Community resilience for urban flood-prone areas: a methods paper on criteria selection using the Fuzzy Delphi method

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sameer Ali ◽  
Abraham George
Keyword(s):  
Group Discussion ◽  
Community Resilience ◽  
Mitigation Strategies ◽  
Disaster Mitigation ◽  
Religious Institutions ◽  
Urban Flood ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Management Domain ◽  
Fuzzy Delphi ◽  
Analysis Technique

PurposeCommunity resilience decides a lot on a city's ability to withstand an external shock. It has evolved naturally from a bounce-back approach to a more robust and meaningful bounce-forward process. The study explores gaps found in community resilience and finds that criteria specific to different disasters are absent.Design/methodology/approachThe study uses a multi-criteria decision analysis technique, fuzzy Delphi, to select criteria. Derivation of the initial list of criteria was from a pilot study, a focus group discussion and other literature studies which was followed by the fuzzy Delphi survey.FindingsAfter two rounds of fuzzy Delphi analysis, the consensus among 65 experts resulted in selecting 125 sub-sub-criteria within seven criteria. Findings show that many criteria previously not discussed in other pieces of literature project high fuzzy scores such as “availability of drinking water post-disaster” and “cracking down fake news spreaders by the police”. In addition, positive cooperation between political and religious institutions have proven to expedite disaster recovery.Research limitations/implicationsThe future scope also includes weighing the selected criteria using analytical hierarchy process (AHP).Practical implicationsPolicymakers in the disaster management domain can use the study findings in implementing effective disaster mitigation strategies.Originality/valueThe selection of criteria is based on the community resilience shown by the Kerala community during the floods of 2018 and 2019 (in Kerala). Measures demonstrated by the community need to be studied, which will help foster disaster mitigation better in future scenarios.

Administrative risks challenging the adoption of smart contracts in construction projects

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Asli Pelin Gurgun ◽  
Kerim Koc
Keyword(s):  
Construction Projects ◽  
Risk Mitigation ◽  
Research Question ◽  
Group Discussion ◽  
Mitigation Strategies ◽  
Risk Category ◽  
Smart Contracts ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Smart Contract ◽  
Criteria Weights

PurposeAs a remedy to usually voluminous, complicated and not easily readable construction contracts, smart contracts can be considered as an effective and alternative solution. However, the construction industry is merely known as a frontrunner for fast adoption of recent technological advancements. Numerous administrative risks challenge construction companies to implement smart contracts. To highlight this issue, this study aims to assess the administrative risks of smart contract adoption in construction projects.Design/methodology/approachA literature survey is conducted to specify administrative risks of smart contracts followed by a pilot study to ensure that the framework is suitable to the research question. The criteria weights are calculated through the fuzzy analytical hierarchy process method, followed by a sensitivity analysis based on degree of fuzziness, which supports the robustness of the developed hierarchy and stability of the results. Then, a focus group discussion (FGD) is performed to discuss the mitigation strategies for the top-level risks in each risk category.FindingsThe final framework consists of 27 sub-criteria, which are categorized under five main criteria, namely, contractual, cultural, managerial, planning and relational. The findings show that (1) regulation change, (2) lack of a driving force, (3) works not accounted in planning, (4) shortcomings of current legal arrangements and (5) lack of dispute resolution mechanism are the top five risks challenging the adoption of smart contracts in construction projects. Risk mitigation strategies based on FGD show that improvements for the semi-automated smart contract drafting are considered more practicable compared to full automation.Originality/valueThe literature is limited in terms of the adoption of smart contracts, while the topic is receiving more attention recently. To support easy prevalence of smart contracts, this study attempts the most challenging aspects of smart contract adoption.

Fake news and brand management: a Delphi study of impact, vulnerability and mitigation

2019 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 246-254 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew Flostrand ◽  
Leyland Pitt ◽  
Jan Kietzmann
Keyword(s):  
Expert Opinion ◽  
Delphi Study ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Brand Management ◽  
Mitigation Strategies ◽  
Fake News ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Management Domain ◽  
International Panel ◽  
The Impact

