Future-Proof Transformational School Design for the New Era

The ‘New Era' defined as post pandemic has opened up a conversation for more opportunities to transform school design in order to create a more functional, engaged democratic society premised on a social responsibility reflecting a multicultural, empowered workforce. This chapter is a product of the collaboration of a UK and a US educator looking at two case studies of secondary education and one higher education that serve as examples of success for transforming schools. Using Bolman and Deal's Four Frames for Organizational Design, the authors make the case for school designs that take into account diverse learner groups and diverse pathways leading to an educated and skilled workforce. A result from this analysis includes a specific, short list of components to consider for transforming schools.

Success factors of long-term CIOs

Although the average tenure of CIOs has increased over the last years, the majority of CIOs have been in their positions for only three years or less. Nevertheless, some CIOs have been successful in their position for a long time. In this study, we use tenure as a proxy for success as a CIO. The goal of this paper is to examine factors that are critical to the success of long-term CIOs. For this purpose, we created and analyzed resumes of 384 CIOs. Out of these 384, we conducted 19 interviews with CIOs from top-tier companies and collected and analyzed both qualitative and quantitative data. In the process, we were able to identify nine factors that are critical for the success (CSF) of CIOs. These factors fall into three categories. Category “Personality” includes “Accepting and embracing change” (CSF #1), “Being perseverant to pursue long-term goals” (CSF #2), “Anticipating the future through visionary thinking” (CSF #3), and “Being empathetic to deal with uncertainty felt by co-workers” (CSF #4). The “Role Fulfilment” category includes “Cross-functional involvement and integration of the IT organization” (CSF #5), “Positioning and restructuring of the IT organization” (CSF #6), and “Well-connected and communicative leadership” (CSF #7). The “Organizational Environment” category consists of “Availability of skilled workforce” (CSF #8) and “Reporting line to the CEO” (CSF #9). CSFs 1, 2, and 3 were perceived as most important by the participating CIOs. The results may be of particular interest both to aspiring CIOs and equally their employing organizations, as they reflect what long-term CIOs value during their time in office.

Unleashing the Potential of Crowd Work: The Need for a Post-Taylorism Crowdsourcing Model

Paid crowdsourcing connects task requesters to a globalized, skilled workforce that is available 24/7. In doing so, this new labor model promises not only to complete work faster and more efficiently than any previous approach but also to harness the best of our collective capacities. Nevertheless, for almost a decade now, crowdsourcing has been limited to addressing rather straightforward and simple tasks. Large-scale innovation, creativity, and wicked problem-solving are still largely out of the crowd’s reach. In this opinion paper, we argue that existing crowdsourcing practices bear significant resemblance to the management paradigm of Taylorism. Although criticized and often abandoned by modern organizations, Taylorism principles are prevalent in many crowdsourcing platforms, which employ practices such as the forceful decomposition of all tasks regardless of their knowledge nature and the disallowing of worker interactions, which diminish worker motivation and performance. We argue that a shift toward post-Taylorism is necessary to enable the crowd address at scale the complex problems that form the backbone of today’s knowledge economy. Drawing from recent literature, we highlight four design rules that can help make this shift, namely, endorsing social crowd networks, encouraging teamwork, scaffolding ownership of one’s work within the crowd, and leveraging algorithm-guided worker self-coordination.

Global mindset: a systematic review of the concept

Background Global mindset (GM) is a relatively new concept slowly gaining the attention of researchers, and it has been heavily influenced by globalisation throughout the years. A better understanding of the term can support companies’ growth in international settings and help develop a more effective, skilled workforce. Due to the multiplicity of approaches across the literature, there is a call to systematise available knowledge on GM regarding its antecedents, outcomes, and definitions. Research aims The aims of this systematic literature review are to present GM and summarise the available knowledge. This article not only reviews available GM definitions but also addresses its antecedents and outcomes. Methodology GM literature was gathered via multiple databases (e.g., ERIC, PsycArticles, PsycINFO, Google Scholar). Two phases of review were incorporated in the process. The first one focused on including peer-reviewed texts and selecting those qualifying for further analyses. The second stage was a content analysis. Two independent judges classified text into specific categories describing the antecedents and outcomes of GM. Findings Systematic literature review has shown a multiplicity of GM definitions (n = 18), antecedents (n = 179), and outcomes (n = 52) of GM. As a result, a new GM definition emerged from merging the most common features of the existing ones. This, in turn, reflects a great need to keep on developing our knowledge on the subject and creating clear, applicable structures of the GM concept.

