Association between Information and Communication Technology Usage and the Quality of Sleep among School-Aged Children during a School Week

ilm OKM 2013

Rakennuksen tietomallien hyödyntämisen edellytykset rakentamisen valmistelu- ja rakennusvaiheessa

Työn tavoitteena oli tutkia, kuinka rakennuksen tietomallia voidaan hyödyntää rakennusliikkeen tuotannonsuunnittelu- ja rakennusvaiheessa sekä mitä sen hyödyntäminen edellyttää rakennuksen tietomallin informaatiosisällöltä. Tavoitteena oli myös tunnistaa tuotannonohjauksen ”pullonkauloja”, joissa kohdin toimintaa voitaisiin tietomallien avulla tehostaa. Työn teoreettisena taustana on aineettoman pääoman merkitys yrityksen kilpailuedun luojana, tietämyksen hallinta ja teknologian hyödyntäminen tietämyksen hallinnassa. Työssä tutkittiin rakennustuotannon johtamista ja tietomallintamisen hyödyntämistä rakentamisessa sekä tietomallien hyödynnettävyyden varmistamista yleisellä tasolla. Työssä tutustuttiin kohdeyritykseen tuotannonohjaukseen ja rakennusvaiheen tietomallien hyödyntämisen nykytilaan. Tuloksina voidaan todeta, että tietomallien tuotannonsuunnittelu- ja rakennusvaiheen tietomallien hyödyntämisen perusedellytys on tietomallien oikeellisuus sekä tietomallien ja perinteisten suunnitteludokumenttien yhdenmukainen tietosisältö. Tämän lisäksi tarvitaan suunnitellut toimintatavat ja toimivat tiedonjakelukanavat sekä kyky hyödyntää tieto- ja viestintäteknologiaa. Tietomallit eivät tämän tutkimuksen perusteella näytä luoneen tarvetta uudenlaisille tuotanto-organisaation roolituksille. Tietomalleilla uskotaan olevan positiivisia vaikutuksia rakennusvaiheen muutostenhallinnassa. Tuotantoorganisaation henkilöillä oli positiivisia odotuksia tietomallien hyödyntämisestä tuotannonohjauksessa. Tietomallien odotetaan tukevan erillisten suunnitelmien muodostamien kokonaisuuksien hahmottamista, rakennusvaiheen osapuolten yhteistyötä ja töiden yhteensovitusta sekä logistiikan suunnittelua ja vaikutusten havainnointia.

Backpacker 2.0 - Contemporary backpackers and their use of social media as an information and communication platform

Long-term independent budget travel to countries far away has become increasingly common over the last few decades, and backpacking has now entered the tourism mainstream. Nowadays, backpackers are a very important segment of the global travel market. Backpacking is a type of tourism that involves a lot of information search activities. The Internet has become a major source of information as well as a platform for tourism business transactions. It allows travelers to gain information very effortlessly and to learn about tourist destinations and products directly from other travelers in the form of electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM). Social media has penetrated and changed the backpacker market, as now modern travelers can stay connected to people at home, read online recommendations, and organize and book their trips very independently. In order to create a wider understanding on modern-day backpackers and their information search and share behavior in the Web 2.0 era, this thesis examined contemporary backpackers and their use of social media as an information and communication platform. In order to achieve this goal, three sub-objectives were identified: 1. to describe contemporary backpacker tourism 2. to examine contemporary backpackers’ travel information search and share behavior 3. to explore the impacts of new information and communications technologies and Web 2.0 on backpacker tourism The empirical data was gathered with an online survey, thus the method of analysis was mainly quantitative, and a qualitative method was used for a brief analysis of open questions. The research included both descriptive and analytical approaches, as the goal was to describe modern-day backpackers, and to examine possible interdependencies between information search and share behavior and background variables. The interdependencies were tested for statistical significance with the help of five research hypotheses. The results suggested that backpackers no longer fall under the original backpacker definitions described some decades ago. Now, they are mainly short-term travelers, whose trips resemble more those of mainstream tourists. They use communication technologies very actively, and particularly social media. Traditional information sources, mainly guide books and recommendations from friends, are of great importance to them but also eWOM sources are widely used in travel decision making. The use of each source varies according to the stage of the trip. All in all, Web 2.0 and new ICTs have transformed the backpacker tourism industry in many ways. Although the experience has become less authentic in some travelers’ eyes, the backpacker culture is still recognizable.

Re-shaping the Resourcing: Recruitment in Social Media

Social media is very current topic in today’s society and organisations. In the times of economic challenges, companies are looking for efficient ways to resource workforce. In addition, there is competition of competent workforce in employment markets. Employer image plays important role in recruitment as people seek to organisations they find interesting and have a reputation as a good employer. This study concerns the discussion on utilising social media in recruitment and employer image in a corporate enterprise. I will find solutions how to utilize social media in recruitment, in which channels and methods that can be done and what these actions require from a company doing social recruitment. I bring up the discussion and challenges that relate to starting to take social media into use in an organization overall and in recruitment. The qualitative material has been gathered with interviews of eighteen persons and the material available about the topic in the enterprise intranet. According to the study, social media is seen both as an opportunity to reach large amount of people quickly and cost-efficiently, but then again it brings news aspects for controlling the employer image and communication towards the audience. Taking social media into use as part of recruiters and managers daily work requires both finding the right channels and attention to the internal communication culture and resourcing. Social recruitment requires a strategy and a proper plan to be able to work in a company. There are several social media channels that enable to reach people, but they don’t do the social recruitment alone.