Purpose Fake news is presently one of the most discussed phenomena in politics, social life and the world of business. This paper aims to report the aggregated opinions of 42 brand management academics on the level of threat to, the involvement of, and the available actions of brand managers resulting from fake news. Design/methodology/approach A Delphi study of 42 academics with peer-reviewed publications in the brand management domain. Findings The study found that on some dimensions (e.g. the culpability of brand managers for incentivizing fake news by sponsoring its sources), expert opinion varied greatly. Other dimensions (e.g. whether the impact of fake news on brand management is increasing) reached a high level of consensus. The general findings indicate that fake news is an increasing phenomenon. Service brands are most at risk, but brand management generally is need of improving or implementing, fake news mitigation strategies. Research limitations/implications Widely diverse opinions revealed the need for conclusive research on the questions of: whether brands suffer damage from sponsoring fake news, whether fake news production is supported by advertising and whether more extensive use of internet facilitated direct interactions with the public through crowdsourcing increased vulnerability. Practical implications Experts agreed that practitioners must become more adept with contemporary tools such as fake news site blacklists, and much more aware of identifying and mitigating the brand vulnerabilities to fake news. Social implications A noteworthy breadth of expert opinion was revealed as to whether embellished or fabricated brand narratives can be read as fake news, inviting the question as to whether brands now be held to higher standards of communication integrity. Originality/value This paper provides a broad-shallow exploratory overview of the professional opinions of a large international panel of brand management academics on how the recent arrival of industrial fake news does, and will, impact this field.

A proposed hybrid root cause analysis technique for quality management

2020 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Dharyll Prince Abellana
Keyword(s):  
Quality Management ◽  
Structural Model ◽  
Group Discussion ◽  
Root Cause Analysis ◽  
Cause Analysis ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Root Cause ◽  
Analysis Technique ◽  
Proposed Model ◽  
Cause And Effect Diagram

PurposeThis paper attempts to develop a hybrid cause and effect diagram (CED) and interpretative structural model (ISM) for root cause analysis in quality management. The proposed model overcomes the weakness of the CED in reliably articulating hierarchical cause–effect Relationships.Design/methodology/approachA focus group discussion (FGD) among quality experts in the case company to establish relationships between the determined causes.FindingsThe hybridization of the CED and ISM allowed the causes to be ordered more clearly to determine potential root causes as well as presenting these causes more comprehensively.Originality/valueThe paper has been one of the very few attempts to improve the CED approach. As such, this paper employs the ability of the ISM to order concepts in a hierarchical structure, which is useful in determining root causes.

Measuring eco-roof mitigation on flash floods via GIS simulation

2016 ◽  
Vol 6 (4) ◽  
pp. 415-427 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chunlu Liu ◽  
Yan Li
Keyword(s):  
Stormwater Management ◽  
Green Roofs ◽  
Flash Floods ◽  
Disaster Mitigation ◽  
Geographical Information ◽  
Management Tool ◽  
Flood Inundation ◽  
Urban Flood ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Flooding Risk

Purpose The rapid and ongoing expansion of urbanised impervious areas could lead to more frequent flood inundation in urban flood-prone regions. Nowadays, urban flood inundation induced by rainstorm is an expensive natural disaster in many countries. In order to reduce the flooding risk, eco-roof systems (or green roof systems) could be considered as an effective mechanism of mitigating flooding disasters through their rainwater retention capability. However, there is still a lack of examining the stormwater management tool. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the effects on flooding disaster from extensive green roofs. Design/methodology/approach Based on geographical information system (GIS) simulation, this research presents a frame of assessing eco-roof impacts on urban flash floods. The approach addresses both urban rainfall-runoff and underground hydrologic models for traditional impervious and green roofs. Deakin University’s Geelong Waurn Ponds campus is chosen as a study case. GIS technologies are then utilised to visualise and analyse the effects on flood inundation from surface properties of building roofs. Findings The results reveal that the eco-roof systems generate varying degrees of mitigation of urban flood inundation with different return period storms. Originality/value Although the eco-roof technology is considered as an effective stormwater management tool, it is not commonly adopted and examined in urban floods. This study will bring benefits to urban planners for raising awareness of hazard impacts and to construction technicians for considering disaster mitigation via roof technologies. The approach proposed here could be used for the disaster mitigation in future urban planning.

Risk and culture: the case of typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines

2016 ◽  
Vol 25 (5) ◽  
pp. 701-714 ◽  
Author(s):  
Soledad Natalia Dalisay ◽  
Mylene T. De Guzman
Keyword(s):  
San Francisco ◽  
Group Discussion ◽  
Storm Surges ◽  
The Philippines ◽  
Disaster Mitigation ◽  
Community Members ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Cultural Contexts ◽  
Engineering And Technology ◽  
Cast Doubt

