Business Tasks Research Articles

Modeling and Measuring Domain-Specific Quantitative Reasoning in Higher Education Business and Economics

Quantitative reasoning is considered a crucial prerequisite for acquiring domain-specific expertise in higher education. To ascertain whether students are developing quantitative reasoning, validly assessing its development over the course of their studies is required. However, when measuring quantitative reasoning in an academic study program, it is often confounded with other skills. Following a situated approach, we focus on quantitative reasoning in the domain of business and economics and define domain-specific quantitative reasoning primarily as a skill and capacity that allows for reasoned thinking regarding numbers, arithmetic operations, graph analyses, and patterns in real-world business and economics tasks, leading to problem solving. As many studies demonstrate, well-established instruments for assessing business and economics knowledge like the Test of Understanding College Economics (TUCE) and the Examen General para el Egreso de la Licenciatura (EGEL) contain items that require domain-specific quantitative reasoning skills. In this study, we follow a new approach and assume that assessing business and economics knowledge offers the opportunity to extract domain-specific quantitative reasoning as the skill for handling quantitative data in domain-specific tasks. We present an approach where quantitative reasoning – embedded in existing measurements from TUCE and EGEL tasks – will be empirically extracted. Hereby, we reveal that items tapping domain-specific quantitative reasoning constitute an empirically separable factor within a Confirmatory Factor Analysis and that this factor (domain-specific quantitative reasoning) can be validly and reliably measured using existing knowledge assessments. This novel methodological approach, which is based on obtaining information on students’ quantitative reasoning skills using existing domain-specific tests, offers a practical alternative to broad test batteries for assessing students’ learning outcomes in higher education.

<i>ESG</i> in the context of strategic business management

Aim. The presented study aims to propose a conceptual approach to ESG reporting in company value management and to identify areas for further research regarding the methodological development of the introduction of environmental, social, and managerial factors into the overall system of strategic business management.Tasks. The author determines the level of influence of the ESG agenda on decision-making in capital markets by creating an overview of statistics, key theses in the information field, and relevant scientific research in the field of finance; determines the degree of methodological development of ESG factors in business management from the perspective of the requirements of the value management concept; describes algorithms used by the investment community to evaluate assets with allowance for ESG rankings and by company management to take into account ESG factors in managerial processes and transmission of signals to the external environment; formulates proposals for taking into account ESG data based on the latest developments in the field of strategic business management and tasks requiring methodological elaboration and further research.Methods. The key methods used in the study include analysis and synthesis, comparison, generalization, system analysis, induction and deduction.Results. It is found that the introduction of ESG factors into business management processes is underdeveloped methodologically by the scientific community and consulting companies against the backdrop of growing investor interest in ESG assets. The issue of making allowance for ESG factors in management remains open and requires further methodological development. An approach to considering ESG factors as drivers of the market value of assets is proposed, which is achievable using a modified approach to company value management based on expectations.Conclusions. Despite the growing interest in the ESG agenda in capital markets, methods for assessing and implementing ESG factors in companies' business processes are underdeveloped, and these factors are insufficiently justified in companies on a growing scale as a whole. On the one hand, considering the significant investment directed to ESG funds and the volume of capital investment of companies in ESG assets, the need to investigate ESG factors as potential drivers of value within the framework of cost management is determined, their role and significance are substantiated. On the other hand, the author believes that a modified approach to company value management based on expectations can already be used today to make allowance for ESG factors and take prompt measures to reduce the noise associated with significant observed variations in the estimates of the ESG status of companies operating in different regions and industries, as well as to implement algorithms for the interaction with the external environment in terms of expectations regarding ESG business performance.

Psychological profiles of South African smallholder farmers.

