Proposed framework for estimating effort in design projects

2018 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 257-274 ◽  
Author(s):  
Henrique Benedetto ◽  
Maurício Moreira e Silva Bernardes ◽  
Darli Vieira

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to propose a framework to assist in the estimation of effort for projects in the field of design. The study first seeks supporting material to outline an understanding of how design professionals have access to time estimation information for quoting their projects. Design/methodology/approach The work was based on in-depth interviews conducted with 13 professionals from various design sectors that focused on understanding important elements of the project quotation process. Content analysis was performed on the information provided, and four dimensions were identified. A framework that included these dimensions was designed and validated using a focus group composed of professionals involved in project quotation. The framework includes the generation of a project network structure; identifying tasks and their duration for each design activity; and the ways in which this information remains updated and evolves through the incorporation of dynamic systems concepts. Findings The results of this study will be the production of an external knowledge base that designers can use as a basis for performing their profession. Originality/value This study is relevant because there is no information source that addresses tasks and associated durations on which design professionals can rely for the development of quotations.

2014 ◽  
Vol 33 (10) ◽  
pp. 906-918
Author(s):  
Jacob D. Vakkayil

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore identity work in response to various types of contradictions experienced by employees in outsourced software development in the initial stages of their careers. Design/methodology/approach – A qualitative methodology is adopted. Data are generated primarily through in-depth interviews with participants who had less than five years of work experience in outsourced software development. Findings – Four dimensions of contradictions in the setting are identified and behaviors associated with identity work driven by these contradictions are explored. While responses included regression, despair, resignation and disengagement, behaviors in the direction of adjustment and development were also reported. The importance of various kinds of resources for developmental identity work is pointed out. Originality/value – This work contributes to discussions on identity work by bringing to light how contradictions influence it in the context of outsourced software work.


2015 ◽  
Vol 30 (5) ◽  
pp. 565-581 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bruno Felix von Borell de Araujo ◽  
Cesar Augusto Tureta ◽  
Diana Abreu von Borell de Araujo

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore the tactics that mid-career professional working mothers use to improve their work-home balance. Design/methodology/approach – The qualitative study used in-depth interviews with 63 Brazilian professional working mothers aged between 37 and 55, having at least one child under the age of 18, and living in dual-career households. The interviews were content analyzed. Findings – The study reported four dimensions of boundary work tactics (behavioral, temporal, physical, and communicative) that mid-career working mothers adopted to construct a satisfying level of segmentation or integration between work and home. Research limitations/implications – The study suggests individual tactics for actively constructing a generalized work-home state that can be adopted by working mothers. Additionally, the authors suggest that HR managers should develop work-home balance programs that provide policies that adjust to the work-home boundary preferences for those mothers who want to integrate and segment these domains. Social implications – The authors hope this study can help mid-career working mothers to understand how they can interact actively with others in such a way that they can better answer their work and home demands. Originality/value – This study was the first to use boundary work tactics theory to explore how mid-career professional working mothers improve their work-home balance.


2019 ◽  
Vol 41 (4) ◽  
pp. 740-757 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sophie Hennekam ◽  
Subramaniam Ananthram ◽  
Steve McKenna

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate how individuals perceive and react to the involuntary demotion of a co-worker in their organisation. Design/methodology/approach The authors draw on 46 semi-structured in-depth interviews (23 dyads) with co-workers of demoted individuals. Findings The findings suggest that an individual’s observation of the demotion of a co-worker has three stages: their perception of fairness, their emotional reaction and their behavioural reaction. The perception of fairness concerned issues of distributive, procedural, interpersonal and informational justice. The emotional responses identified were feelings of disappointment/disillusion, uncertainty, vulnerability and anger. Finally, the behavioural reactions triggered by their emotional responses included expressions of voice, loyalty, exit and adaptation. Originality/value Perceptions of (in)justice perpetrated on others stimulate emotional and behavioural responses, which impacts organisational functioning. Managers should therefore pay attention to the way a demotion is perceived, not only by those directly concerned, but also by co-workers as observers.