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to look into the socio-cultural contexts that shaped people’s evacuation decisions during typhoon Haiyan in three affected areas in the Philippines. Design/methodology/approach This is a multi-sited ethnography that utilized interviews, focus group discussion and participatory risk mapping among selected women and men in areas affected by typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines. Findings Coastal communities encounter threats from storm surges as brought about by typhoons. During such periods, disaster evacuation programs are implemented. In some instances, evacuation programs are met with resistance from community members. Such resistance has been attributed to the people’s hard headedness and ignorance of the potential impacts of living in hazard prone areas. This paper argues that it is not solely for these reasons that people refused to evacuate. Results showed that hesitance may also be due to other considerations and priorities vital to people. It is also because people had faith in the knowledge and strategies that they were able to develop by engaging with hazards through time. Furthermore, previous experiences with disaster evacuation programs cast doubt on their value in saving their lives. Life in the evacuation areas can be as dangerous if not more compared with living in their coastal homes. Some of the informants believed that they were being moved from hazard zones to death zones. This paper ends with recommendations for the development of evacuation programs that build people’s resilience while taking into consideration the local moral world in identified hazard zones in the Philippines. Research limitations/implications The study focused on three areas affected by typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines, namely, Tacloban City, Guiuan, Eastern Samar, and San Francisco, Cebu. Originality/value Most research on disaster mitigation looked into the engineering and technology aspects. This paper looks into the socio-cultural contexts of disaster evacuation.

Sustainable supply chain management

2015 ◽  
Vol 115 (3) ◽  
pp. 436-461 ◽  
Author(s):  
MingLang Tseng ◽  
Ming Lim ◽  
Wai Peng Wong
Keyword(s):  
Supply Chain ◽  
Supply Chain Management ◽  
Balanced Scorecard ◽  
Evaluation Model ◽  
Corporate Sustainability ◽  
Sustainable Supply Chain ◽  
Chain Management ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Sustainable Supply Chain Management ◽  
Fuzzy Delphi

Purpose – Assessing a measure of sustainable supply chain management (SSCM) performance is currently a key challenge. The literature on SSCM is very limited and performance measures need to have a systematic framework. The recently developed balanced scorecard (BSC) is a measurement system that requires a balanced set of financial and non-financial measures. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the SSCM performance based on four aspects i.e. sustainability, internal operations, learning and growth, and stakeholder. Design/methodology/approach – This paper developed a BSC hierarchical network for SSCM in a close-loop hierarchical structure. A generalized quantitative evaluation model based on the Fuzzy Delphi Method (FDM) and Analytical Network Process (ANP) were then used to consider both the interdependence among measures and the fuzziness of subjective measures in SSCM. Findings – The results of this study indicate that the top-ranking aspect to consider is that of stakeholders, and the top five criteria are green design, corporate sustainability, strategic planning for environmental management, supplier cost-saving initiatives and market share. Originality/value – The main contributions of this study are twofold. First, this paper provides valuable support for supply chain stakeholders regarding the nature of network hierarchical relations with qualitative and quantitative scales. Second, this paper improves practical performance and enhances management effectiveness for SSCM.

Digital transformation of organizations: what do we know and where to go next?

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Monika Jedynak ◽  
Wojciech Czakon ◽  
Aneta Kuźniarska ◽  
Karolina Mania
Keyword(s):  
Literature Review ◽  
Systematic Literature Review ◽  
Business Models ◽  
Grey Literature ◽  
Blind Spot ◽  
Digital Transformation ◽  
Academic Disciplines ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Management Domain

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to identify the development of the digital transformation literature and to the systematic literature review methodology.Design/methodology/approachThe authors run a systematic literature review, followed by a rigorous thematic analysis of both academic and grey literature dataset, in order to develop a conceptual map of organizations' digital transformation. The authors aggregate the concepts and topics identified across the literature to find that they overwhelmingly tackle digital business models. At the same time, the authors identify a major blind spot resulting from ignoring the organization itself as a unit of analysis.FindingsThe findings show that developing a digital theory of the organization or the theory of digitally transformed organization is a major challenge to management researchers. The analysis exposed numerous research gaps that can be helpful for future research directions.Originality/valueDigital transformation research enjoys an increasingly rapid rise to recognition across many academic disciplines and strongly impacts the management domain. adopt the view that published documents reflect the collective understanding of a phenomenon. This paper contributes to filtering the digital transformation literature, clarify complex relation between digital transformations of organizations and identify the key blind points.