The present study examined smallholder farmer profiles based on key psychological variables associated with farm business performance in the South African context. A sample of 471 beef farmers (mean age = 54.15 years; SD = 14.46; men = 76%) and 426 poultry farmers (mean age = 47.28 years; SD = 13.53; women = 54.5%) provided data on a range of measures assessing attitudes, subjective norms, perceived behavioral control, personality characteristics, present and future time orientation, expected benefits of, and efficacy to perform the farm business tasks, and farm-related concerns. Latent profile analysis identified three distinct profile segments of smallholder beef and poultry farmers, respectively: Fatalists, Traditionalists, and Entrepreneurs. Our results suggested unique combinations of psychological characteristics in a sample of South African smallholder beef and poultry farmers and show a novel way of understanding enablers of, and barriers to, engaging in the farm business.

Mengembangkan Strategi Bisnis di Era Transformasi Digital

As contemporary organizations go through computerized change, the job of a practical methodology turns out to be vital for any organization. There are different significant perspectives to zero in on while fostering a computerized business system: specifically, expanding the extent of business tasks as well as carrying out the most recent IT answers for make this procedure a long haul "improvement" plan expected to keep up with the feasibility of the organization, execution and add to the accomplishment of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The reason for this article is to examine the improvement of effective business techniques in the computerized time. The technique utilized in this examination is a subjective illustrative strategy. The consequences of this conversation show that in the age of the "new economy" and the computerized change that goes with it, creative advanced business systems in view of modern IT arrangements and lined up with the SDGs are an extraordinary chance for organizations to stray from contenders and gain upper hand.

Automation of cargo sorting and transportation: technologies, domestic solutions, Boxberry example

The article discusses what business tasks the automation of the terminal helps to solve, about the criteria for choosing technical solutions in the current economic conditions and the work of the sorting node of the federal delivery service.

Optimal hierarchical EWMA forecasting

Prediction of demand at different levels of aggregation is a crucial task in many business and industrial activities. This task may be extremely challenging when the number of time series increases together with the number of parameters governing the dynamics of the underlying model. This paper proposes theoretical and empirical contributions providing practical tools for managers needing efficient, flexible, and timely instruments. We first derive optimal results for predicting a system of time series following multivariate Exponentially Weighted Moving Average (EWMA) dynamics. Our results have relevant practical consequences. Indeed, we propose a fast EM algorithm that maximizes the Gaussian multivariate likelihood regardless of the model’s dimension. Secondly, we show optimal results for the hierarchies, deriving closed-form results for the underlying parameters. Finally, using more than one hundred Walmart sales time series, we show that our approach is competitive with the optimal forecast reconciliation approach based on univariate forecasts.

A requirement for fraud investigation professionals

In developing countries, fraud and corruption are seen as a way of life, a norm of public service or a culture that cannot hope to disappear. Auditors specialize in error detection and treat fraud and corruption as secondary tasks in a particular business. The primary responsibility of a Forensic Investigation Professional (FIP) or forensic accountant is to investigate fraud in financial records. A certified public accountant is a witness of fact, while a forensic investigator or forensic accountant is an expert witness, not a witness of fact. They can testify in court as experts for either the prosecution or the defence. This paper aims to critically examine the requirements for fraud investigation professionals who need to be obtained by a forensic accountant in investigating fraud as one of the most serious financial crimes in any company. The findings suggest that forensic investigative professionals play a complementary role with government anti-fraud and anti-corruption agencies in strategies and policies to reduce the risk of systemic corruption. Findings also show that Forensic Investigation Professionals (FIPs) play an important role in reducing fraud and corruption risks in developing countries.

User interface modeling technique in the cloud environment

For designing a qualified user interface, there needs to be a graphic expert, requirement analyst, system designer, programmer, technical expertise, social activity scientist, and experts for each field. However, it is extremely difficult for these various experts to participate in such user interface design. This paper focused on design rules and modeling techniques of user interfaces that can support user availability. The visual cohesion of business events can be improved by modeling the prototype of the object-oriented user interface based on the object. The clustering method uses transaction objects and forms objects based on business event objects and task objects. We have studied it in detail so that a prototype of the user interface can be created. The significance and conclusions of this study are as follows. First, visual cohesion is improved by designing the object of functional, sequential, and communicative objects. Second, the object design rules of the user interface were created so that even an inexperienced designer could create a high-quality prototype. Third, it enhances the user's preference, ease, understanding, compliance rate, and quality of graphic layout by improving object-based visual cohesion. Fourth, functional, sequential, communicative, and procedural cohesion of business events is increased by the clustering of user interface objects. As a result, this paper is providing a modeling method of user interface technique in the cloud environment that could enhance the visual cohesion of user interface prototypes.

