Impact of Lean Production on Perceived Job Autonomy and Job Satisfaction: An Experimental Study

Previous studies have indicated positive and negative effects of lean production on employees’ perceived work characteristics and job attitudes. The most detrimental consequence of lean production is a decrease in the perceived job autonomy of workshop employees. To reduce these negative consequences, we propose human resource practices for integration with lean production. Drawing on the job characteristics model, we hypothesized that the implementation of lean production combined with human resource practices would enhance perceived job autonomy, job satisfaction, and operational performance. To evaluate our hypotheses, we used an experimental design consisting of a simulation game that mimics a manufacturing company. We implemented lean production combined with human resource practices in this simulated company. The results indicated a significant increase in perceived job autonomy, job satisfaction, and operational performance. Moreover, the results revealed a positive relationship between job satisfaction and operational performance.     

The Relationship Between Facebook Use and Well‐Being Depends on Communication Type and Tie Strength

An extensive literature shows that social relationships influence psychological well‐being, but the underlying mechanisms remain unclear. We test predictions about online interactions and well‐being made by theories of belongingness, relationship maintenance, relational investment, social support, and social comparison. An opt‐in panel study of 1,910 Facebook users linked self‐reported measures of well‐being to counts of respondents' Facebook activities from server logs. Specific uses of the site were associated with improvements in well‐being: Receiving targeted, composed communication from strong ties was associated with improvements in well‐being while viewing friends' wide‐audience broadcasts and receiving one‐click feedback were not. These results suggest that people derive benefits from online communication, as long it comes from people they care about and has been tailored for them.     

Multimodal Connectedness and Quality of Life: Examining the Influences of Technology Adoption and Interpersonal Communication on Well‐Being Across the Life Span

This study examined the relationship between the number of communication technologies used for social interactions (i.e., multimodal connectedness) and well‐being across the lifespan. Consistent with the assumptions of media multiplexity, multimodal connectedness and frequency of strong‐tie communication enhanced well‐being, but only for older‐age cohorts (35–54 and 55–70+). For young adults (18–34), multimodal connectedness and frequency of weak‐tie communication diminished well‐being. The findings are framed in terms of differing motives for maintaining social relations across the lifespan, as maintenance of relationships with strong ties become more important and the number of weak ties contract as people age.     

The Relationships among Internal Marketing,Job Satisfaction,Relationship Marketing,Customer Orientation,and Organizational Performance: An Empirical Study of TFT‐LCD Companies in Taiwan

The thin film technology liquid‐crystal displays (TFT‐LCD) industry has become one of the main industries in Taiwan. In this research, we take Taiwanese TFT‐LCD industrial companies as the research objects and try to identify the interrelationships among internal marketing, job satisfaction, relationship marketing, customer orientation, and organizational performance. Although these companies are classified as part of the manufacturing industry, it is suggested that their service components could be the focus of greater attention to enhance the success of their business operations. Analytical results indicate that internal marketing, job satisfaction, and customer orientation have significant influences on relationship marketing as well as the organizational performance of TFT‐LCD manufacturing companies. Therefore, Taiwan TFT‐LCD manufacturing companies need to implement relationship marketing continuously, increase employee job satisfaction, and inspire employees to become more customer oriented in order to increase productivity. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Predictors of Online Health Information Seeking Among Women with Breast Cancer: The Role of Social Support Perception and Emotional Well‐Being

This study attempts to examine the role of social support perception and emotional well‐being on online information seeking among cancer patients within the context of CHESS, a well‐established Interactive Cancer Communication System (ICCS). Factor and regression analyses conducted among 231 breast cancer patients revealed that social support perception and emotional well‐being interacted with each other to influence online health information seeking. Patients with low social support perception and high emotional well‐being were most likely to seek health information, whereas patients with high social support perception and high emotional well‐being sought out the same information least. Practical implications of the study findings are further discussed.     

How to Improve E‐Satisfaction and E‐Loyalty and Strengthen the Links Between Them: Value From Regulatory Fit

This article aims to investigate how regulatory fit can improve e‐satisfaction and e‐loyalty and strengthen the links between e‐satisfaction and both its antecedents (two technology acceptance model factors and the perceived quality of e‐shopping) and consequence (e‐loyalty). The research model and hypotheses are constructed through a literature review. An empirical study is performed to test the proposed research model, using survey research. The data are gathered via a questionnaire, which is developed on the basis of prior empirical studies. Results from this study point to the following: first, the two technology acceptance model factors and the perceived quality of e‐shopping significantly affect e‐satisfaction, which in turn e‐loyalty. Second, regulatory fit not only improves e‐satisfaction and e‐loyalty but also strengthens the links between e‐satisfaction and both its antecedents and consequence. On the basis of these findings, the implications are discussed and directions for future research are highlighted.     

