A Business Ethics Experiential Learning Module: the Maryland Business School Experience

In this paper we describe the principal activities of the initial implementation in May of 1996 of one of the Experiential Learning Modules (ELMs) entitled Business Ethics (UMCP 1995, p. 7) that is part of the full-time MBA program at the College of Business and Management (Maryland Business School) of the University of Maryland at College Park (UMCP). Additionally, we briefly consider the location of this Business Ethics ELM in the curriculum of the Maryland Business School's full-time MBA program. We also outline how the Business Ethics ELM was developed. Further, we provide a discussion and a short conclusion.     

Debriefing Experiential Learning Exercises in Ethics Education

The major conclusion of this paper is that to obtain optimum pay-off from using experiential learning exercises in teaching business ethics, faculty must pay close attention to debriefing. The paper presents an approach based on a conceptual model for systematic and analytical debriefing of experiential learning exercises in ethics education. The paper also suggests that faculty must provide structure and ambiguity so that students can personalize the learning – experiencing meaningfulness (i.e., usefulness) in its application – so that learning is r0elevant to the individual.     

The Cultural Convergence of MBA Education Across Australia,Singapore and Malaysia

A commonly held view among international researchers is that markets and cultures are growing closer together. This cultural convergence is believed to result from the homogenising effect of technology transfer. One force which emerges from technology transfer is the convergence of education, in particular management education This study examined the MBA experience as a factor potentially causing cultural convergence. Students in five MBA programs in Australia, Malaysia and Singapore were surveyed on cultural dimensions using Hofstede's (1980) Values Survey Module to determine whether there was cultural convergence between Hofstede's cultural dimensions and the three countries. The results indicated that there was convergence between Hofstede's Uncertainty Avoidance and Power Distance distributions for the three countries.     

E-Business Method: A Cyclical-Model for Internet Commerce Development

ABSTRACT

This paper presents a methodology for designing and deploying electronic enterprises–a step beyond intuitive or rule-based approaches. As a starting point, the paper presents a cyclical-model consisting of three e-business development phases: conceptualization, simulation, and implementation. Since an e-business “idea” rarely springs forth complete and ready to go, realizing the idea–that is, turning it into a commercial product, system, process, or profitable enterprise–requires business development. Business development requires analysis of the potential organizational structures, IT architectures, HR policies and procedures, strategies, market niche, partnership agreements, and so on, until a satisfactory enterprise design is found. Such consideration and experimentation can be done mentally (intuitively), or by drawing on a napkin (informally), or more logically using strategic and marketing analysis, revenue/cost/asset/operational business models, computer simulations, and other quantitative and qualitative management practices and techniques. In any case, only rarely is the result of the first development effort completely satisfactory, perhaps the business system or process will be too difficult to develop, too complex, or too costly to implement, maintain, or sell. So, once again the business idea goes into the cycle of developing, testing, redeveloping, implementing, and re-testing. Succinctly, the methodology advocated in this paper provides a framework for guiding the e-business development process.     

Impacts of Asynchronous Learning Networks on Individual and Group Problem Solving: A Field Experiment

An Asynchronous Learning Network (ALN) is a Computer-Mediated Communication System designed to support "anytime/anywhere" interaction among students and between students and instructors. A field experiment compared groups and individuals solving an ethical case scenario, with and without an ALN, to determine the separate and joint effects of communication medium and teamwork. Dependent variables include quality and length of the reports, and subjective perceptions of learning and satisfaction. The results indicate that that an ALN enhances the quantity and quality of the solutions to an ethical case scenario. The combination of teamwork with ALN-support increases the students' perception of learning. Although the perception of collaborative learning was similar between ALN-supported and unsupported groups, participants in computer-mediated groups reported lower perceptions of discussion quality than participants in manual groups.     