Reliable Scheduling Method for Sensitive Power Business Based on Deep Reinforcement Learning

The main function of the power communication business is to monitor, control and manage the power communication network to ensure normal and stable operation of the power communication network. Communication services related to dispatching data networks and the transmission of fault information or feeder automation have high requirements for delay. If processing time is prolonged, a power business cascade reaction may be triggered. In order to solve the above problems, this paper establishes an edge object-linked agent business deployment model for power communication network to unify the management of data collection, resource allocation and task scheduling within the system, realizes the virtualization of object-linked agent computing resources through Docker container technology, designs the target model of network latency and energy consumption, and introduces A3C algorithm in deep reinforcement learning, improves it according to scene characteristics, and sets corresponding optimization strategies. Minimize network delay and energy consumption; At the same time, to ensure that sensitive power business is handled in time, this paper designs the business dispatch model and task migration model, and solves the problem of server failure. Finally, the corresponding simulation program is designed to verify the feasibility and validity of this method, and to compare it with other existing mechanisms.

Features of microservices architecture in e-commerce systems

The development of information system architectures for e-commerce is a crucial task for busi-nesses in today's digital environment. This article presents a comparative analysis of different types of information system architectures used in e-commerce. The paper examines the specific characteristics of e-commerce and the requirements of web applications that support electronic business operations. Traditional monolithic architecture, microservices architecture, and server-less architecture have been characterized, and their advantages and disadvantages have been identified. Technological solutions in the field of e-commerce development have been studied to create an efficient and user-friendly platform. The article highlights such key architectural aspects as scalability, flexibility, deployment speed and management, reliability, and develop-ment and operational costs. The impact of each architecture type on performance and alignment with e-commerce business needs has been analyzed. This analysis will assist in the creation or modernization of information systems for e-commerce, enabling an informed choice of archi-tectural approach. The article specifically examines the advantages and disadvantages of micro-services architecture for developing e-commerce web applications, particularly using the Spring Boot framework. It explores how microservices can provide modularity and facilitate the devel-opment, deployment, and maintenance of e-commerce web applications. Such challenges of mi-croservices architecture as managing and coordinating services, as well as addressing data con-sistency and transaction management in distributed environments have been discussed. Some possible approaches and technical tools to overcome these challenges in the context of e-commerce web applications based on Spring Boot have been considered.

Bridging the Gap: An Explainable Methodology for Customer Churn Prediction in Supply Chain Management

Customer churn prediction is a critical task for businesses aiming to retain their valuable customers. Nevertheless, the lack of transparency and interpretability in machine learning models hinders their implementation in real-world applications. In this paper, we introduce a novel methodology for customer churn prediction in supply chain management that addresses the need for explainability. Our approach take advantage of XGBoost as the underlying predictive model. We recognize the importance of not only accurately predicting churn but also providing actionable insights into the key factors driving customer attrition. To achieve this, we employ Local Interpretable Model-agnostic Explanations (LIME), a state-of-the-art technique for generating intuitive and understandable explanations. By utilizing LIME to the predictions made by XGBoost, we enable decision-makers to gain intuition into the decision process of the model and the reasons behind churn predictions. Through a comprehensive case study on customer churn data, we demonstrate the success of our explainable ML approach. Our methodology not only achieves high prediction accuracy but also offers interpretable explanations that highlight the underlying drivers of customer churn. These insights supply valuable management for decision-making processes within supply chain management.

