The role of the health care leader. Past, present, future

Strong, effective communication may be the single most important key to success for any type of executive. Leaders of health care organizations must be able to promote ideas that others will implement, help staff see the value of their work, and have the vision to overcome limitations that stand in the way of progress.     

Forecasting: A hybrid approach

It has recently been shown that the Box-Jenkins approach to forecasting time series is superior to an econometric approach over a relatively short horizon. The results here support this contention. A combination of the two approaches, however, proves to be clearly superior to either one separately. By taking account of changes in economic and weather related variables in a time series model, improved forecasts are obtained.     

A Simulation Study of Work-in-Process Inventory Drive Systems and their Effect on Operational Measurements

This simulation study compares three operational measures of performance through the exploration of three work-in-process (WIP) inventory drive systems and their associated inventory buffer characteristics. The three drive systems under study are a push, a pull and a hybrid push-pull system. While these systems have many aspects in common, their buffer management systems do not. The data analysis was based on information gathered from three computer-simulated flow shop assembly lines all operating in the same environment. Hypotheses concerning the operational performance measurements were established, independent variables were controlled and manipulated and a conclusion was drawn as to which system would afford the operation optimum results. While inventory has traditionally been considered and is currently being shown as an asset from an accounting point of view, it is obvious from the findings of this study, that excess WIP inventory, above the minimal requirements for production, may have a negative effect on the operational measurements evaluated.     

The influence of riparian corridor width on ant and plant assemblages in northern Sydney,Australia

Protecting riparian corridors is a commonly applied environmental policy in urban landscapes. However, empirical data demonstrating their efficacy for biodiversity conservation outcomes is scarce. In this study we investigated whether riparian corridor width influences the diversity and community structure of ant (Hymenoptera: Formicidae) and vascular plant assemblages therein. Eighteen corridors of differing widths were selected from within the Ku-ring-gai Local Government Area, Sydney Australia. Ants were sampled using pitfall traps positioned within rectangular vegetation transects (30 × 10 m). Both ant and plant species richness, when standardised for sampling effort, were unrelated to riparian corridor width. However, significant compositional differences between sites were evident with increased width up to ~50 m. Narrow corridors contained greater abundances of opportunistic ant species and higher proportions of exotic plants. We interpret this to be the result of the greater disturbance/edge influence derived from adjacent upland urban environments. Site beta diversity did not increase with corridor width, suggesting that the exclusion of novel upslope habitats in narrow riparian corridors is not a significant cause of community assemblage modification at these sites. To minimise the impact of deleterious edge effects on ant fauna, environmental managers should seek to retain riparian corridors wider than ~50 m. However, we observed substantial between-site variability of biotic assemblages, irrespective of corridor width. Therefore we recommend that environmental management practice needs to take a catchment-wide approach and consider other parameters that may contribute to riparian health so as to optimise the protection of riparian biodiversity.     

Strategic planning for social and political change

Formalized planning is currently applied to planning for operations and capital investment, planning for products and markets, and occasionally for manpower. However, there is little evidence that companies are producing formal plans and programmes to deal with social and political change. Unfortunately, public opinion is moving against business, action groups inside and outside companies are challenging the authority of management, and public officials and politicians are already framing new laws and regulations. Unless managers begin to get more involved in the framing of these controls they are likely to find laws enacted and enforced by people who have little knowledge or sympathy with business. In this article the author points up the necessity to assess the social and political challenge to their business, and formulate and implement social and political strategies and plans aimed at ensuring the survival and prosperity of their organisations.     

The impact of acquisitions on firm performance: A review of the evidence

This paper presents a review of empirical research on the impact of acquisitions on firm performance. The evidence suggests that, in the short run, acquisitions have at best an insignificant impact on shareholder wealth. Long‐run performance analysis reveals overwhelmingly negative returns, while the evidence using accounting performance measures is mixed. The review also examines the impact of bid characteristics on performance. The acquisition of hostile targets, transactions that are paid for with cash and acquisitions of larger targets are associated with superior (or at least less negative) performance, while there is mixed evidence on the benefits of related acquisitions. A number of recent studies find that acquirers with superior pre‐bid performance tend to experience significant underperformance in the post‐bid period.     

