Tree edge decomposition with an application to minimum ultrametric tree approximation

A k-decomposition of a tree is a process in which the tree is recursively partitioned into k edge-disjoint subtrees until each subtree contains only one edge. We investigated the problem how many levels it is sufficient to decompose the edges of a tree. In this paper, we show that any n-edge tree can be 2-decomposed (and 3-decomposed) within at most ⌈1.44 log n⌉ (and ⌈log n⌉ respectively) levels. Extreme trees are given to show that the bounds are asymptotically tight. Based on the result, we designed an improved approximation algorithm for the minimum ultrametric tree.     

Slacks-based inefficiency approach for general networks with bad outputs: An application to the banking sector

In this paper the efficiency assessment of general networks of processes that produce both desirable and undesirable outputs is addressed. This problem arises in many contexts (e.g. transportation, energy generation, etc.). A general networks slacks-based inefficiency (GNSBI) measure can be computed using a simple linear program that takes into account the weak disposability of the bad outputs. The slacks-based inefficiency (SBI) of each process is also calculated. Target values for all inputs, outputs (both desirable and undesirable) and even intermediate products are also provided. The proposed approach is rather general and can accommodate many different network topologies and returns to scale assumptions. Two applications to the banking sector are presented: one to assess banks efficiencies and another to assess bank branches.     

The effect of mergers and acquisitions on productivity: An empirical application to Spanish banking

Mergers and acquisitions are frequently justified in terms of value creation or efficiency improvements. Nevertheless, the evidence is not consistent with the existence of benefits in terms of the costs, productivity, profitability or market value of the firms involved. A distinguishing feature of extant research is that it focuses on the assessment of the consequences of mergers around the time in which the operation takes place, limiting the possibility of observing a complete integration between the merged firms. In this context, the objective of this paper is to evaluate the effects of mergers and acquisitions on the long-run productivity of Spanish savings banks. Our results show that productivity improvements can be found in only half of the mergers that take place during the period analyzed.     

Benchmarking firm performance from a multiple-stakeholder perspective with an application to Chinese banking

We know very little about how a firm would compare against its peers when evaluated from a multiple-stakeholder perspective where the same variables are interpreted differently. Since most medium-to-large organizations acknowledge the multi-dimensional nature of their operations, finding out the performance evaluations of various stakeholders can inform managerial decision-making. Thus, the main motivation for this study is to capture the interactions among different perceptions on a common set of performance measures. Using data envelopment analysis (DEA), we work with an approach that allows a flexible designation of inputs and outputs based on varying perspectives of five key stakeholders in banking. The versatile approach demonstrates that different views from the stakeholder universe can be summarily captured in DEA scores. A numerical example on Chinese commercial banks identifies the compliant (efficient) banks versus rigid (inefficient) banks, as well as the amenable stakeholders (those evaluating banks as efficient) versus the recalcitrant stakeholders (those evaluating banks as inefficient). The aligned views held by management and shareholders as evidenced by significant correlation among performance rankings imply reduced agency costs. Similarly, shared perceptions between customers and employees may encourage management to examine how this important business interface can be improved.     

Spatial directional robust Benefit of the Doubt approach in presence of undesirable output: An application to Italian waste sector

This paper introduces a new composite indicator method integrating the spatial dependence into the robust directional model in the case of undesirable outputs. The proposed approach is advantageous compared to the traditional and conditional robust Benefit-of-the-Doubt (BoD) models in that it allows to compare the performance of individual units with local cluster of peers. The methodology has been tested on a very detailed database of Italian municipalities for the year 2015 in the municipal solid waste collection and processing sector and confirms the existence of strong local constraints linked to the disposal facilities planned by higher level Authorities.     

Improvement culture in the public mental healthcare sector: evaluation of implementation efforts

Abstract

The Danish public healthcare system has been forced to improve performance in terms of better service and lower costs. One regional Danish public healthcare organization has systematically implemented an improvement culture in its psychiatry sector. This research paper contains an evaluation of the organization’s transformation journey towards continuous improvement in psychiatry. The study was based on twenty-five personal interviews, two group interviews and four focus group interviews with centre managers, doctors, psychologists, psychiatrists, nurses and medical personnel in two of the ten psychiatry centres in the region. The objectives of implementing an improvement culture were to create better service for patients and to improve efficiency. Findings indicate that a number of critical success factors and barriers exist in mental healthcare and that even though a number of resources was invested up front, adjustments of the implementation process were needed from centre to centre. Furthermore, the implementation of a lean culture had some positive effects on treatments. In particular, internally, efficiency improved in some areas, creating a common view of what creates value and how to make improvements. Involving different groups of specialists in the implementation of an improvement culture is important. However, the achievement of continuous improvement efforts could be challenging, as results can be difficult to quantify. The novelty of the paper lies in the fact that data is collected from different groups of employees (from both managers’ and employees’ perspectives) on the effects of a full-scale implementation of an improvement culture in public mental healthcare.     

