Towards an assessment for organizational participatory research health partnerships: A systematic mixed studies review with framework synthesis

Within the health sciences, organizational participatory research (OPR) is defined as a blend of research and action, in which academic researchers partner with health organization members. OPR is based on a sound partnership between all stakeholders to improve organizational practices. However, little research on the evaluation of OPR health partnership exists. This systematic mixed studies review sought to produce a new theoretical model that structures the evaluation of the OPR processes and related outcomes of OPR health partnerships. Six bibliographic databases were searched together with grey literature sources for OPR health partnership evaluation questionnaires. Six questionnaires were included, from which a pool of 95 OPR health partnership evaluation items were derived. The included questionnaires were appraised for the quality of their origin, development and measurement properties. A framework synthesis was performed using an existing OPR framework by organizing questionnaire items in a matrix using a hybrid thematic analysis. This led to our proposed Organizational Participatory Research Evaluation Model (OPREM) that includes three axes, Trust, Collective Learning and Sustainability (with specific dimensions) and 95 items. This model provides information to help stakeholders comprehensively structure the evaluation of their partnerships and subsequent improvement; thus, potentially helping to improve health organization practices.     

Hypothesis Testing of CNA Perceptions of Organizational Culture in Long Term Care

This commentary for the special issue on research that went wrong describes a study that explored factors that contribute to variability within Certified Nursing Assistants (CNAs) on organizational safety culture. We know from previous research that CNAs provide most direct care in nursing homes and that direct care workers often experience agency culture differently from agency management (Wolf et al., 2014). We were looking for factors that nursing homes could alter to improve the culture for CNAs, and thus, residents. We conducted a secondary analysis of data collected via a multi-component paper survey of CNAs employed in long term care. We used results from the Nursing Home Survey on Patient Safety Culture and primary shift, type of unit, and years as a CNA to identify modifiable characteristics that would explain variability in the perceptions of patient safety culture. The final sample included n = 106 from three nursing homes. Dimension scores were compared using bivariate tests appropriate to the scale and ordinal logistic regression. Despite support in the literature for the hypothesis, we found few significant differences on the total scale within groups. Differences in perceptions have implications for quality of care and the experiences of residents within nursing homes.     

Early-life mortality clustering in families: A literature review

Research on early-life mortality in contemporary and historical populations has shown that infant and child mortality tend to cluster in a limited number of high-mortality families, a phenomenon known as ‘mortality clustering’. This paper is the first to review the literature on the role of the family in early-life mortality. Contemporary results, methodological and theoretical shortfalls, recent developments, and opportunities for future research are all discussed in this review. Four methodological approaches are distinguished: those based on sibling deaths, mother heterogeneity, thresholds, and excess deaths in populations. It has become clear from research to date that the death of an older child harms the survival chances of younger children in that family, and that fertility behaviour, earlier stillbirths, remarriages, and socio-economic status all explain mortality clustering to some extent.     

企业开放式创新实施机制:项目管理视角

开放式创新是目前理论界和企业界关注的热点,从项目层面研究企业开放式创新管理对于企业更具指导意义。选取中控EPA项目作为研究对象,运用项目管理分析框架,从项目概念形成和项目实现两个阶段对EPA项目的具体运作进行了详细阐释。研究显示,成功的项目需要同时获得企业高层管理人员和项目成员的大力支持;企业的开放式创新应该根据创新项目流程进行有选择性开放;在项目运作过程中,应综合使用内向和外向开放式创新模式;发展中国家的高技术企业应积极争取政府支持,特别是在一些关系产业发展的重大项目开发上。     

农村合作经济组织的组织形式、问题及对策

中国农村合作经济组织良好的发展势头,已经开始把农业产业中的一部分弱势群体带动起来,使长期困扰中国农业和农村经济发展中的一些困难和问题有了新的解决思路。文章在大量的调查研究和项目实践的基础上,对我国当前农村合作经济的组织形式以及各类组织建设中存在的共性问题和个性问题进行分析,以探讨解决这些问题的对策。     

Transparency tested: The influence of message features on public perceptions of organizational transparency

The concept of transparency has been promoted within the public relations and business literature as both ethical and advantageous; however, the effectiveness of transparency is seldom empirically put to the test. In particular, the use of clarity, disclosure, and accuracy in organizational messages needs to be empirically examined. To this end, we conducted an online experiment using a 2 (high vs. low message transparency) x 2 (news story placed before or after an organizational statement) between-subjects design. Participants (n?=?357) perceived organizations as more transparent and credible when exposed to messages exhibiting greater levels of clarity, disclosure, and accuracy as opposed to messages that did not. Placement of an information anchor in the form of an objective news story before the organizational message increased the perceived organizational transparency when messages employed transparent design features and decreased the perceived organizational transparency when messages did not use these features. These results provide significant implications for practitioners attempting to convey organizational transparency at the tactical level through message features.     