Integrating the export distribution channels after an acquisition

This thesis is based on studying integration synergies in a merger or acquisition situation with the interest in distribution channel integration. M&As seem to be forever popular and nowadays companies often use them as a certain kind of strategy to develop their business. M&As have attracted research for decades and also distribution in M&As has been found interesting. Moreover, research often concentrates to the horizontal M&A´s potential synergies that emerge in the integration process and so is the case also in this study as the core issue is to study the integration of the distribution channels and its potential synergies. This study concentrates on a single case, an acquisition which took place in 2011. The case consists of two Finnish companies operating in the same business field. Both of the companies are very export orientated, which gives this study its export view. As the companies operate in the same field this acquisition falls into the categorization of horizontal acquisition. The objective of the thesis is to study how the export channels could be integrated after an acquisition? This research question is divided again to three sub-questions asking how the distribution channels of the acquirer and acquired company are organized, what is pursued by the post-acquisition distribution channel integration and what are the integration challenges especially from the logistics point-of-view. The framework was built from the basis of the literature used in this thesis. The framework combines M&A process and distribution channels to a one united model which presents the progress of this thesis. The study was carried out as a qualitative research and as a holistic single case study. The data used in the research includes two interviews, other material from the case companies and also material of the companies collected by the author independently from different sources. There were many motives for the acquisition as usual. From the research results one can find that the integration process is still very ongoing and the synergies have not yet been fully discovered but also they are there to be found. The concentration of the research was in the export distribution which proved to be meaningful since the exports markets of the case companies were found to be quite complementary. The research results brought up also other issues concerning the post-acquisition integration process rather than the distribution channels and export. M&As are always a risky business. The final result can never be predicted. No matter how good the merging companies look on paper the practice is not the same. The acquisition process of this case has not ended yet and there lies potential synergy benefits to be discovered if enough effort is used to go through the process right.

Task Force on Librarians’ Competencies in Support of E-Research and Scholarly Communication

Presentation at Open Repositories 2014, Helsinki, Finland, June 9-13, 2014

A Survey about Integration of Journal Systems with Repositories in Brazil

Poster at Open Repositories 2014, Helsinki, Finland, June 9-13, 2014

The Human Communication Science Virtual Lab (HCS vLab): A repository microclimate in a rapidly evolving research-ecosystem

Presentation at Open Repositories 2014, Helsinki, Finland, June 9-13, 2014

Target audience and message alignment for integrated marketing communication of luxury products: entering the Chinese market

The purpose of this study is to identify opportunities to match marketing communication message strategies with the target audience characteristics in the Chinese luxury market entry context. Therefore, consumer behaviour and psychographic marketing segmentation fields are being reviewed in a holistic view in order to identify the similarities and connection points. Through the analysis of the messages in advertisements placed in a certain luxury and fine living magazine, message creation strategies are being anticipated.

The effect of celebrity CEO’s crisis communication to crisis outcome

The purpose of this this study is to examine the effects that a celebrity CEO’s crisis communication has on the crisis outcome and further on the quick decision response, resource mobilization and information flow during a crisis. The research was conducted using a multiple embedded case method, with four cases that represent different kinds of crisis that have all involved a celebrity CEO. The cases have been collected from various secondary data sources. The results of the study indicate that in crisis situations the celebrity CEO is expected to take responsibility of the crisis communication. The CEO needs to understand how and what to communicate in these situations and they need to make quick decisions even with limited information available. Crisis outcome is highly dependent on the golden hour crisis communication and there the performance of the celebrity CEO is crucial.

Connexin domains relevant to the chemical gating of gap junction channels

Most cells exchange ions and small metabolites via gap junction channels. These channels are made of two hemichannels (connexons), each formed by the radial arrangement of six connexin (Cx) proteins. Connexins span the bilayer four times (M1-M4) and have both amino- and carboxy-termini (NT, CT) at the cytoplasmic side of the membrane, forming two extracellular loops (E1, E2) and one inner (IL) loop. The channels are regulated by gates that close with cytosolic acidification (e.g., CO2 treatment) or increased calcium concentration, possibly via calmodulin activation. Although gap junction regulation is still unclear, connexin domains involved in gating are being defined. We have recently focused on the CO2 gating sensitivity of Cx32, Cx38 and various mutants and chimeras expressed in Xenopus oocytes and studied by double voltage clamp. Cx32 is weakly sensitive to CO2, whereas Cx38 is highly sensitive. A Cx32 chimera containing the second half of the inner loop (IL2) of Cx38 was as sensitive to CO2 as Cx38, indicating that this domain plays an important role. Deletion of CT by 84% did not affect CO2 sensitivity, but replacement of 5 arginines (R) with sparagines (N) at the beginning of CT (C1) greatly enhanced the CO2 sensitivity of Cx32. This suggests that whereas most of CT is irrelevant, positive charges of C1 maintain the CO2 sensitivity of Cx32 low. As a hypothesis we have proposed a model that involves charge interaction between negative residues of the beginning of IL1 and positive residues of either C1 or IL2. Open and closed channels would result from IL1-C1 and IL1-IL2 interactions, respectively

Regulation of gap junctions by protein phosphorylation

Gap junctions are constituted by intercellular channels and provide a pathway for transfer of ions and small molecules between adjacent cells of most tissues. The degree of intercellular coupling mediated by gap junctions depends on the number of gap junction channels and their activity may be a function of the state of phosphorylation of connexins, the structural subunit of gap junction channels. Protein phosphorylation has been proposed to control intercellular gap junctional communication at several steps from gene expression to protein degradation, including translational and post-translational modification of connexins (i.e., phosphorylation of the assembled channel acting as a gating mechanism) and assembly into and removal from the plasma membrane. Several connexins contain sites for phosphorylation for more than one protein kinase. These consensus sites vary between connexins and have been preferentially identified in the C-terminus. Changes in intercellular communication mediated by protein phosphorylation are believed to control various physiological tissue and cell functions as well as to be altered under pathological conditions.