Managing conflict in user-oriented development environments: Effects on information systems success

Today, many organizations are turning to new approaches to building and maintaining information systems (I/S) to cope with a highly competitive business environment. Current anecdotal evidence indicates that the approaches being used improve the effectiveness of software development by encouraging active user participation throughout the development process. Unfortunately, very little is known about how the use of such approaches enhances the ability of team members to develop I/S that are responsive to changing business conditions.^ Drawing from predominant theories of organizational conflict, this study develops and tests a model of conflict among members of a development team. The model proposes that development approaches provide the relevant context conditioning the management and resolution of conflict in software development which, in turn, are crucial for the success of the development process.^ Empirical testing of the model was conducted using data collected through a combination of interviews with I/S executives and surveys of team members and business users at nine organizations. Results of path analysis provide support for the model's main prediction that integrative conflict management and distributive conflict management can contribute to I/S success by influencing differently the manifestation and resolution of conflict in software development. Further, analyses of variance indicate that object-oriented development, when compared to rapid and structured development, appears to produce the lowest levels of conflict management, conflict resolution, and I/S success.^ The proposed model and findings suggest academic implications for understanding the effects of different conflict management behaviors on software development outcomes, and practical implications for better managing the software development process, especially in user-oriented development environments. ^

Effects of service-learning on student attitudes toward academic engagement and civic responsibility

This empirical study explored the impact of service-learning participation on high school students' attitudes toward academic engagement and civic responsibility. This study focused whether a group of high school students who participated in a service-learning project had more positive attitudes toward academic engagement and civic responsibility than their high school peers who did not participate in a service learning project. ^ Data were collected from 67 volunteer students as participants in grades 9–12. A service-learning treatment group of 34 high school students was examined relative to a comparison group of 33 high school students with similar demographic and academic characteristics. The investigator used questionnaires, an oral history/service-learning project, and interviews with the teacher-coordinators of the project to collect the data. The two surveys, one investigating high school students' attitudes about academic engagement, the other investigating high school students' attitudes toward civic responsibility, were administered in a pre-treatment/post-treatment design. There were 90 days between the pre-treatment and post-treatment administrations. A factor analysis of the civic responsibility instrument and multivariate analysis of gain scores were used to compare the means of the total aggregate scores of the treatment and comparison groups. Factor analysis was performed on the academic engagement instrument but it was determined that only the total scores could be used in subsequent analyses. Results were used to determine the efficacy of service-learning as interpreted in student attitudes toward academic engagement and student attitudes toward civic responsibility. ^ The study found no significant difference between the academic engagement and the civic responsibility attitudes of a high school service-learning project group and a high school comparison group with comparable school and similar demographic characteristics. One of the implications for educational practice and policy from the study results is a need to design and implement more powerful studies, studies implemented at many sites rather than just at two sites that were the basis of this study, and studies that investigate the research questions over longer time periods. Although it was not a focus of the study, the investigator concluded that service learning projects such as this might be more effective if they were better aligned with Dewey's principles. ^

Resource allocation in multi-user telecommunication networks

This dissertation discussed resource allocation mechanisms in several network topologies including infrastructure wireless network, non-infrastructure wireless network and wire-cum-wireless network. Different networks may have different resource constrains. Based on actual technologies and implementation models, utility function, game theory and a modern control algorithm have been introduced to balance power, bandwidth and customers' satisfaction in the system. ^ In infrastructure wireless networks, utility function was used in the Third Generation (3G) cellular network and the network was trying to maximize the total utility. In this dissertation, revenue maximization was set as an objective. Compared with the previous work on utility maximization, it is more practical to implement revenue maximization by the cellular network operators. The pricing strategies were studied and the algorithms were given to find the optimal price combination of power and rate to maximize the profit without degrading the Quality of Service (QoS) performance. ^ In non-infrastructure wireless networks, power capacity is limited by the small size of the nodes. In such a network, nodes need to transmit traffic not only for themselves but also for their neighbors, so power management become the most important issue for the network overall performance. Our innovative routing algorithm based on utility function, sets up a flexible framework for different users with different concerns in the same network. This algorithm allows users to make trade offs between multiple resource parameters. Its flexibility makes it a suitable solution for the large scale non-infrastructure network. This dissertation also covers non-cooperation problems. Through combining game theory and utility function, equilibrium points could be found among rational users which can enhance the cooperation in the network. ^ Finally, a wire-cum-wireless network architecture was introduced. This network architecture can support multiple services over multiple networks with smart resource allocation methods. Although a SONET-to-WiMAX case was used for the analysis, the mathematic procedure and resource allocation scheme could be universal solutions for all infrastructure, non-infrastructure and combined networks. ^