2019 ◽  
Vol 32 (4) ◽  
pp. 455-471
Author(s):  
Jorge Cruz-Cárdenas ◽  
Jorge Guadalupe-Lanas ◽  
Ekaterina Zabelina ◽  
Andrés Palacio-Fierro ◽  
Margarita Velín-Fárez ◽  
...  

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to understand in-depth how consumers create value in their lives using WhatsApp, the leading mobile instant messaging (MIM) application. Design/methodology/approach The study adopts the perspective of customer-dominant logic (CDL) and uses a qualitative multimethod design involving 3 focus groups and 25 subsequent in-depth interviews. The research setting was Ecuador, a Latin American country. Findings Analysis and interpretation of the participants’ stories made it possible to identify and understand the creation of four types of value: maintaining and strengthening relationships; improving role performance; emotional support; and entertainment and fun. In addition, the present study proposes a conceptual model of consumer value creation as it applies to MIM. Practical implications Understanding the way consumers create value in their lives using MIM is important not only for organizations that offer MIM applications, but also for those companies that develop other applications for mobile phones or for those who wish to use MIM as an electronic word-of-mouth vehicle. Originality/value The current study is one of the first to address the topic of consumer behavior in the use of technologies from the perspective of CDL; this perspective enables an integrated qualitative vision of value creation in which the consumer is the protagonist.


2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 115-124
Author(s):  
Chunchun Wang

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to examine the transformations of prosthetic practices in China, as well as the daily experiences and dilemmas arising from the everchanging practices since 1949. On the basis of materials, this paper explores an everyday perspective to review the history of technology.Design/methodology/approachEthnography was collected with the application of participant observations, informal interviews and in-depth interviews during a 13-months study at a rehabilitation center in Chengdu, China. The literature on prosthetic manufacturing was also reviewed for this paper.FindingsChina's prosthetic technology seems to evolve from traditional to modern. However, this progressive narrative – innovation-based timeline (Edgerton, 2006, xi) – has been challenged by daily practices. Due to institutional pressures, prosthetists are in a dilemma of selectively using their knowledge to create one kind of device for all prosthesis users with a certain kind of disability, thereby regulating the physical and social experiences of prosthesis users. Besides, prosthesis users are accustomed to prostheses made with old techniques, and must correct themselves from old experiences to the daily practices recognized by the selected techniques.Originality/valueThis paper provides a cross-cultural case to reexamine Edgerton's criticism of the progressive and orderly innovation-centric technological narrative. More importantly, it reviews the history and practices of China's prosthetics from daily experiences rather than Edgerton's concentration on technology; therefore, it provides an everyday perspective for future research on technological transformations.


2014 ◽  
Vol 31 (2) ◽  
pp. 129-143
Author(s):  
Alexey Zhirabok ◽  
Alexey Shumsky ◽  
Yevgeny Bobko

Purpose – The purpose of this study is to investigate the problem of fault accommodation in bilinear dynamic systems. Design/methodology/approach – Solution to this problem is related to constructing the control law which provides full decoupling with respect to the fault effects. The so-called logic-dynamic approach will be used to solve this problem. The main steps of this approach are: replacing the initial bilinear system by certain linear one, solving the problem under consideration for this linear system by well-known linear methods with some restrictions, taking into account the bilinear term to correct the obtained linear solution. Findings – Existing conditions of the fault accommodation problem in a form of rank equalities and inequalities are formulated. Calculating relations for the control law and the auxiliary systems are given. Practical implications – The suggested method allows determining such a control law that preserves the main performances of the system in the faulty case, while the minor performances may degrade. Originality/value – The main advantage of the logic-dynamic approach is a possibility to solve the problem of fault accommodation for nonlinear systems by linear methods without decreasing the main properties of the obtained solution.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Claudia Benavides-Salazar ◽  
Cristina Iturrioz-Landart ◽  
Cristina Aragón-Amonarriz ◽  
Asunción Ibañez-Romero