Measurement and decomposition of the Malmquist productivity index for parallel production systems

The conventional Malmquist productivity index (MPI), which ignores the internal structure of a production system when measuring changes in performance between two periods, may produce misleading results. This paper thus takes the operations of the component processes into account in investigating the MPI of parallel production systems. A relational data envelopment analysis (DEA) model is developed to measure the biennial MPIs of the system and internal processes at the same time, and it is shown that the former is a linear combination of the latter. This decomposition helps identify the processes that cause the decline in performance of the system. An example of 39 branches of a commercial bank, with deposits, sales, and services as the three major functions operating in parallel, is used to illustrate this approach.     

An application of BPR and RCM methods to an oil refinery turnaround process

This works reports on the application of business process re-engineering (BPR) methods to a specific stage in the maintenance activities of the API refinery in Falconara Marittima (AN), i.e. the scheduled annual turnaround. The aim of the study was to analyse the process as it was always implemented up until the year 2001, identifying any related problems and inconsistencies, and then describe the re-engineering of this process, assessing and emphasising the changes involved and pinpointing further opportunities for improvement. Using the synergies provided by the simultaneous adoption of management policies and maintenance management methods enables considerable changes to be made with a view to the production of servicing plans that ensure a greater reliability at the lowest possible cost. The annual turnaround process was modelled using the AIØ WIN software, which supports the IDEFØ method.     

An evaluation of social learning and learner outcomes in a massive open online course (MOOC): a healthcare sector case study

ABSTRACT

This paper responds to calls for new inquiries into the use of technology in HRD. We examine how, and to what extent, social media tools contribute to learner experiences and learner outcomes in an HRD intervention in a workplace context. We analyse qualitative and quantitative data relating to a massive open online course (MOOC) in a healthcare sector case study setting. We examine the interaction between the MOOC programme, social learning through social media tools and learner outcomes. The results of our evaluation show that usage of social media tools does not significantly affect knowledge outcomes but social media usage enhances affective outcomes. We conclude that social media tools can foster productive social learning processes. We also find evidence of some reluctance to engage with the technologies and declining patterns of interactivity using social media over the duration of the MOOC programme. We conclude that a more nuanced theorization to take account of personal and professional workplace context is necessary to explain how learners regulate their engagement with social media tools and the effect of social technologies for sustained social learning in HRD interventions.     

An analysis of anti-money laundering in the German non-financial sector

Journal of Management and Governance - European anti-money laundering (AML) law obliges both financial and non-financial private companies to contribute to combatting money laundering. Since the...     

An aggregate index for the analysis of productivity and profitability

Many measures have been devised for assessing economic performance in industry and business, but there is no systematic formula for integrating productivity and profitability, the effect of scale of production and the effect of technical change. This paper examines the factors which underlie the performance of economic activity and proposes an aggregate index number for the purpose. Experience from actual applications shows that the formula proposed is applicable at the level of industry and even of the firm.     

A modified DEA model to estimate the importance of objectives with an application to agricultural economics

This paper demonstrates a connection between data envelopment analysis (DEA) and a non-interactive elicitation method to estimate the weights of objectives for decision-makers in a multiple attribute approach. This connection gives rise to a modified DEA model that allows us to estimate not only efficiency measures but also preference weights by radially projecting each unit onto a linear combination of the elements of the payoff matrix (which is obtained by standard multicriteria methods). For users of multiple attribute decision analysis the basic contribution of this paper is a new interpretation in terms of efficiency of the non-interactive methodology employed to estimate weights in a multicriteria approach. We also propose a modified procedure to calculate an efficient payoff matrix and a procedure to estimate weights through a radial projection rather than a distance minimization. For DEA users, we provide a modified DEA procedure to calculate preference weights and efficiency measures that does not depend on any observations in the dataset. This methodology has been applied to an agricultural case study in Spain.     