An approach for design and analysis of User-centric Communication Middleware

Today, the development of domain-specific communication applications is both time-consuming and error-prone because the low-level communication services provided by the existing systems and networks are primitive and often heterogeneous. Multimedia communication applications are typically built on top of low-level network abstractions such as TCP/UDP socket, SIP (Session Initiation Protocol) and RTP (Real-time Transport Protocol) APIs. The User-centric Communication Middleware (UCM) is proposed to encapsulate the networking complexity and heterogeneity of basic multimedia and multi-party communication for upper-layer communication applications. And UCM provides a unified user-centric communication service to diverse communication applications ranging from a simple phone call and video conferencing to specialized communication applications like disaster management and telemedicine. It makes it easier to the development of domain-specific communication applications. The UCM abstraction and API is proposed to achieve these goals. The dissertation also tries to integrate the formal method into UCM development process. The formal model is created for UCM using SAM methodology. Some design errors are found during model creation because the formal method forces to give the precise description of UCM. By using the SAM tool, formal UCM model is translated to Promela formula model. In the dissertation, some system properties are defined as temporal logic formulas. These temporal logic formulas are manually translated to promela formulas which are individually integrated with promela formula model of UCM and verified using SPIN tool. Formal analysis used here helps verify the system properties (for example multiparty multimedia protocol) and dig out the bugs of systems.

Abstractions to support dynamic adaptation of communication frameworks for user-centric communication

The convergence of data, audio and video on IP networks is changing the way individuals, groups and organizations communicate. This diversity of communication media presents opportunities for creating synergistic collaborative communications. This form of collaborative communication is however not without its challenges. The increasing number of communication service providers coupled with a combinatorial mix of offered services, varying Quality-of-Service and oscillating pricing of services increases the complexity for the user to manage and maintain ‘always best’ priced or performance services. Consumers have to manually manage and adapt their communication in line with differences in services across devices, networks and media while ensuring that the usage remain consistent with their intended goals. This dissertation proposes a novel user-centric approach to address this problem. The proposed approach aims to reduce the aforementioned complexity to the user by (1) providing high-level abstractions and a policy based methodology for automated selection of the communication services guided by high-level user policies and (2) providing services through the seamless integration of multiple communication service providers and providing an extensible framework to support the integration of multiple communication service providers. The approach was implemented in the Communication Virtual Machine (CVM), a model-driven technology for realizing communication applications. The CVM includes the Network Communication Broker, the layer responsible for providing a network-independent API to the upper layers of CVM. The initial prototype for the NCB supported only a single communication framework which limited the number, quality and types of services available. Experimental evaluation of the approach show the additional overhead of the approach is minimal compared to the individual communication services frameworks. Additionally the automated approach proposed out performed the individual communication services frameworks for cross framework switching.

Assessing the effects of professionals' career decision -making on their participation reasons in continuing education in Taiwan