Purpose This paper aims to investigate how entrepreneurial families (EFs) influence the development of entrepreneurial ecosystems (EEs) by using the family social capital (FSC) approach. Design/methodology/approach For this paper, the authors analyzed the Manizales EE as a case study. The authors used a variety of data collection procedures, including in-depth interviews with 26 entrepreneurs and mentors. Findings The authors established how EFs affect EE development, identifying how the FSC bridging mechanisms impact the EE’s social and cultural attributes, boosting entrepreneurial dynamics. Originality/value The results indicated the relevance of EFs’ embeddedness and the degree of the FSC institutionalization in promoting of entrepreneurship within the EEs.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Suman Choudhary ◽  
Kirti Mishra

Purpose This paper aims to explore the implications of virtual work arrangements on employee knowledge hiding (KH) behaviour and the different strategies of KH used by employees in these arrangements. Design/methodology/approach Following a grounded theory approach to understanding KH, 21 semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted with employees engaged in virtual working setups. The data collected from these informants were then analysed using qualitative methods. Findings The study revealed that virtual work arrangements increase employee KH behaviour because of three reasons: ease of hiding, digital burnout and loss of control. Further, the study found that rationalized hiding is the most commonly adopted strategy by employees engaged in virtual work arrangements, while inclinations towards evasive hiding strategy decrease in this arrangement. Originality/value This is the first study in knowledge management literature that seeks to explain KH in the virtual work context.


2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 476-494
Author(s):  
Ömer Torlak ◽  
Müjdat Özmen ◽  
Muhammet Ali Tiltay ◽  
Mahmut Sami İşlek ◽  
Ufuk Ay

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to theorize and empirically investigate the formation of consumer’s consumption ritual experiences and discourses associated with Feast of Sacrifice. Design/methodology/approach The authors have approached the data from assemblage theory perspective. By use of ethnographic participant observation and in-depth interviews, seven themes are uncovered and discussed: meaning of Qurban, preparation of the ritual, Qurban choice, meat, Qurban ritual, marketplace and framing of discourses. Findings This study provides a theoretical development in which it depicts that assemblage theory can be used in the context of religious rituals such as the Feast of Sacrifice. This suggests that parts forming the social phenomena include different meanings and functions in different assemblages to the ritual, which has a structure with a particular process, roles and content scenario. This implies that even the most structured social phenomena as religious rituals can be accepted as social assemblage where every individual experiences his/her own ritual with the parts that have ever-changing material and expressive roles. Originality/value This study will contribute to the literature on religious rituals and practices through viewing ritual as an assemblage including material and expressive features as well as human and non-human actors. Besides, this study aims to find out whether there is a constant consumer and the concept of ritual by focusing on buying experiences of consumer in Feast of Sacrifice in Turkey.


2016 ◽  
Vol 54 (4) ◽  
pp. 796-814 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohammad Jalalkamali ◽  
Anees Janee Ali ◽  
Sunghyup Sean Hyun ◽  
Davoud Nikbin

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationships between work values (cognitive, instrumental, social, and prestige), communication satisfaction (informational and relational), and employee job performance (task and contextual) in the context of international joint ventures (IJVs) in Iran. Design/methodology/approach – Validated measurement items for study variables were adopted from previous studies. Data were collected through surveys using a random sample of employees and their direct supervisors from the two largest IJVs in Iran’s automobile industry. Findings – According to the results, cognitive, instrumental, and prestige work values had significant effects on informational communication satisfaction. All dimensions of work values (cognitive, instrumental, social, and prestige) were significantly related to relational communication satisfaction. Both dimensions of communication satisfaction (informational and relational) were significantly related to both dimensions of employee job performance (contextual and task). Research limitations/implications – Data were collected from two IJVs in Iran, which may limit the generalization of results to non-IJVs in Iran. The results have important implications for IJV managers by providing valuable insights into adopting various effective tools in the workplace. Originality/value – Previous studies have generally considered work values as a two-dimensional construct. This study extends the literature by conceptualizing work values based on four dimensions (cognitive, instrumental, social, and prestige). No study has taken into consideration social and prestige values in an Asian context. In addition, few studies have investigated the relationships between work values and communication satisfaction.


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