Designing an E-Mail Prototype to Enhance Effective Communication and Task Management: A Case Study

This paper deals with communicational breakdowns and misunderstandings in computer mediated communication (CMC) and ways to recover from them or to prevent them. The paper describes a case study of CMC conducted in a company named Artigiani. We observed communication and conducted content analysis of e-mail messages, focusing on message exchanges between customer service representatives (CSRs) and their contacts. In addition to task management difficulties, we identified communication breakdowns that result from differences between perspectives, and from the lack of contextual information, mainly technical background and professional jargon at the customers’ side. We examined possible ways to enhance CMC and accordingly designed a prototype for an e-mail user interface that emphasizes a communicational strategy called contextualization as a central component for obtaining effective communication and for supporting effective management and control of organizational activities, especially handling orders, price quoting, and monitoring the supply and installation of products.

Social Movement Unionism or Social Justice Unionism? Disentangling Theoretical Confusion within the Global Labor Movement

After the election of John Sweeney as President of the AFL-CIO in October 1995, activists and supportive intellectuals in the United States began thinking about how to revitalize the almost moribund American labor movement. A key part of this literature has revolved around the concept of “social movement unionism.” This term touched a nerve, and has garnered widespread usage in North America over the past two decades. However, most researchers using this term have no idea that it was initially developed to understand the new unionism developed by members of specific labor movements in Brazil, the Philippines and South Africa, a type of unionism qualitatively different from that found in North America. This paper argues that the term “social movement unionism” should be confined only to labor organizations developing the same type of unionism, wherever in the world such should be found. Accordingly, this concept should not be utilized in North America today as there are no labor centers or unions present that are developing this type of trade unionism. It is important to clarify this confusion because it is leads to incorrect understandings and miscommunication. Accordingly, the current situation—whereby the same term is used to refer to two qualitatively different social phenomena —theoretically works against efforts to build global labor solidarity. What about the progressive, broad-scope unionism emerging in North America over the past two decades? Taking a page from labor history, this article argues that the proper precedent is progressive unionism developed by the United Packinghouse Workers of America, CIO, and others, and therefore should be referred to as “social justice unionism.” An Appendix provides a measurement tool. The argument is empirically grounded and theoretically developed, allowing us to better understand trade unionism around the globe.

Communication and behavior in high reliability organizations: An Analysis of Communication in Civil Aviation

Communication can be seen as one of the most important features to manage conflicts and the stress of the work teams that operate in environments with strong pressure, complex operations and continuous risk, which are aspects that characterize a high reliability organization. This article aims to highlight the importance of communication in high-reliability organizations, having as object of study the accidents and incidents in civil aviation area. It refers to a qualitative research, outlined by documental analysis based on investigations conducted by the Federal Aviation Administration and the Center of Investigation and Prevention of Aeronautical Accidents. The results point out that human errors account for 60 to 80 percent of accidents and incidents. Most of these occurrences are attributed to miscommunication between the professionals involved with the air and ground operation, such as pilots, crewmembers and maintenance staff, and flight controllers. Inappropriate tone of voice usage, difficulties to understand different accents between the issuer and the receiver or even difficulty to perceive red flags between the lines of verbal and non-verbal communication, are elements that contribute to the fata of understanding between people involved in the operation. As a research limitation this present research pointed out a lack of a special category of "interpersonal communications failures" in the official agency reports. So, the researchers must take the conceptual definition of "social ability", communication implied, to classify behaviors and communication matters accordingly. Other research finding indicates that communication is superficially approached in the contents of air operations courses what could mitigate the lack of communications skills as a social ability. Part of the research findings refers to the contents of communication skills development into the program to train professional involved in air flight and ground operations. So, it is expected that this present article gives an appropriate highlight towards the improvement of flight operations training programs. Developing communication skills among work teams in high reliability organizations can contribute to mitigate stress, accidents and incidents in Civil Aviation Field. The original contribution of this article is the proposal of the main contents that should be developed in a Communication Skills Training Program, specially addressed to Civil Aviation operations.

Erros de comunicação entre Protésicos e Médicos Dentistas

Este trabalho consiste numa revisão de literatura sobre os erros de comunicação entre dois grupos de profissionais, cujos trabalhos na área da Medicina Dentária se complementam: o Médico Dentista (MD) e o Técnico de Prótese Dentária (TPD). A comunicação entre estes dois grupos é o um fator muito importante e deve existir uma boa sinergia para que o trabalho seja executado com o maior rigor e qualidade possível. Esta pressupõe aspetos funcionais, biomecânicos, estruturais e estéticos, da reabilitação a realizar, potenciando deste modo a máxima de qualquer tratamento médico: a satisfação do paciente. O objetivo que se propõe é expor os erros decorrentes de falhas de comunicação e alertar os MD e TPD para a mudança do nível de colaboração. É também objetivo desmistificar a postura dos MD em relação à Prótese Dentária. O culminar deste trabalho de equipa traduz-se na promoção da Saúde Oral e melhor qualidade de vida dos pacientes. As falhas na comunicação são o principal entrave ao sucesso da reabilitação protética, pois impedem a conjugação dos conhecimentos científicos e técnicos de ambos os profissionais perpetuando erros ao longo das etapas de fabrico. Com base numa pesquisa relacionada com a comunicação entre MD e TPD, utilizando-se as palavras-chave “dentist technician relationship”, “dentist technician communication”, “dentist technician survey”, “dental fixed architecture” e “dental technicians fabrication”, através dos motores de busca Pubmed, Scielo e Science Direct, foi realizada uma revisão de literatura com o intuito de avaliar a comunicação entre TPD e MD. Procurou-se caracterizar que tipos de erros que podem ser cometidos, bem como formas para melhorar a comunicação. Após a revisão, constatou-se que existe uma grande deficiência a nível de comunicação entre MD e TPD e que tal facto induz a que um trabalho perca em termos de qualidade. Também se verificou que os erros cometidos são a nível académico e profissional, proporcionando a que o trabalho final resulte na insatisfação do paciente, bem como dos profissionais envolvidos.