The purpose of this study was to assess the relationship between working professionals' Career Decision-Making Self-Efficacy beliefs (CDMSE beliefs) and their reasons for participating in in-service master's level programs in Taiwan. ^ The data collection instruments used were Grotelueschen's (1985) Participation Reasons Scale (PRS), and Betz, Klein, and Taylor's (1996) Career Decision-Making Self-Efficacy-Short Form (CDMSE-SF), and a Demographic Data Form (DDF) developed specifically for this study. ^ Surveys were administered to 800 working professionals who participated in inservice master's level programs at 22 Taiwanese universities. The survey was conducted in May 2004. Data were analyzed by simple descriptive statistics, principal component factor analysis, and multiple regression. Four factors of participation reasons were found and five components of CDMSE beliefs were scored. ^ Five components of CDMSE beliefs are structured into the CDMSE-SF instrument: Self-Appraisal, Occupational Information, Goal-Selection, Planning, and Problem Solving. The reasons for participation found in this study were: Professional Improvement and Development, Professional Service, Personal Benefit and Job Security, and Professional Competence and Collegial Interaction. Pearson-product moment correlations revealed significant positive correlations between the five CDMSE subscales and the four factors of participation reasons. Multiple regression analysis revealed that participants' beliefs in their abilities to obtain information about occupations accounted for the preponderance of variance of scores on the Participation Reasons Scale (PRS). ^ This study concluded that professionals who believed that they were efficacious in obtaining information about occupations or professions tended to believe that the four reasons for participation represented by the factors of the PRS were important to them in making the decision to participate in continuing education. Additionally, it was noted that the reasons for participations for professionals who did not feel confident in their abilities to find such information could not be determined. ^ Recommendations are offered to assist those individuals responsible for developing recruiting programs in continuing education for professionals in Taiwan. These recommendations focus only on strategies intended to attract this target population of professionals who believe that they are efficacious in obtaining information about occupations. ^

Public Service Motivation in Public and Nonprofit Service Providers: The Cases of Belarus and Poland

The work motivation construct is central to the theory and practice of many social science disciplines. Yet, due to the novelty of validated measures appropriate for a deep cross-national comparison, studies that contrast different administrative regimes remain scarce. This study represents an initial empirical effort to validate the Public Service Motivation (PSM) instrument proposed by Kim and colleagues (2013) in a previously unstudied context. The two former communist countries analyzed in this dissertation—Belarus and Poland— followed diametrically opposite development strategies: a fully decentralized administrative regime in Poland and a highly centralized regime in Belarus. The employees (n = 677) of public and nonprofit organizations in the border regions of Podlaskie Wojewodstwo (Poland) and Hrodna Voblasc (Belarus) are the subjects of study. Confirmatory factor analysis revealed three dimensions of public service motivation in the two regions: compassion, self-sacrifice, and attraction to public service. The statistical models tested in this dissertation suggest that nonprofit sector employees exhibit higher levels of PSM than their public sector counterparts. Nonprofit sector employees also reveal a similar set of values and work attitudes across the countries. Thus, the study concludes that in terms of PSM, employees of nonprofit organizations constitute a homogenous group that exists atop the administrative regimes. However, the findings propose significant differences between public sector agencies across the two countries. Contrary to expectations, data suggest that organization centralization in Poland is equal to—or for some items even higher than—that of Belarus. We can conclude that the absence of administrative decentralization of service provision in a country does not necessarily undermine decentralized practices within organizations. Further analysis reveals strong correlations between organization centralization and PSM for the Polish sample. Meanwhile, in Belarus, correlations between organization centralization items and PSM are weak and mostly insignificant. The analysis indicates other factors beyond organization centralization that significantly impact PSM in both sectors. PSM of the employees in the studied region is highly correlated with their participation in religious practices, political parties, or labor unions as well as location of their organization in a capital and type of social service provided.

Delay-sensitive service request scheduling for cloud computing

Cloud computing realizes the long-held dream of converting computing capability into a type of utility. It has the potential to fundamentally change the landscape of the IT industry and our way of life. However, as cloud computing expanding substantially in both scale and scope, ensuring its sustainable growth is a critical problem. Service providers have long been suffering from high operational costs. Especially the costs associated with the skyrocketing power consumption of large data centers. In the meantime, while efficient power/energy utilization is indispensable for the sustainable growth of cloud computing, service providers must also satisfy a user's quality of service (QoS) requirements. This problem becomes even more challenging considering the increasingly stringent power/energy and QoS constraints, as well as other factors such as the highly dynamic, heterogeneous, and distributed nature of the computing infrastructures, etc. ^ In this dissertation, we study the problem of delay-sensitive cloud service scheduling for the sustainable development of cloud computing. We first focus our research on the development of scheduling methods for delay-sensitive cloud services on a single server with the goal of maximizing a service provider's profit. We then extend our study to scheduling cloud services in distributed environments. In particular, we develop a queue-based model and derive efficient request dispatching and processing decisions in a multi-electricity-market environment to improve the profits for service providers. We next study a problem of multi-tier service scheduling. By carefully assigning sub deadlines to the service tiers, our approach can significantly improve resource usage efficiencies with statistically guaranteed QoS. Finally, we study the power conscious resource provision problem for service requests with different QoS requirements. By properly sharing computing resources among different requests, our method statistically guarantees all QoS requirements with a minimized number of powered-on servers and thus the power consumptions. The significance of our research is that it is one part of the integrated effort from both industry and academia to ensure the sustainable growth of cloud computing as it continues to evolve and change our society profoundly.^

