fits-all” answer to the challenge of tourism in protected areas – indeed an attraction of visiting protected areas is to see how each park manager has developed his or her local situation in a way that projects its uniqueness, while contributing to the common endeavour of conservation. To a large extent, management must be responsive to local conditions. It may appear that protected area managers have a relatively simple job in achieving the task of conservation and visitor use, but in fact it is not easy at all. Managers have the challenging responsibility of balancing the many competing pressures thrust upon them. This challenge grows and becomes more complicated with increasing numbers of visitors, changes in patterns of visitor use, and the emergence of an ever more critical public demanding higher standards in conservation management. The challenge of protected area management, especially that of dealing with the pressures of recreation and tourism, will only be met effectively through building partnerships between all the interested parties. It is hoped that this document, by being available to protected area managers as well as other important stakeholders, such as local communities, tour operators and conservation groups, will help build such partnerships.

Dynamic virtual clusters in a grid site manager

Abstract: This paper presents new mechanisms for dynamic resource management in a cluster manager called Cluster-on-Demand (COD). COD allocates servers from a common pool to multiple virtual clusters (vclusters), with independently configured software environments, name spaces, user access controls, and network storage volumes. We present experiments using the popular Sun GridEngine batch scheduler to demonstrate that dynamic virtual clusters are an enabling abstraction for advanced resource management in computing utilities and grids. In particular, they support dynamic, policy-based cluster sharing between local users and hosted Grid services, resource reservation and adaptive provisioning, scavenging of the idle resources, and dynamic instantiation of Grid services. These goals are achieved in a direct and general way through a new set of fundamental cluster management functions, with minimal impact on the Grid middleware itself.

The Science of Sustainable Development: Local Livelihoods and the Global Environment

Abstract: List of figures List of boxes List of tables Foreword Claude Martin Preface Acknowledgements Part I. Integrating Natural Resource Management: 1. The challenge: alleviating poverty and conserving the environment 2. Dealing with complexity 3. Getting into the system: multiple realities, social learning and adaptive management 4. issues of scale 5. Models, knowledge and negotiation Part II. Realities on the Ground: 6. Institutions for managing natural resources in African savannahs 7. Forest margins in Indonesian Borneo 8. Learning by doing on tropical American hillsides Part III. The Research-Management Continuum: 9. The spread of innovations 10. Measuring the performance of natural resource systems 11. Achieving research-based management Bibliography Index.

Managing Tragedies: Understanding Conflict over Common Pool Resources

Abstract: Conflicts over the management of common pool resources are not simply material. They also depend on the perceptions of the protagonists. Policy to improve management often assumes that problems are self-evident, but in fact careful and transparent consideration of the ways different stakeholders understand management problems is essential to effective dialogue.

Implementing enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems in small and midsize manufacturing firms

Abstract: Enterprise resource planning systems, if implemented successfully, can bestow impressive strategic, operational and information‐related benefits to adopting firms. A failed implementation can often spell financial doom. Currently, most of the information about the failures and successes are based on reports on implementations in large manufacturing and service organizations. But enterprise resource planning vendors are now steadily turning their marketing sights on small and medium‐sized manufacturers. The time is ripe for researchers to gather, analyze and disseminate information that will help these firms to implement their projects successfully. This research adopts a multiple case study approach to investigate the implementation process in small and midsize manufacturing firms in the US. The research focuses on implementation activities that foster successful installations and are developed using information gleaned from our field studies of four projects. Avenues for future research are also suggested.

Human Resource Management in a Business Context

Abstract: The concept of human resource management HRM and the business environment Organizational HRM human resource strategy and planning managing people employee resourcing performance and success developing people managing change the future

SHARP: an architecture for secure resource peering

Abstract: This paper presents Sharp, a framework for secure distributed resource management in an Internet-scale computing infrastructure. The cornerstone of Sharp is a construct to represent cryptographically protected resource claims---promises or rights to control resources for designated time intervals---together with secure mechanisms to subdivide and delegate claims across a network of resource managers. These mechanisms enable flexible resource peering: sites may trade their resources with peering partners or contribute them to a federation according to local policies. A separation of claims into tickets and leases allows coordinated resource management across the system while preserving site autonomy and local control over resources. Sharp also introduces mechanisms for controlled, accountable oversubscription of resource claims as a fundamental tool for dependable, efficient resource management. We present experimental results from a Sharp prototype for PlanetLab, and illustrate its use with a decentralized barter economy for global PlanetLab resources. The results demonstrate the power and practicality of the architecture, and the effectiveness of oversubscription for protecting resource availability in the presence of failures.

Model-based resource provisioning in a web service utility

Abstract: Internet service utilities host multiple server applications on a shared server cluster. A key challenge for these systems is to provision shared resources on demand to meet service quality targets at least cost. This paper presents a new approach to utility resource management focusing on coordinated provisioning of memory and storage resources. Our approach is model-based: it incorporates internal models of service behavior to predict the value of candidate resource allotments under changing load. The model-based approach enables the system to achieve important resource management goals, including differentiated service quality, performance isolation, storage-aware caching, and proactive allocation of surplus resources to meet performance goals. Experimental results with a prototype demonstrate model-based dynamic provisioning under Web workloads with static content.