Caracterização da captura incidental de tartarugas marinhas pela pesca de espinhel pelágico no Nordeste do Brasil

The marine turtles biological characteristics and the impact they have been suffering in consequence of human activities have caused in the last decades the decrease of populations to unsustainable levels. All four of the species described in this paper are registered as endangered in a list by IUCN: Caretta caretta, Lepidochelys olivacea, Chelonia mydas, Dermochelys coriacea. The main causes of such impact include several fishing activities, mostly the surface longline. This paper discusses the monitoring of two foreigner longline fleet along the North East Brazilian coast between October of 2004 and September of 2005. Both operated in the West South Atlantic, one using the Chinese technique and the other the American. The American method s target species is the swordfish (Xiphias gladius), and it is characterized by using squid as bait, J 9/0 offset 5º hook, light sticks and night soaking. It also operates in shallower waters than the Chinese method. The source of information about the efforts and the catches came from onboard observers and were used to calculate the catching rate of turtles over 1000 hooks (CPUE). The American equipment caught more turtles (CPUE = 0,059; N= 103), mainly D. coriacea, while the Chinese longline caught mainly the L. olivacea and presented a CPUE= 0,018 (N= 89). The hooks were most frequently found attached to the mouth of C. caretta, C. mydas, and L. olivacea. The D. coriacea were most frequently caught by hooks externally attached to different parts of their body. There was no significant difference between the hook type catching and most turtles were still alive when released. The results suggest a greater potential of turtle catching by the American method. Besides the statistic tests have showed less interaction between the Chinese equipment and marine turtles, the catches of this fishing technique could have been underestimated due to miscommunication between the onboard observer and the vessel s crew plus the retrieve of the longline during night time

El trabajo social y la educación de Bachillerato General Unificado (BUG)

El presente trabajo monográfico consiste en establecer la importancia que tiene la intervención del Trabajo Social dentro de las instituciones públicas que brindan el servicio de educación en los niveles de Bachillerato General Unificado BGU. Como lo establecen (Merino & Namicela, 2012) dentro de estas instituciones (Colegios y/o Unidades Educativas) se identifican varias problemáticas como el acoso escolar, el consumo, uso y abuso de sustancias psicotrópicas, problemas intrafamiliares (falta de comunicación, negligencia, déficit económico, etc.) que dificultan al proceso educativo de los estudiantes, causan bajo rendimiento académico, abandono y/o deserción escolar; que finalmente repercute al desarrollo económico y social de cada persona y de la sociedad ecuatoriana en general. Ante esta problemática el Estado ecuatoriano ha implementado varios instrumentos legales, empezando desde la reforma de la Constitución en el 2008, que significo un cambio fundamental para el sistema educativo ecuatoriano, pues a partir de este hecho, se han creado y reformulado normas legales que especifican y garantizan el acceso a una educación integral de mayor calidad y calidez. Dentro de esta apuesta gubernamental para mejorar el acceso y la calidad educativa aparece la intervención del Trabajo Social como la profesión que investiga procesos concretos relacionados a las condiciones de vida de los individuos, sus necesidades y potencialidades para que atreves de sus funciones reconozca y establezca soluciones a problemas entre las interacciones humanas e institucionales, a fin de lograr un mayor bienestar social de los estudiantes.

Caracterização da captura incidental de tartarugas marinhas pela pesca de espinhel pelágico no Nordeste do Brasil

The marine turtles biological characteristics and the impact they have been suffering in consequence of human activities have caused in the last decades the decrease of populations to unsustainable levels. All four of the species described in this paper are registered as endangered in a list by IUCN: Caretta caretta, Lepidochelys olivacea, Chelonia mydas, Dermochelys coriacea. The main causes of such impact include several fishing activities, mostly the surface longline. This paper discusses the monitoring of two foreigner longline fleet along the North East Brazilian coast between October of 2004 and September of 2005. Both operated in the West South Atlantic, one using the Chinese technique and the other the American. The American method s target species is the swordfish (Xiphias gladius), and it is characterized by using squid as bait, J 9/0 offset 5º hook, light sticks and night soaking. It also operates in shallower waters than the Chinese method. The source of information about the efforts and the catches came from onboard observers and were used to calculate the catching rate of turtles over 1000 hooks (CPUE). The American equipment caught more turtles (CPUE = 0,059; N= 103), mainly D. coriacea, while the Chinese longline caught mainly the L. olivacea and presented a CPUE= 0,018 (N= 89). The hooks were most frequently found attached to the mouth of C. caretta, C. mydas, and L. olivacea. The D. coriacea were most frequently caught by hooks externally attached to different parts of their body. There was no significant difference between the hook type catching and most turtles were still alive when released. The results suggest a greater potential of turtle catching by the American method. Besides the statistic tests have showed less interaction between the Chinese equipment and marine turtles, the catches of this fishing technique could have been underestimated due to miscommunication between the onboard observer and the vessel s crew plus the retrieve of the longline during night time