产品协同设计的任务分解与耦合机制研究

在产品协同设计的初始阶段,合理的任务分解有利于协同设计的顺利进行,从而提高设计效率与质量。文章研究了任务的分解与耦合策略,采用按功能划分和按结构划分相结合的方式,并根据设计组的满意度对产品协同设计的任务进行了分解,用设计结构矩阵描述设计任务的耦合关系,提出了利用图论中基于邻接矩阵的深度优先搜索算法求出耦合任务集的原理与方法,并通过具体实例验证了该方法。     

Translating the impact of knowledge management into knowledge‐based innovation: The neglected and mediating role of knowledge‐worker satisfaction

The purpose of knowledge management is innovation. However, this study proposes that the existence of knowledge management in the knowledge‐worker's work environment can nurture the overall satisfaction of knowledge worker. As the ultimate purpose of knowledge management is innovation performance, therefore, the satisfaction of knowledge worker as an outcome of knowledge management should be greater innovation performance. Consequently, the purpose of this study is to test the mediating role of satisfaction of knowledge worker between knowledge management and innovation. The study collected the data from 306 knowledge workers (engineers and managers) of software houses from Pakistan. The SmartPLS 3 Version 2.7 software that uses the PLS‐SEM (Partial Least Square‐Structural Equation Modelling) technique was used. The results indicate that satisfaction of knowledge worker mediates between two knowledge management processes (knowledge creation and knowledge sharing) and innovation significantly. However, it does not mediate between knowledge utilization and innovation significantly.     

Continuous‐ and discrete‐time fixed‐gain controller designs for the control of vehicle lateral dynamics

In this paper, fixed‐gain feedback linearization controls are presented to stabilize the vehicle lateral dynamics at bifurcation points for both continuous‐time and discrete‐time cases. Based on the assumption of constant driving speed, a second‐order nonlinear lateral dynamics model is adopted for controller design. Via the feedback linearization scheme and the first‐order Taylor series expansion, a time‐invariant feedback linearization control is proposed as a fixed‐gain linear version of the previously proposed nonlinear one. Furthermore, the conventional linear quadratic regulator (LQR) design is applied to facilitate the choice of the fixed‐gain matrix. Refined controls to compensate the model uncertainty and their local stability analysis are provided. Extension of the continuous‐time design results to discrete‐time cases is also addressed. Numerical simulations for an example model demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed continuous‐time and discrete‐time design results. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley and Sons Asia Pte Ltd and Chinese Automatic Control Society     

A continuation‐based task programming model for C++: design of the Causeway library

There is a big class of problems that requires writing programs in an asynchronous manner. Cloud computing, service‐oriented architectures, multi‐core and heterogeneous systems all require programs to be written with asynchronous components. The necessity of concurrency and asynchronous execution brings in the added complexity of the inversion of control into the system, either through message passing or through event processing. In this paper, we introduce explicit programming language support for asynchronous programming that completely hides inversion of control. The presented programming model defines a common abstraction of the different types of tasks, both synchronous and asynchronous. It defines common imperative control constructs equivalent to those of the host programming language, along with a few more advanced ones for transactional and parallel execution that can universally work for any task type. It allows the programmer to implement the logic of an asynchronous system in a natural way by writing simple, seemingly, synchronous imperative code. We will show that the programs written using this approach are easier to understand by programmers. They are also easier to design automated tests for, and for performing computer‐based static analysis of the program logic. The principles behind this approach were tested in a couple of real‐world systems with worldwide user base. Our experience shows that it makes the complex code with a lot of interdependencies between asynchronously executed tasks easy to write and reason about. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Work Satisfaction,Causes, and Sources of Job Stress and Specific Ways of Coping: A Case Study of White‐Collar Outsourcing Service Employees