Transect-spacing design of ice cores on the Antarctic continent

Chemical analyses of ice cores, drilled deep into an ice sheet, provide a historical record of the earth's atmosphere that dates back as far as 400,000–500,000 years. Although the atmosphere mixes quite well, it is recognized that spatial variability associated with ice-core locations should be allowed for. In this article, spatial statistical methodology is applied to the design question of finding the best spacing of ice-core locations on a partial transect of Antarctica.     

Combining forecast quantiles using quantile regression: Investigating the derived weights, estimator bias and imposing constraints

SUMMARY A novel proposal for combining forecast distributions is to use quantile regression to combine quantile estimates. We consider the usefulness of the resultant linear combining weights. If the quantile estimates are unbiased, then there is strong intuitive appeal for omitting the constant and constraining the weights to sum to unity in the quantile regression. However, we show that suppressing the constant renders one of the main attractive features of quantile regression invalid. We establish necessary and sufficient conditions for unbiasedness of a quantile estimate, and show that a combination with zero constant and weights that sum to unity is not necessarily unbiased.     

Workshop to Orient Students to Career Planning Services

This article describes a 1-hour workshop designed to orient students to a career resource center and assist them with career decision making.     

Tutelage,Resistance and Co-optation in Canadian Indian Administration*

L'administration des affaires indiennes par l'état canadien a longtemps suivi une politique de tutelle coercitive visant à accomplir la transformation sociale, économique et culturelle des peuples autochtones et de leurs communautés. En se basant sur l'idée que les autochtones étaient incapables de gérer leurs propres affaires, les autorités fédérales ont imposé des bureaucraties visant à assurer le contrôle de presque tous les aspects de leur vie, de l'éducation des enfants à la gestion des ressources matérielles. Ce système de tutelle étatique a engendré de vastes et profonds mouvements de résistance chez les peuples visés. Toutefois, certains aspects des politiques de l'état fédéral n'ayant pas été uniformément rejetés par l'ensemble de la population autochtone, l'on est en droit de se demander si une acceptation passive ou même une collaboration de la part de certains autochtones aurait un effet néfaste, direct ou indirect, sur l'avancement social des Premieres Nations. En s'appuyant sur une étude de cas, cet article examine un projet unique en son genre, celui du recyclage de l'ancien pensionnat d'une réserve indienne, et met en lumière les méthodes de manipulation et d'incitation à la collaboration qui ont été employées par les autorités fédérales pour convaincre les autochtones d'abandonner le projet. L'auteur se penche également sur l'enjeu théorique et ethnographique pour l'anthropologue, et celui, politique, pour les autochtones, dans la mesure où les incitations à la collaboration peuvent être interprétées dans le cadre d'un rapport tutelle-resistance entre les Premières Nations et l'état fédéral. The administration of Indian affairs by the Canadian state has embodied a form of coercive tutelage designed to effect the social, economic and cultural transformation of aboriginal peoples and their communities. Working from the premise that aboriginal peoples did not know what was in their own best interests, federal officials imposed bureaucratic systems that sought to regulate almost every aspect of Indians' lives, from the rearing of children to the management of material resources. This system of state tutelage in turn generated deep and widespread resistance from aboriginal communities, which frequently served to frustrate the realization of the federal government's objectives. Nevertheless, not all aspects of federal Indian administration have been uniformly resisted by all aboriginal communities or by all members of given communities. This raises the question of whether instances of non-resistance or even of active co-operation on the part of some aboriginal people with certain government policies, initiatives or procedures comprise acts or habits of co-optation that directly or indirectly compromise the attainment of social justice for the greater aboriginal population. This essay employs a case study to examine the circumstances under which a unique aboriginal initiative to transform a former Indian residential school has been undermined by co-optative state processes. The essay considers what is at stake theoretically and ethnographically for anthropologists and politically for aboriginal communities if co-optation is operationally defined as an associated element of relations of tutelage and resistance.