MARKETING RESEARCH OF THE SERVICES MARKET OF HOTEL AND RESTAURANT BUSINESS ESTABLISHMENTS

The article is devoted to the study of marketing aspects of the functioning and development of the services market of hotel and restaurant enterprises. The modern market of hotel and restaurant business services is a competitive and dynamic environment where companies constantly compete for the attention and loyalty of customers. Attracting and retaining customers is becoming an important task for businesses in this industry. However, success in the hotel and restaurant industry is not limited to providing quality services and creating a comfortable environment. Effective marketing planning and strategies play an important role in achieving competitive advantage. Marketing research is considered as a basis for determining the market opportunities of hotels and restaurants. The concept of the term «marketing research» is defined and the main factors that are the basis for understanding this concept are highlighted. The formation of an effective marketing information system in the hotel and restaurant industry has been studied. Methodological bases of hotel and restaurant services market research are defined. Conclusions and recommendations on improving the marketing strategy of hotel and restaurant business enterprises were formed. The results of the research will help identify the strengths and weaknesses of the market, reveal new opportunities for development, determine the needs and expectations of customers, as well as develop proposals for the promotion of services in the hotel and restaurant business. Therefore, conducting a marketing research of the market of services of hotel and restaurant business establishments is an important step for increasing the competitiveness of enterprises in this field and meeting the needs of customers. Marketing research occupies an important place in the life of any organization and is used by enterprises of all types – from small businesses to large corporations. Marketing research creates a scientifically and practically justified basis for making qualified decisions by managers and top management of the company.

Структура и социально-психологические особенности личной эффективности руководителей

The article considers the socio-psychological features of the personal effectiveness of the leader. The key role of the leader and the increase in the importance of this role in connection with the complication of living conditions are determined, as a result of which the requirements for the personality of the leader change. In this regard, the issues of personal effectiveness acquire both theoretical and practical significance. The theoretical review, compiled on the basis of a study of the works of domestic and foreign researchers, presents structural, theoretical-methodological, classification approaches, and also identifies directions for assessing the effectiveness of managers. The criteria for evaluating personal effectiveness are outlined within the framework of the mechanistic approach, the theory of human relations, the theory of hierarchical systems, competence and resource approaches. From the analysis of scientific literature, it is concluded that there is a difference in determining the personal effectiveness of different categories of employees. In the course of the study, the structure of the manager's personal effectiveness was determined (physiological, personal, socio-psychological, operational and meta levels were identified), its features were identified among managers of different levels of management and management experience, the relationship between the components of the efficiency structure was determined, with the identification of key characteristics that made up basis for the typology of leaders. The typology of managers was developed on the basis of cluster analysis. Four clusters were formed, the representatives of which do not differ in gender composition, management level, management experience and age. In each cluster, distinctive characteristics are defined for the considered and identified components of personal effectiveness. Based on the work done, key areas for improving the personal effectiveness of managers were formed: time management, goal-setting and self-presentation skills, highlighting key business tasks, and increasing the level of awareness of activities.

The concept of implementing distributed registry technology in the activities of wholesale distribution centers

The paper considers the conceptual aspects of the application of distributed ledger technology elements (blockchain) and their derivative smart contract for the construction of automated transactions on the example of individual business tasks of large wholesale distribution centers. In the course of the study, the elements and properties of the smart contract characteristic of the subject area under study were determined, as well as the conditions, types of business operations and the corresponding data allowing them to consider the business object state with its subsequent implementation in the smart contract transaction.