This study investigated work‐related stresses in the business outsourcing service environment. Eighty‐six white‐collar professionals who occupied low‐level managerial positions in a business accounting outsourcing company took part in the field study. The derived scales for the sources of stress, work satisfaction, and coping with stress had different structure than those contained in the original occupational stress indicator scale of Cooper, Sloan, and Williams (1988). The study results also illustrate that the observed sources of work stress perceived by white‐collar employees of the outsourcing firm are unique to this occupational group and specific to this sector of business activity. Future research efforts will focus on comparative analysis of work stress in outsourcing companies across different cultures. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Effect of repetitive elbow holding tasks with low‐level muscular exertion on perceived muscle discomfort

This study aimed to investigate the effect of task repetition on perceived muscle discomfort (PMD). The experimental trial consisted of fatigue and recovery periods. In the fatigue period, an elbow‐holding task was performed with an external load of 10%, 20%, and 30% of the premeasured maximum voluntary contraction (MVC) for 7.0, 4.5, and 3.0 min, respectively. In the recovery period, the participants released the load and rested until they felt no PMD. The trial was repeated six times sequentially (Trials 1–6). PMD at the end of the fatigue period increased with task repetition at all %MVCs. The interclass correlation coefficients between Trial 1 and the other trials were lower than those for the combinations of Trials 2–6, irrespective of %MVC. In the recovery period, the absolute sensitivity of PMD in the range of 0–10 (or the speed of recovery) of Trial 1 was faster than that of Trials 2–6. The findings of this study could lead to the development of work regimes that limit the risk of PMD in workers. Possible changes include allowing for a longer recovery time if the task requires a relatively large flexion angle, such as those performed in narrow spaces.     

Circumnavigation of a speedy unpredictable target by a group of speed‐ and acceleration‐limited robots

An unpredictably maneuvering speedy target travels in a plane, which also hosts a team of fully actuated robots whose velocities and accelerations are upper‐bounded in magnitude. The robots should approach the target and then follow it at a prespecified distance. They also should achieve an even self‐distribution around the target and a given angular velocity of rotation about the target. Every robot has access to the relative position of the target and other robots (in the latter case, within a finite “visibility” range) and to the angular speed of its own pure rotation; access to the coordinates of its own linear velocity in its own local frame is also employed in some cases. The robots are not equipped with communication facilities and cannot distinguish among one another; assignment of different roles to various robots is infeasible. Necessary conditions for the mission feasibility are first obtained. A distributed control law is then presented, and its global convergence and collision avoidance property are rigorously justified under slight enhancement of the just mentioned necessary conditions. The performance of the control law is illustrated by computer simulations.     

New approach for the analysis and design of negative‐resistance oscillators: Application to a quasi‐MMIC VCO

This article proposes a new approach for the analysis and design of negative‐resistance oscillators using computer‐aided engineering tools. The method presented does not require any special probe and makes the oscillator design similar to the methodology applied to amplifiers. It speeds up convergence and avoids uncertainties in the solution. The negative‐resistance oscillator is split into two parts: an active‐amplifying part and a resonator part. A chain is constructed by linking both parts and repeating them several times, which is known as the repeated circuit simulation procedure. This method allows the separation of the signal flowing between them. Small‐signal AC‐sweep and harmonic‐balance techniques, both available in several commercial software packages, are applied. This method is theoretically justified and shows convergence with less iteration. Furthermore, it is more robust than standard harmonic‐balance probes in the case of multiple frequencies of oscillation. It has been demonstrated in the design of a quasi‐MMIC VCO. This VCO has an external resonator circuit (coaxial resonator and varactor) and a MMIC negative‐resistance circuit, which was manufactured using ED02AH p‐HEMT technology (OMMIC). © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Int J RF and Microwave CAE, 2006.     

Full‐Order and Reduced‐order Observer Design for a Class of Fractional‐order Nonlinear Systems

The paper is concerned with problem of the full‐order and reduced‐order observer design for a class of fractional‐order one‐sided Lipschitz nonlinear systems. By introducing a continuous frequency distributed equivalent model and using indirect Lyapunov approach, the sufficient condition for asymptotic stability of the full‐order observer error dynamic system is presented. Furthermore, the proposed design method was extended to reduced‐order observer design for fractional‐order nonlinear systems. All the stability conditions are obtained in terms of LMI, which are less conservative than some existing ones. Finally, a numerical example demonstrates the validity of this approach.     

