High Production Volume Chemical Amine Oxides [C8–C20] Category Environmental Risk Assessment

An environmental assessment of amine oxides has been conducted under the OECD SIDS High Production Volume (HPV) Program via the Global International Council of Chemical Associations (ICCA) Amine Oxides Consortium. Amine oxides are primarily used in conjunction with surfactants in cleaning and personal care products. Given the lack of persistence or bioaccumulation, and the low likelihood of these chemicals partitioning to soil, the focus of the environmental assessment is on the aquatic environment. In the United States, the E-FAST model is used to estimate effluent concentrations in the United States from manufacturing facilities and from municipal facilities resulting from consumer product uses. Reasonable worst-case ratios of predicted environmental concentration (PEC) to predicted no effect concentration (PNEC) range from 0.04 to 0.003, demonstrating that these chemicals are a low risk to the environment.     

Joe's First Bank

Joe Spoke has had a highly successful career in banking. Joe will leave his present job as CEO of a county region of a bank chain within 60 days because of disagreements with his new boss. The case explores several career options for Joe. One option is to take a job as one of three executive vice presidents of a local bank. A second option is to take a job that will involve relocation. A third option is to start a new bank in his county. The case explores the option of starting a new bank in detail. Projected financial statements are included for analysis by the students. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Resignation or Dismissal?: When a CEO and a President Clash

In the executive director's opinion, Bluehills Family Services' board of directors had serious problems with their organizational governance. These difficulties came to a head in an apparently unresolvable clash between the executive director and the board president. Given the preexisting board and organization perceptions, could an emergency board meeting produce a positive outcome, and would the executive director's participation be counterproductive?     

Use of an ISO 14000 Option in Implementing EPA's Rule on Risk Management Programs for Chemical Accidental Release Prevention

EPA's rule of Risk Management Programs for Chemical Accidental Release Prevention applies to facilities that manufacture, process, use, store, or otherwise handle regulated substances at or above specified threshold quantities. EPA estimates that approximately 66,000 facilities nationwide will be regulated under the rule. This paper examines the use of a structured ISO 14000 mechanism as option-regulated facilities could elect for implementation of the rule. Under the ISO 14000 option, facilities would commit to additional obligations regarding information disclosure, discussions with potentially affected publics, and timely correction of deficiencies noted in annual ISO 14000 audits of their compliance with the Risk Management Program they submit to the EPA under the rule. In return, facilities would be granted significant relief in regard to both EPA audit frequency and the penalties that might be applied for any items of noncompliance with the rule noted during the course of implementing agency reviews of the facility. The paper concludes with a discussion of the advantages and disadvantages of this option to potentially affected stakeholders.     

The Ties that Bind: Social Networks, Person-Organization Value Fit, and Turnover Intention

This article examines the influence of social networks and valuecongruence on turnover intention among public and nonprofitemployees. We argue that employees exist in social networksinside and outside their organization, and these networks shapeemployee attitudes and behavior. To illustrate this theory,we use turnover intention. A strong and positive intraorganizationalsocial network characterized by good relations with and a senseof obligation toward other staff is hypothesized to make itmore likely that employees will stay. A strong social networkexternal to the organization is hypothesized to increase theopportunities that employees have to leave. Our findings offerstrong support for the role of intraorganizational networks,but relatively weak support for the effect of external networks.We also propose that person-organization (P-O) fit shape turnoverintention. Our results suggest that employees who experiencea strong P-O fit in terms of value congruence are more likelyto offer a long-term commitment.     

Integrating dose estimation into a decision‐making framework for model‐based drug development

Model‐informed drug discovery and development offers the promise of more efficient clinical development, with increased productivity and reduced cost through scientific decision making and risk management. Go/no‐go development decisions in the pharmaceutical industry are often driven by effect size estimates, with the goal of meeting commercially generated target profiles. Sufficient efficacy is critical for eventual success, but the decision to advance development phase is also dependent on adequate knowledge of appropriate dose and dose‐response. Doses which are too high or low pose risk of clinical or commercial failure. This paper addresses this issue and continues the evolution of formal decision frameworks in drug development. Here, we consider the integration of both efficacy and dose‐response estimation accuracy into the go/no‐go decision process, using a model‐based approach. Using prespecified target and lower reference values associated with both efficacy and dose accuracy, we build a decision framework to more completely characterize development risk. Given the limited knowledge of dose response in early development, our approach incorporates a set of dose‐response models and uses model averaging. The approach and its operating characteristics are illustrated through simulation. Finally, we demonstrate the decision approach on a post hoc analysis of the phase 2 data for naloxegol (a drug approved for opioid‐induced constipation).     

The Qualityity-of-Life (QOL) Research Movement: Past, Present, and Future

The purpose of this paper is to trace the history of the social indicators or quality-of-life (QOL) research movement up to today, forecast future developments, and pave the way for future growth. Broadly speaking, we tried to review historical antecedents from the point of view of different disciplines, with specialists in each discipline preparing the basic text and co-authors helping to polish the material into a finished product. Briefly, we begin with an overview of the conceptual and philosophical foundations of our field of research. That is followed by a historical overview of the sociological roots of our field. In the third section, the main contributions from the discipline of economics are reviewed. Following that, the fourth section covers a historical overview of the literature on health-related quality of life is provided. Next, the history of QOL research from a marketing perspective is reviewed followed by a history from the perspectives of industrial/organizational psychology and management. Finally, we offer some forecasts for future QOL studies that are intended not only to predict what might happen, but to encourage, stimulate and motivate researchers to undertake new initiatives.     

Trust: Missing Piece(s) in the Safety Puzzle

While trust is increasingly recognized as a factor that impacts on safety behavior, the exact nature of trust and its role in shaping organizational safety is poorly understood. This special issue contains six articles that examine the relationship between trust and safety behavior in a range of high-risk work contexts. The issue begins with two articles that introduce the complex nature of trust and the positive and negative roles that trust can play in shaping an organization's safety culture. This background is then developed by two articles that explore the role of trust and distrust in safety performance, and uncover a range of significant but often counterintuitive relationships between forms of trust and safe behavior. Finally, the issue concludes with two articles that examine the role that leadership may play in developing trust. These articles examine the conditions important for the development of trust in leaders, and the trust-promoting actions that leaders can employ to influence employees' engagement in safety participation.     

Authorizing processes changing team autonomy during new product development

One basic feature of recent collaborative team arrangements for organizing new product development is a high degree of autonomy for cross-functional teams. The literature, however, has not provided a very precise analysis of team autonomy in the context of new product development. The theoretical framework advanced here, based on the literature and the authors' case studies, assumes that developing a large and technologically sophisticated new product requires a hierarchy of collaborating teams. In this complex organizational context, managers do not completely predetermine any one team's autonomy. During the course of a new product development program, certain authorizing (deauthorizing) processes produce ad hoc changes in autonomy. This paper identifies specific authorizing processes and hypothesizes about variables that should affect them. The propositions also lead to some managerial implications for preserving team autonomy.