Teachers' learning in extraordinary times: shifting to a digitally facilitated approach to lesson study

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
James Calleja ◽  
Patrick Camilleri
Keyword(s):  
Technology Use ◽  
Lesson Study ◽  
Group Discussion ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Self Reflection ◽  
Opportunities For Learning ◽  
Study Process ◽  
The University ◽  
Practical Implications

PurposeThe research reported in this paper brings forth the experiences of three teachers working in different schools. These teachers learned about lesson study through a course offered at the University of Malta while, at the same time, leading a lesson study with colleagues at their school. With the COVID-19 outbreak, these teachers had, out of necessity, to adopt and accommodate for their lesson study to an exclusive online approach. This paper, hence, focuses on teachers' learning as they shifted their lesson study online.Design/methodology/approachThis paper presents a case study that delves into the experiences and perceptual insights that these teachers manifested in shifting to an exclusive online lesson study situation. Data collection is derived from a focus group discussion, teacher reflective entries and detailed reports documenting the lesson study process and experiences. Employing technological frames as the theoretical lens, a description-analysis-interpretation approach was employed to analyse and interpret reflections and grounded experiential perceptions that the respondents disclosed during their lesson study journey.FindingsNotwithstanding their initial discerned sense of loss and unpreparedness of being constrained to migrate lesson study to exclusive online means, teachers eventually recognised that digitally mediated collaborative practices enhanced self-reflection about the lesson study process. Therefore, the extraordinary situation that the teachers in this study experienced not only disrupted their modus operandi but also allowed them to discern new opportunities for learning about digital technology use in lesson study.Practical implicationsDisruption, brought about by unforeseen circumstances, takes teachers and professional development facilitators out of their comfort zones, invariably helping them grow out of their limitations and rethink lesson study practices.Originality/valueIntentionally driven disruptions prompt teachers to resolve their dissatisfactory situations by thinking out of the box, eventually helping them to improve their professional practices.

Does tax policy fit in the portfolio of COVID-19 responses?

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Kerrie Sadiq ◽  
Richard Krever
Keyword(s):  
Tax Policy ◽  
Value Added ◽  
Mitigation Strategies ◽  
Income Support ◽  
Policy Reforms ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Goods And Services ◽  
Policy Responses ◽  
Tax Regimes ◽  
The Uk

Purpose Tax policymakers are currently navigating a path through a delicate dialectic of macro- and micro-level policy responses to the economic dislocation of the COVID-19 pandemic. The purpose of this paper is to examine initial tax measures that are aimed at helping taxpayers needing liquidity, solvency and income support. Design/methodology/approach This study undertakes a review of key tax policy responses of six jurisdictions across the globe that have similar tax regimes and virus mitigation strategies (albeit with different outcomes). Key initiatives implemented from February to April 2020 by Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Singapore, South Africa and the UK are examined. Findings This study indicates that tax concessions are a crude and mostly ineffective way of assisting individuals and enterprises in difficulty. In the longer term, if the crisis prompts desirable reforms such as extending the recognition of tax losses, the income tax system will emerge fairer and more efficient. Practical implications An investigation of the short-term reforms announced relating to asset write-offs, tax deferral, tax losses and goods and services tax/value-added tax rates in light of the liquidity, income support and stimulus objectives shows that in some cases the policies may have been misguided. The findings can be used by policymakers as the basis for designing better targeted alternative non-tax responses. Originality/value Jurisdictional responses to tax policy reforms during a modern period of significant economic dislocation have yet to be documented in the literature. Specifically, this paper highlights the limitations of tax policy initiatives as a response to financial hardship.

Exploring the effects of studentification on neighbourhoods in Nigeria

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Oluseyi Adebowale ◽  
Fredrick Simpeh
Keyword(s):  
Research Area ◽  
Student Housing ◽  
Research Strategy ◽  
The Body ◽  
Exploratory Research ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Related Factors ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Positive Effects ◽  
Analysis Technique

Purpose The increase in enrolment into higher education and the inadequate student housing in educational institutions has led to the growth of off-campus private student housing in Nigeria. Studentification as a research area has received attention in most countries in the global North, whereas there is dearth of studies on studentification in Nigeria. Therefore, this paper aims to examine the effects of studentification on the residents of selected Nigerian communities. Design/methodology/approach The study adopted an exploratory research strategy. Semi-structured interviews were conducted to gather qualitative data from respondents, who were landlords and indigenous tenants of the host communities of two tertiary institutions. The data collected were analysed by means of the thematic analysis technique. Findings It became evident that studentification has some effects on the communities. Significant positive effects are business patronage and liveliness, while socio-economic-related factors, which include indecent clothing and theft, were noted as the most significant negative factors. Practical implications Implementing the outcomes of this study will contribute to promoting societal ethical values and economic prosperity of the communities. Originality/value The paper contributes to building the body of knowledge on the effect of studentification in the Nigerian context.

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