Design and implementation of a dual‐band concurrent fully‐integrated LNA for WLAN IEEE 802.11a/b/g applications

This article presents a dual‐band concurrent fully‐integrated low‐noise amplifier (LNA) targeted to WLAN IEEE 802.11a/b/g standards. The use of a concurrent topology enables saving die area and power consumption compared with the parallel solution that employs two separated LNAs. An original design methodology that helps in the selection of input/output matching network element values is also presented. The LNA die area is 1.0 × 0.9 mm² and it consumes 9 mW (5 mA at 1.8 V). © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Int J RF and Microwave CAE, 2009.     

The effects of topology and task complexity on digital‐speech‐desktop interface design and evaluation

Abstract— This study investigated user task performance in terms of three interface proposals (linear, hierarchical, and network type) and task complexities (single‐layered, double‐layered, and triple‐layered). Forty‐two participants (all male), aged 19–23 years, were recruited for the experiment. The results generated from this study reveal that the different degrees of task complexity interacted with the topological structures of the user interfaces. No difference was found among the three topological structures in the single‐layered task. A linear structure resulted in better user performance than network or hierarchical structures in the double‐layered task, while in the triple‐layered task both network and hierarchical structures resulted in better user performance than a linear topological structure. This study provides an example of the application of topological structures in interface design and evaluation. From a practical perspective, the results imply the necessity of alternative or parallel control systems (linear and hybrid topologies) so that the user can shift between structures according to task complexity.     

Effect of scribe‐wheel dimensions on the cutting of AMLCD glass substrate

Abstract— The scribe‐and‐break method for glass cutting is widely used to separate individual liquid‐crystal‐display (LCD) panels from a larger motherglass substrate cell. Optimum glass‐scribing conditions including scribe‐wheel dimensions, scribing load, scribing speed, etc., have been determined based on practical manufacturing experience. However, there has been no systematic study to determine the scribing conditions necessary to avoid stray breakage. In this paper, the influence of the scribe‐wheel angle and diameter upon the scribing and breaking of an active‐matrix liquid‐crystal‐display (AMLCD) glass substrate, Corning Code1737F glass, was experimentally investigated for the case of simple single‐glass‐sheet separation. It was determined that an equation including the factors of scribe‐wheel tip angle and diameter can be used to predict median crack depth as a function of scribe load. It was further found that the breaking force of the scribed sheet was strongly influenced by the residual stress created during scribing. A wheel having a 130° tip angle and 4‐mm diameter demonstrated the best results for sheet separation in terms of the lowest breaking force without lateral crack propagation. In addition, increasing the time interval between scribing and separating was found to result in an increase in the breaking force required to separate the glass substrate.     

Effect of guard‐ring on the DC and high‐frequency performance of deep‐submicrometer metal oxide semiconductor field effect transistor

The influence of guard‐ring (GR) on the direct current (DC) and high‐frequency performance of deep‐submicrometer metal oxide semiconductor field effect transistors (MOSFETs) is investigated in this study. MOSFETs with four different GRs are fabricated using 90 nm complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) process, and a detailed comparative study on their device performances is performed. A united DC and small signal equivalent circuit model that takes into the effect of GR is developed. A set of simple, but efficient formulas provide a bidirectional bridge for the S parameters transformation between devices with different GRs. The corresponding model parameters for MOSFETs with different GRs are determined from S parameter on‐wafer measurement up to 40 GHz. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Int J RF and Microwave CAE 24:259–267, 2014.     

Effect of Job Rotation Types on Productivity,Accident Rate,and Satisfaction in the Automotive Assembly Line Workers

This study investigates different autonomous job rotation types to analyze their impacts on productivity, accident rate, and worker's satisfaction. The subjects of research were 422 assembly‐line units in 3 production plants from an automobile company. The preferred rotation types and workers’ satisfaction scores in the 422 units were surveyed by the average worker's experience and work productivity, quality and accident rate scores were traced over a 5‐year period. Results showed that workers with little work experience preferred to work in shorter cycles composed of a small variety of tasks, whereas workers with more experience preferred longer cycles composed of a larger variety of tasks. In addition, autonomously chosen rotation systems proved to boost productivity and work satisfaction when compared to units that did not implement job rotation. In contrast, only 4 out of 10 rotation types showed improvements in decreased number of accidents. Of the 10 rotation types, ones with daily cycles with a small range of tasks and weekly cycles with a wide range of tasks displayed the most promising results for productivity, work satisfaction, and accident prevention. This study implies that the preferred types of rotation do not necessarily lead to higher productivity, safety, and satisfaction. The results of this study are expected to serve as a basic guideline for job design.