Delay-Sensitive Service Request Scheduling for Cloud Computing

Cloud computing realizes the long-held dream of converting computing capability into a type of utility. It has the potential to fundamentally change the landscape of the IT industry and our way of life. However, as cloud computing expanding substantially in both scale and scope, ensuring its sustainable growth is a critical problem. Service providers have long been suffering from high operational costs. Especially the costs associated with the skyrocketing power consumption of large data centers. In the meantime, while efficient power/energy utilization is indispensable for the sustainable growth of cloud computing, service providers must also satisfy a user's quality of service (QoS) requirements. This problem becomes even more challenging considering the increasingly stringent power/energy and QoS constraints, as well as other factors such as the highly dynamic, heterogeneous, and distributed nature of the computing infrastructures, etc. In this dissertation, we study the problem of delay-sensitive cloud service scheduling for the sustainable development of cloud computing. We first focus our research on the development of scheduling methods for delay-sensitive cloud services on a single server with the goal of maximizing a service provider's profit. We then extend our study to scheduling cloud services in distributed environments. In particular, we develop a queue-based model and derive efficient request dispatching and processing decisions in a multi-electricity-market environment to improve the profits for service providers. We next study a problem of multi-tier service scheduling. By carefully assigning sub deadlines to the service tiers, our approach can significantly improve resource usage efficiencies with statistically guaranteed QoS. Finally, we study the power conscious resource provision problem for service requests with different QoS requirements. By properly sharing computing resources among different requests, our method statistically guarantees all QoS requirements with a minimized number of powered-on servers and thus the power consumptions. The significance of our research is that it is one part of the integrated effort from both industry and academia to ensure the sustainable growth of cloud computing as it continues to evolve and change our society profoundly.

Public service motivation in public and nonprofit service providers: The cases of Belarus and Poland

The work motivation construct is central to the theory and practice of many social science disciplines. Yet, due to the novelty of validated measures appropriate for a deep cross-national comparison, studies that contrast different administrative regimes remain scarce. This study represents an initial empirical effort to validate the Public Service Motivation (PSM) instrument proposed by Kim and colleagues (2013) in a previously unstudied context. The two former communist countries analyzed in this dissertation—Belarus and Poland—followed diametrically opposite development strategies: a fully decentralized administrative regime in Poland and a highly centralized regime in Belarus. The employees (n = 677) of public and nonprofit organizations in the border regions of Podlaskie Wojewodstwo (Poland) and Hrodna Voblasc (Belarus) are the subjects of study. ^ Confirmatory factor analysis revealed three dimensions of public service motivation in the two regions: compassion, self-sacrifice, and attraction to public service. The statistical models tested in this dissertation suggest that nonprofit sector employees exhibit higher levels of PSM than their public sector counterparts. Nonprofit sector employees also reveal a similar set of values and work attitudes across the countries. Thus, the study concludes that in terms of PSM, employees of nonprofit organizations constitute a homogenous group that exists atop the administrative regimes. ^ However, the findings propose significant differences between public sector agencies across the two countries. Contrary to expectations, data suggest that organization centralization in Poland is equal to—or for some items even higher than—that of Belarus. We can conclude that the absence of administrative decentralization of service provision in a country does not necessarily undermine decentralized practices within organizations. Further analysis reveals strong correlations between organization centralization and PSM for the Polish sample. Meanwhile, in Belarus, correlations between organization centralization items and PSM are weak and mostly insignificant. ^ The analysis indicates other factors beyond organization centralization that significantly impact PSM in both sectors. PSM of the employees in the studied region is highly correlated with their participation in religious practices, political parties, or labor unions as well as location of their organization in a capital and type of social service provided.^