The Impact of Covid-19 on Higher Education: A Review on the Moroccan Case

The period 1999-2009 was considered as “the decade of education” in Morocco because of the main projects of the overhaul of the education system launched during this period. This period has seen profound reforms which affected the organization, pedagogy, and financial management of Moroccan universities to improve their performances and to offer the market a skilled workforce. In March 2020, Morocco recorded the first positive cases of Covid-19. Following this situation and in interaction with the international circumstances, the country has embarked on an anticipatory strategy to limit the spread of this new virus through confinement that lasted from March 20 to July 10, 2020, influencing the normal functioning of most sectors and disrupting the strategies of all sectors of activity. The higher education sector has not escaped the effects of the pandemic. Through this article, we wonder about the impact of covid-19 on Moroccan higher education, scientific research, and currents project launched in this sector. We found that the learning process in universities was the most negatively impacted by the pandemic, at the same time, the scientific research mission saw improvements in publications and research funding during the crisis. Finally, the article highlights lessons from this pandemic for the Moroccan higher education sector, which could be illustrative for other developing countries.

How should conservation be professionalized?

Meeting the complex demands of conservation requires a multi-skilled workforce operating in a sector that is respected and supported. Although professionalization of conservation is widely seen as desirable, there is no consistent understanding of what that entails. Here, we review whether and how eight elements of professionalization observed in other sectors are applicable to conservation: (1) a defined and respected occupation; (2) official recognition; (3) knowledge, learning, competences and standards; (4) paid employment; (5) codes of conduct and ethics; (6) individual commitment; (7) organizational capacity; and (8) professional associations. Despite significant achievements in many of these areas, overall progress is patchy, and conventional concepts of professionalization are not always a good fit for conservation. Reasons for this include the multidisciplinary nature of conservation work, the disproportionate influence of elite groups on the development and direction of the profession, and under-representation of field practitioners and of Indigenous peoples and local communities with professional-equivalent skills. We propose a more inclusive approach to professionalization that reflects the full range of practitioners in the sector and the need for increased recognition in countries and regions of high biodiversity. We offer a new definition that characterizes conservation professionals as practitioners who act as essential links between conservation action and conservation knowledge and policy, and provide seven recommendations for building a more effective, inclusive and representative profession.

Effectiveness-Based Manufacturing as a Foundation of China’s Innovation Machine

This chapter demonstrates the importance of manufacturing in China’s innovation machine. It explains the history of China’s industrialization and how it overcame early challenges to become the ‘world’s factory’. It argues that China has since progressed to become the ‘world’s workshop’, with the capability and capacity to translating complex designs into products with engineering precision and with unmatchable speed and scale. Examples are provided of large overseas companies attracted to manufacture in China, such as Tesla and Apple. It also examines a new model of mass customization facilitated by the country’s super e-commerce platforms such as Alibaba and Pinduoduo, which connects consumers with hundreds of millions of SME manufacturers, including China’s ‘hidden champions’ in niche areas of manufacturing. Chinese manufacturing possesses significant strengths in its resilience and flexibility, building upon its highly skilled workforce and digital infrastructure. The chapter shows how China’s manufacturing is benefiting from recent trends that have moved production in global value chains to countries with lower labour costs.

Corporate Governance And A Paradigm Strategy By Multinational Enterprises In Emerging Markets

This qualitative investigation meticulously identified challenges to corporate governance in operations of Multinational Enterprises (MNEs) in diverse situational positions in emerging markets. These challenges are weak macro institutions, strict government interest and influence, over formalized institutional structure, and overbearing political influence and the obvious; information asymmetries. A flexible mixed allegiance paradigm strategy was identified. It provides alignment of diversities and equilibrium based on micro operational efficacies of the multinational enterprise which are experienced and skilled workforce, related to locality of interest, management of loyalty, trust and negotiation hinged on acceptable agreements to member countries. Trust is emphasized as important for international business.

FinTech in Latvia: Status Quo, Current Developments, and Challenges Ahead

FinTech has been in the focus of discussion for quite some time. However, the market share of FinTech companies is still relatively small compared to that of more traditional financial services. The purpose of this paper is to analyse the status quo, current developments, and challenges ahead for the Latvian FinTech sector. We combine three analyses: a political and legal, economic, social, and technological environment (PEST) analysis; a survey among FinTech companies; and an analysis of the size and financial performance of FinTech companies during the last 10 years. We find that the current status of regulation is one of the main obstacles to FinTech development, because it does not sufficiently consider FinTech-specific aspects. Problems in attracting a skilled workforce and an environment that is not very supportive of new developments in finance are further challenges and might explain at least part of the growth and financial performance difficulties. A revision, modernization, and harmonization of regulation is essential to create a level playing field for all market participants: FinTech companies, traditional financial service providers, and those originally traditional players that are integrating FinTech solutions in their business model. Further efforts are also required to foster Latvia’s attractiveness for a skilled workforce. We hope that this study helps increase the visibility of Latvian FinTech and contributes to the development of the new Latvian FinTech strategy.