Organizational ecology of immigrant employment and organizational buffer zones: Who leaves first when the organization gets into trouble?

Using data from the German social insurance system immigrant employment in organizational buffer zones will be investigated from an organizational ecology perspective. Theories in organization and labor market research predict higher exit rates of employees holding jobs in buffer zones. These buffer zones protect organizations from unfavorable environmental turbulences. Consequently, analyzing the impact of buffer zone employment on job stability of immigrants requires a fully dynamic approach, which goes beyond a mere identification of generally increased turnover rates of immigrants.In the first step, determinants of organizational dissolution rates will be estimated. In order to obtain a dynamic measurement of unfavorable environmental conditions, the model includes both organizational and time-varying environmental characteristics of organizational populations. This will be done by using a three-level mixed-effects hazard model controlling for observed and unobserved environmental characteristics. In the second step, dissolution rates predicted in the first step will be used as an explanatory variable. These rates indicate the degree of enactment of the flexible buffer zone. It will be shown that immigrants have indeed higher turnover rates, but they tend to remain longer in their organizations when environmental conditions deteriorate—and they are not those who leave first when the organization gets into trouble.     

Marriage and separation risks among German cohabiters: Differences between types of cohabiter

We propose a typology of different meanings of cohabitation that combines cohabiters’ intentions to marry with a general attitude toward marriage, using competing risk analyses to examine whether some cohabiters are more prone than others to marry or to separate. Using data (N = 1,258) from four waves of the German Family Panel (PAIRFAM) and a supplementary study (DEMODIFF), we compared eastern and western German cohabiters of the birth cohorts 1971–73 and 1981–83. Western Germans more frequently view cohabitation as a step in the marriage process, whereas eastern Germans more often cohabit as an alternative to marriage. Taking into account marital attitudes reveals that cohabiters without marriage plans differ from those with plans in their relationship careers, and also shows that cohabiters who plan to marry despite holding a less favourable view of marriage are less likely to realize their plans than cohabiters whose intentions and attitudes are more congruent.     

AFFECTIVE RESPONSES WITHIN A COMPLEX DECISION-MAKING TASK: THE INFLUENCE OF “PERCEPTUALLY” ILL-STRUCTURED PROBLEMS

The perceptual effects of varying levels of expert advice for potentially improving on strategic decisions were examined in conjunction with goals. The amounts of advice about decision alternatives, as well as assigned goals ranging from “nearly impossible” to “easy,” were manipulated. The task used was complex and functioned perceptually as an “ill-structured” problem. Mixed results indicated that more advice significantly affected satisfaction but advice in general had little influence on effort. On the other hand, as goal difficulty decreased, satisfaction and effort significantly increased. Easy goals were superior to more difficult ones within this perceptually ill-structured decision-making situation.     

Governing Deviance in Public Space through Mayoral Orders: Fields Mismatch and Metropolitan Turbulence

This article addresses the issue of policy change and its consequences on the organizational field and institutional context, looking at the role of an instrument transfer process. We adopt a political sociology approach to policy instruments to account for the impact that the introduction of a securitarian instrument, the mayoral order, had on the implementation process of a social policy. Through a genealogy of the instrument we identify a constitutive, normative and cognitive dimension. Our aim is to explain the interaction between these institutional dimensions, the re‐definition of the organizational field of the policy, and the dynamics of metropolitan politics. Following a synthesis of the policy process and the institutional arrangements where the policy is implemented, we show how the instrument transfer triggered a division within the organizational field, and the rise of institutional tensions amongst local authorities. In the conclusion, we identify the institutional dimensions of the instruments and the policy implementation scale as elements that are to interact with public‐private relationships and institutional arrangements, and that have an impact on implementation process and policy outcome.