Non-oriented slack-based decompositions of profit change with an application to Taiwanese banking

A change in profit can originate from the output side and the input side. In the spirit of work by Tone [1] and follows Grifell-Tatjé and Lovell's [2], we propose a non-oriented slacks-based measure (SBM) model to decompose the change in the operating profit into various meaningful components: quantity effect and a price effect. The quantity effect can be decomposed into a productivity effect and an activity effect. The productivity effect is further decomposed into a technical effect and an operating efficiency effect. Both of them include an output side, which will result in a change in revenue and an input side which will result in a change in cost. The activity effect can be decomposed into a product mix effect, a resource mix effect and a scale effect. We illustrate our decompositions to the Taiwanese banking sector during the period 1994-2002 using the average of the base and current prices to evaluate these contributions. We find ignoring input side effects on the decomposition of profit changes would cause misleading results in managerial issues.     

An application of mathematical programming to soybean processing

In this paper, a mathematical programming methodology is applied to a production planning problem involving a soybean processing plant which can purchase its raw materials from multiple origins and must ship its finished products to multiple destinations. A time horizon production planning model is developed, with the objective of maximizing the net income produced by this plant. This model is tested for a five origin, three destination, processing network, over a thirteen month time horizon. Test results, in terms of a production plan and associated purchasing-allocation decisions, are presented and discussed.     

An improved linear convergence of FISTA for the LASSO problem with application to CT image reconstruction

Journal of Combinatorial Optimization - The LASSO problem has been explored extensively for CT image reconstruction, the most useful algorithm to solve the LASSO problem is the FISTA. In this...     

浅析新医改环境下会计电算化在医院财务管理中的运用

随着我国医疗体制改革的不断深入，会计电算化正以其高效、便捷、准确、及时等优势日益受到医院财务人员的欢迎。但是针对当前医院运用会计电算化过程中存在的实际问题，采取有效措施加以完善其在医院财务管理中发挥的作用，是医院把握时代发展趋势，提升市场竞争力，创造丰厚效益的重要手段。     

An appointment scheduling policy for healthcare systems with parallel servers and pre-determined quality of service

The appointment scheduling problem is well-known in the literature. The use of appointment systems has been adopted widely in many different fields, including service industries and especially healthcare.This research focuses on healthcare systems where patients arrive according to pre-assigned appointments. We consider healthcare systems with several parallel servers, where a given sequence of patients, with randomly distributed service durations and a possibility of no-shows, is to be scheduled. The aim is to minimize the end of day and increase resource utilization while a minimal probability of each appointment starting on time (quality of service) is required.We formulated the problem using mathematical programing and developed a multi-server numerical-based (MSN) algorithm to solve it. We conducted some experimental runs and checked the impact of the problem parameters on the end of day, customers’ average waiting time and the percentage of customers that waited for service. We also show how server pooling improves the above system measures. Finally, once the appointments are set, we develop a methodology to determine the shift length so as to balance overtime costs (costs of overtime hours) against undertime costs (costs of regular, unused hours).     

Two-level network design with intermediate facilities: An application to electrical distribution systems

We consider the two-level network design problem with intermediate facilities. This problem consists of designing a minimum cost network respecting some requirements, usually described in terms of the network topology or in terms of a desired flow of commodities between source and destination vertices. Each selected link must receive one of two types of edge facilities and the connection of different edge facilities requires a costly and capacitated vertex facility. We propose a hybrid decomposition approach which heuristically obtains tentative solutions for the vertex facilities number and location and use these solutions to limit the computational burden of a branch-and-cut algorithm. We test our method on instances of the power system secondary distribution network design problem. The results show that the method is efficient both in terms of solution quality and computational times.     

An application of catastrophe theory to management science process

Practicing management scientists often complain of the alleged irrational behavior on the part of the managers they are trying to serve, particularly when a manager suddenly and unexpectedly shifts behavior from one of support to one of resistance. The authors feel such behavior is only believed to be irrational because the management scientist is using the wrong mental model when projecting past behavioral patterns into the future. This paper attempts to solve this problem by using the newly developed catastrophe theory to develop a different model where sudden shifts in behavior are considered perfectly rational and explainable. The basic implication that is drawn from this new model is that successful implementation of management science depends on a sequence of interactions with the ultimate model user and that care in the structuring of these interactions can greatly enhance the probability of eventual user acceptance.     

An empirical application of multidimensional scaling to advertising pretesting

One of the least-managed aspects of advertising management may well be that of effectiveness measurement. The problem of obtaining satisfactory indications of advertising effectiveness is particularly critical in pretesting since the rationale for pretesting is to evaluate advertisements before their release for broadscale media distribution. Therefore, the primary purpose of the research reported here is to provide empirical evidence of the value of multidimensional scaling methods to pretesting advertising. The article demonstrates how nonmetric methodology obviates the disadvantages of such methods as consumer jury tests and rating scales. A secondary purpose of the research project is to demonstrate the value of pretesting itself by comparing the perceptions of target market consumers with those of selected group of advertising professionals.