Human resource management and knowledge management: enhancing knowledge sharing in a pharmaceutical company

Abstract: There is a gap in understanding the implications for human resource management practices of the rising interest in managing knowledge (Scarbrough and Carter, 2000). As a response, this paper takes an organizational learning perspective to reflect more critically upon the problems of managing knowledge. In particular, it highlights employees' unwillingness to share knowledge with others as crucial in determining the contribution human resource practices can make to managing knowledge ( Alvesson and Karreman, 2001; Easterby-Smith et al., 2000; Hayes and Walsham, 2000; Mueller and Dyerson, 1999; Pritchard et al., 2000; Willmott, 2000). Specifically, the paper considers the contribution that human resource management practices can make in mediating a functionally based organizational structure and culture in a global pharmaceutical company.

Diagnostics/prognostics using wireless links

Abstract: A system and method for monitoring operating parameters of a machine (such as a vehicle) and producing diagnostic and/or prognostic results are disclosed. Active, semi-active, or semi-passive sensors are wirelessly linked with an interrogator that selectively interrogates the sensors, such as through transponders in wired communication with the sensors. A data concentrator or processor analyzes data from certain sensors and generates diagnostic/prognostic conclusions, in some cases using additional data selectively requested from and acquired by the sensors. In some embodiments, raw or abstracted data is communicated with a management center that provides troubleshooting information (again, possibly using additional, selectively acquired data), makes resource management decisions (such as preparing parts or labor resources to make a repair), and tracks problems in all or a subset of the machines being managed.

Human Resource Management in Construction Projects: Strategic and Operational Approaches

Abstract: Preface. 1. Introduction: The Challenges of Managing People in Construction. 2. The Development of Modern Organization and Management Theory. 3. Human Resource Management Theory: Strategic Concepts and Operational Implications. 4. Strategic Approaches to Managing Human Resources in the Construction Industry. 5. The Mechanics of Human Resource Management in Construction: Resourcing, Development and Reward. 6. Employee Relations. 7. Employee Participation, Involvement and Empowerment in Construction. 8. Workforce Diversity, Equal Opportunities and Work-life Balance In Construction. 9. Employees' Health, Safety and Welfare. 10. Strategic Human Resource Development. 11. The HRM Implications of Management Thinking, Trends & Fads: Cross-Cutting HRM Themes for the New Millennium. 12. Conclusions: SHRM as a Route to Improved Business Performance.

Knowledge management systems and developing sustainable competitive advantage

Abstract: Recent literature in the strategic management field suggests that firms must learn to re‐bundle internal competencies and resources in order to maintain competitive advantages over time. Utilizing the resource‐based view of the firm and dynamic capabilities perspectives, this paper examines the roles that absorptive and transformative capacity play in organizational innovation, with specific emphasis placed on the role and effectiveness of knowledge management systems as a determinant of innovation practices.

Exploiting Loop-Level Parallelism on Coarse-Grained Reconfigurable Architectures Using Modulo Scheduling

Abstract: Coarse-grained reconfigurable architectures have become increasingly important in recent years. Automatic design or compilation tools are essential to their success. In this paper, we present a modulo scheduling algorithm to exploit loop-level parallelism for coarse-grained reconfigurable architectures. This algorithm is a key part of our dynamically reconfigurable embedded systems compiler (DRESC). It is capable of solving placement, scheduling and routing of operations simultaneously in a modulo-constrained 3D space and uses an abstract architecture representation to model a wide class of coarse-grained architectures. The experimental results show high performance and efficient resource utilization on tested kernels.

Alternatives to Conventional Management: Lessons from Small-Scale Fisheries

Abstract: on long-term research on community-based resource management, and using small-scale fisheries as an example, alternatives to conventional management may be characterized by: a shift in philosophy to embrace uncertainty and complexity; an appreciation of fisheries as social-ecological systems and more broadly as complex adaptive systems; an expansion of scope of management information to include fishers' knowledge; formulation of management objectives that incorporate livelihood issues; and development of participatory management with community-based institutions and cross-scale governance. Such alternative management is adaptive as well as participatory in nature, as it engages the knowledge of resource users, their adaptive learning, and their institutions for self-governance. It is human-oriented but uses an ecosystem approach, effectively linking social systems with natural systems. Such management breaks out of the old tradition of management-as-control. It effectively redefines resource to mean, not commodity, but elements of an ecosystem that supports essential processes as well as human needs. It also redefines management to refer to governance, learning and adaptive management, oriented to maintaining the productive capacity and resilience of the linked social-ecological system.

The Role of Knowledge in Resource Allocation to Exploration versus Exploitation in Technologically Oriented Organizations

Abstract: Decisions regarding research and development (R&D) activities of an organization greatly affect the fiscal and market outcomes of technologically oriented firms. Yet, the resource allocation choices between these two activities are tied strongly to an organization's technology knowledge. Technological knowledge is itself a resource that the firm can manage to achieve strategic and competitive advantage. In this paper, the authors present a system dynamics view of the decomposition of R&D efforts into explorative and exploitive activities and the resultant knowledge-specific and performance outcomes from the decision to focus on one type of activity or another. Four factors are shown to affect the relative value of innovative knowledge to the organization: resource availability, exogenous competition, aging of knowledge bases, and adaptive capacity, a firm's ability to adapt to its environment. A variety of long- and short-term strategic issues are discussed in relation to these forces.