Primary Care Groups: Trade-offs in Managing Budgets and Risk

The NHS reforms introduced on 1 April 1999 were intended to remove competition and promote co-operation in the delivery of health care. This was to be achieved in part by the development of joint working by groups of General Practitioner (GP) practices covering populations of around 100,000-known as Primary Care Groups (PCGs). A key element is the integration of responsibility for managing both the clinical and financial aspects of delivering health care. The authors report on the success of this new joint role, based on findings from a national survey. There are trade-offs in choosing the scale at which to encourage GPs to take on their new roles. Smaller groups will be better able to integrate practices' clinical and financial responsibilities, while larger groups will have less financial risk due to random variation.     

Emotional intelligence,job satisfaction,well‐being and engagement: explaining organisational commitment and turnover intentions in policing

This study examines the effect of emotional intelligence upon the job satisfaction, well‐being and engagement of police officers in explaining their organisational commitment and turnover intentions. Survey responses from 193 police officers in Australia were analysed using partial least squares path modelling. As predicted, emotional intelligence leads to job satisfaction and well‐being, with positive path relationships leading to employee engagement and organisational commitment, thereby affecting turnover intentions. Organisational commitment was found to partially mediate the causal relationship between employee engagement and turnover intentions. The findings of this research have important theoretical and practical implications for police officer retention.     

‘Gentrification Without Displacement' and the Consequent Loss of Place: The Effects of Class Transition on Low‐income Residents of Secure Housing in Gentrifying Areas

The increasingly disputed concept of gentrification‐induced displacement is combining with the argument that the poor benefit from social mix to produce a theoretical case for ‘positive gentrification'. The notion that new middle‐class residents not only attract more investment but bring opportunities for ‘upward social mobility' to low‐income people who manage to stay in gentrifying areas has become policy orthodoxy. While there are scholarly challenges to the extent of these benefits, the disadvantages of imposed social mix on low‐income communities even where they are not physically displaced remain under‐researched. This article helps to fill this gap by reporting on research into the experience of long‐term low‐income residents of gentrifying neighbourhoods who managed to stay put. The research explores notions of social mix, place and displacement among residents of secure community housing in Melbourne, Australia (the equivalent of small‐scale social housing in Europe and North America) with the object of establishing whether the absence of physical displacement is sufficient to ameliorate gentrification's negative impacts. The findings demonstrate that transformations in shops and meeting places, and in the nature of local social structure and government interventions, cause a sense of loss of place even without physical displacement.     

A survey on performance analysis of warehouse carousel systems

This paper gives an overview of recent research on the performance evaluation and design of carousel systems. We discuss picking strategies for problems involving one carousel, consider the throughput of the system for problems involving two carousels, give an overview of related problems in this area and present an extensive literature review. Emphasis has been given on future research directions in this area.     

Expatriate return on investment in the Asia Pacific: An empirical study of individual ROI versus corporate ROI

The return on investment (ROI) from international assignments is a crucial aspect of expatriate management. The literature has taken a mostly organizational perspective of this important phenomenon, with little attention to the ‘individual ROI’ expatriates gain when undertaking an assignment. Especially lacking is research on expatriate ROI in the Asia Pacific region. Based on interviews with 31 long-term expatriates in 10 Asian countries, we use psychological contract theory to examine (1) how ‘individual ROI’ acts as a key driver of ‘corporate ROI’ and (2) the challenges and opportunities that expatriation in the Asia Pacific presents to individuals and organizations.     

Price Limits and Stock Market Volatility in the Athens Stock Exchange

In this paper, we have examined the effects of price limits on the stock volatility in the Athens Stock Exchange. We put forward two hypotheses, the information hypothesis, which implies that price limits only slow down the process of adjustment and have no effect on stock volatility; and the over-reaction hypothesis, which assumes that investors tend to overreact to new information, so that price limits give them time to reassess the information and reduce stock volatility. Our results show strong support for the information hypothesis. This evidence is obtained by performing the tests on ten stocks, which include heavily traded stocks as well as less active stocks, and covering a variety of industries, and on a market wide price index. The results are also robust to the frequency of the measurement of the returns, and to the tightness of the limits.     

The Attractiveness of Portugal as a Tourist Destination: The Perspective of Czech Tour Operators

In this study we investigate the attractiveness of Portugal as a tourist destination from the perspective of Czech tour operators. Tour operators were selected as the target population because they represent an important source of information about a destination and can significantly influence the decision of potential tourists about a holiday destination. One of the important findings of this research is that weak promotion and financial demands are perceived as the main reasons why many Czech tourists do not choose Portugal as their vacation destination. An obvious obstacle in the development of Portugal as a Czech tourism destination is the lack of information about its advantages as a tourist destination. The results also show that Portugal is not considered a key destination for Czech tourists. However, in terms of its attractiveness as a tourist destination Portugal has much potential, which should be utilized in the future.     

Practices that Support Team Learning and Their Impact on Speed to Market and New Product Success

Competition is fierce today. Businesses are feeling extreme pressure to innovate and do so quickly. If they take too long in bringing a product to market or make a mistake along the way, they can be preempted by a faster moving competitor. One technique gaining popularity to help companies compete is establishing learning teams—teams that create and use knowledge rapidly and effectively. But how do teams learn? By studying the learning practices of 95 new product teams, we have uncovered several factors that improve a new product team’s ability to learn, innovate faster, and be more successful. These factors include thoroughly reviewing project information, having stable project goals, and following a rigorous new product development process.