Business Marketing Education: A Distinctive Role in the Undergraduate Curriculum

ABSTRACT

By extending their knowledge of markets beyond the consumer-goods domain, by deepening their understanding of how organizations make buying decisions, by strengthening their grasp of cross-functional processes, and by providing them with decision-making skills in this important area of marketing, the business marketing course makes a special contribution to undergraduates and the undergraduate marketing curriculum. Moreover, the content and focus of the business marketing course are closely tied to important themes that are transforming business practice. This article isolates the distinct contribution of business marketing education and examines important trends that are reshaping this domain. The central knowledge areas that comprise the undergraduate business marketing course are detailed and linked to specific course design strategies that can be pursued to strengthen the skill set of marketing students and respond to the needs of important constituents.     

The Informational Role of Manufacturer Returns Policies: How They Can Help in Learning the Demand

Returns policies are usually thought of as being a way to insure retailers against excess inventory. The work of Pellegrini (1986), Chu (1993), Lin (1993) and Padmanabhan and Png (1997) highlights the fact that there is considerably more to returns policies than just a mechanism for insurance. Our work identifies a heretofore undocumented rationale for returns policy: its role in learning the demand for a new product. The model of manufacturer–retailer interaction assumes that the demand is uncertain but correlated across time periods. Thus, its true nature is revealed over time via the realization of sales. The speed of such learning depends on the size of the inventory at the retail level which in turn can be strategically influenced by the manufacturer through a returns policy. In such environments, we show that a returns policy may be a way for the manufacturer to learn the demand of a new product.     

基于信息空间的组织学习与知识转化

本文针对野中郁次郎提出的SECI知识创造模型的不足,借鉴博依索特的信息空间的概念构建了一个基于信息空间的组织学习模型。通过研究组织学习过程中知识的创造与转化,得出了知识在个人和组织内部以及个人、组织与社会之间的转移规律,从而有效弥补了SECI模型的缺陷,深化了对组织中知识创造的认识。     

中国政府义务教育支出：问题和进一步的改革

本文从理论方面探讨了政府在义务教育融资及生产中的责任，并结合中国政府义务教育支出的现状和问题，提出了进一步改革的原则、具体建议及相关改革措施。     

A Responsibility Ethics for Audit Expert Systems

To effectively pursue ethical action, the business community must recognize that the fundamental form of human association is not the "social contract" into which persons enter as atomic individuals, making partial commitments to each other for the purpose of gaining limited common ends or of satisfying certain laws. The fundamental form of human association is rather the face to face community in which ongoing commitments are the rule and in which aspects of every individual's experience are conditioned by the continuing membership. The following discussion initiates a preliminary phase in the consideration of what constitutes ethical issues associated with the business applications of expert systems. The focus is on knowledge based expert system applications in public accounting, specifically in the audit domain. Prior research on the development and use of expert systems in auditing has focused on a limited set of ethical issues. Niebuhr's theory of the "the responsible self" is used here to broaden the scope of what constitutes an ethical issue and provides a framework for identifying responsible action. Within this framework, an action is responsible if it takes into consideration ongoing relationships among the stakeholder groups affected. Actions prior to the development of the system along with the potential consequences for the system must be considered. The discursive requirements that provide the context and conditions necessary for implementing the proposed theoretical framework are presented and an illustration of how the responsibility ethic can be implemented in the audit expert system domain is developed.     

借鉴台湾经验发展海南休闲农业的探讨

琼台两地同属岛屿型经济,在地理气候、土地面积、农业资源和人文习俗等诸多方面都有相似之处。目前,海南省休闲农业发展还处在起步阶段,而台湾省的休闲农业起步较早,已经步入比较成熟的发展阶段。海南省应借鉴台湾省休闲农业在发展方向与目标、政策与措施、经营与管理等方面的成功经验,通过加强组织领导,切实搞好规划;创新发展机制,规范行业管理;优化发展环境,强化政策扶持;实施人才战略,促进相互合作等一系列措施,大力推进休闲农业快速发展。     

A Learning Framework for Customer Integration: Know-How Acquisition, Dissemination and Utilization

Successful product innovation has increasingly been recognized as an outcome of integrating customers in the new product development process. Despite the attention of this research subject, the comprehension of how to learn from customers is still limited in scope and in depth. This research investigates ‘learning’ in the customer integration context and discusses a conceptual framework from learning theory with customer know-how acquisition, dissemination and utilization as critical steps. The paper reports a comparative case study of new product development projects in a business-to-business context. The findings show empirical support for the developed framework and demonstrate the importance of a differentiated consideration of the three steps. They lead to determinants for successful customer know-how integration in new product development projects.     

Nonprofit Agency Perspectives of Higher Education Service Learning and Volunteerism

ABSTRACT

The majority of studies in the service learning field focus on campus-based impacts of service learning and community service. In order to provide a more balanced understanding of the impacts of service learning, this study examined college student service learning and volunteer activities from the nonprofit agency perspective. Findings from this qualitative study revealed the positive and negative impacts that college student volunteers and service learners have at the agencies where they serve and on the youth they provide service for.     

Developing a Learning Community Approach to Business Ethics Education

In this paper we discuss a project, still in progress, that moves away from a traditional lecture based educational pedagogy. We present a team taught approach to ethics teaching that embraces a progressive philosophy of education and is focused on the development of a discussion based learning community. We describe our primary pedagogical tools of case discussion and the development of student expert role assignments as a locus, and how they relate to the learning community, course content and course objectives. Finally, we provide our preliminary review of outcomes and emerging issues.     

远程教育“三维”学习环境创设的实践与研究

任何学习活动都会发生在特定的环境中,创设有效的学习环境是保证教学及学习活动发生的基础和关键,尤其是对教与学处于准分离状态的现代远程教育而言尤为重要。通过实践,本文对三维学习环境的内涵进行了分析,总结了学习环境设计原则及呈现特征,并对学习环境创设策略进行了实践研究。     

The Effects of Process and Content Facilitation Restrictiveness on GSS-Mediated Collaborative Learning

Group Support Systems (GSS) technology, extensively applied in decision-making contexts, is now seeing increased application in the educational sector. Previous work has suggested that GSS applications can have significant positive effects on both the process and the outcome of collaborative learning. This study extends this work to examine the effects of process (high/low) and content (high/low) facilitation restrictiveness on GSS-supported collaborative learning. Our results indicate that content facilitation restrictiveness has no significant bearing on student learning. Process facilitation restrictiveness, on the other hand, is more influential, with knowledge acquisition by students requiring a low restrictive environment.     

Distributed Visual Language Environments for Cooperation and Learning: Applications and Intelligent Support

An increasing number of collaborative learning environments is based on shared workspace systems using two-dimensional graph-structured visual representations such as argumentation networks and concept maps. We propose an integrated framework that allows for flexibly specifying a wide range of visual languages and plugging in components for operational semantics, adequate feedback and intelligent support. The generic application CardBoard provides card-based user interaction and collaboration by means of different languages in shared workspaces. To enhance modifiability, the interfaces between the distributed heterogeneous system components, particularly between intelligent components and user interfaces, have been standardised.     

Learning in international new ventures: A systematic review

The present paper reports the findings of a systematic review on learning among International New Ventures (INVs). Learning has been studied fairly extensively by scholars in the field of organization theory. Learning is a prerequisite for internationalization, and the behavior of individuals working in INVs seems to indicate a strong predisposition or aptness to learning. In spite of this, research on learning among INVs has been limited and fragmented up to the present time. In seeking to advance the research niche of INV learning, we conducted a systematic review of articles published on learning within INVs. Our contributions are related to: (i) providing a review of current knowledge of learning among INVs; (ii) relating the findings of our review to the organizational learning theory proposed by March (1991); and (iii) a future research agenda.