IMPROVEMENT OF FINANCIAL ACTIVITIES OF SMALL ENTERPRISES

The key points of the financial activity of small business development are justified. It is noted that entrepreneurship in the field of small business is determined by the activity of business entities, which is characterized by both features that are characteristic of business structures in general, and specific features that determine the peculiarities of such functioning of business entities in the sphere of the implementation of business tasks and goals. It was determined that the success of small business is determined by the conditions of the environment in which business structures function. It is clarified that such conditions should include economic, legal, socio-cultural, demographic, technological, natural-geographic and organizational conditions. It has been proven that ensuring the existence of all enterprises depends on its financial resources. The sources of formation of financial resources are the main feature of their classification. In practice, own and involved groups of sources of formation are distinguished. FG "Iryna – O.T" was chosen to evaluate the structure of sources of small enterprises. This is a farm, the main activity of which is grain and technical crops. During the studied period, the amount of financial resources is increasing. Having evaluated the financial management of the FG "Iryna – O.T" using various indicators, we came to the conclusion that the FG under study is profitable and financially independent. Having evaluated the formation, placement and efficiency of the use of financial resources, they came to the conclusion that the FG "Iryna – O.T" had a good financial condition, as evidenced by the relevant indicators: the amount of net profit increased by 469.8 thousand hryvnias; liquidity indicators of the FG indicate the liquid balance of the enterprise; the state of the FG in 2020–2022 is characterized as financially stable; the financial independence of the FG is high, which indicates a good state of financial resources; profitability indicators of FG had positive values. In general, FG "Iryna – O.T" has positive indicators of filling financial resources, their volume increases over the years, however, the FG has become completely independent of obligations and avoids a crisis situation associated with a lack of funds to pay debts. Farms are an important component of the market of economic relations between the world and Ukraine. In the conditions of hostilities, farmers and private peasant farms provided food for the local population and internally displaced persons, thus proving the stability and possibility of ensuring the existence of small producers.

УПРАВЛІННЯ ЦИФРОВОЮ ТРАНСФОРМАЦІЄЮ МЕНЕДЖМЕНТУ ПЕРСОНАЛУ ЧЕРЕЗ ЦИФРОВУ HR СТРАТЕГІЮ

The world around us is changing. The workforce is changing rapidly. The pandemic and the war have drastically shortened the business path to remote and hybrid work models. The advent of technology and data makes personnel management easy and more complex at one time. Business processes of personnel management are undergoing significant changes under the influence of digitalization. For this transformation to be manageable and meet organizational needs, digital HR strategy formation is necessary. Theoretical understanding and modernization of context defining the new challenges of the digital HR transformation, its stages, components and elements, and the development of a digital HR strategy for the transformation of personnel management are necessary. The article is devoted to the study of the paradigm of digital HR strategy forming, namely: concepts, components, principles, and stages of its forming in organizations. The relationship between the concepts of digital HR transformation and digital HR strategy is substantiated. Vectors and stages of digital HR transformation are highlighted. The components of the digital HR transformation are summarized and characterized, and the components of the digital HR strategy are selected based on them. The introduction of new HR technologies must be supported by a digital HR strategy, which is a detailed plan for the digital transformation of personnel management. To sustain the digital transformation of HR management, companies need a clear digital HR strategy that will involve a strategic rethinking of the use of digital HR technologies to increase business value; rules for forming and implementing a digital HR strategy. The software has enormous potential, but it is important to approach the choice strategically. Any investment in new technology should be tied to specific company goals and have a detailed deployment plan. Modern business tasks cannot be solved using outdated solutions, so traditional sets of HR competencies will not be sufficient; they need to be updated to include new means of communication and critical analysis. In addition, HR teams cannot and should not allow others to make important technological decisions for them, impose on them solutions that are not designed specifically to solve the problems of personnel management of a specific business environment; and, instead, take the initiative to develop and implement a digital HR strategy.

Izbor optimalne centralne procesorske jedinice PSI metodom

Modern business strongly relies on the use of information and communication technologies. So, choosing the right technical equipment is extremely important because the right one influences the timely execution of business tasks. Various conflicting criteria impact the decision about equipment selection which justifies the application of Multiple-Criteria Decision-Making (MCDM) as a convenient tool for the optimization of this kind of decision process. This paper proposes the application of the Preference Selection Index (PSI) method to settle the appropriate processing unit (CPU). Five alternative CPUs are compared against four criteria which include: core numbers, virtual cores (threads), operating frequency, and price. The results that came from using the PSI method favor the CPU3 - AMD Ryzen 5 5600 as the most compatible for the end-user in the present case. The obtained results proved the applicability of the PSI method because it facilitated the decision process and define the best solution regarding the given conditions.

SeeMe: An intelligent edge server selection method for location‐aware business task computing over IIoT

AbstractIn the past few years, latency‐sensitive task computing over the industrial internet of things (IIoT) has played a key role in an increasing number of intelligent applications, such as intelligent self‐driving vehicles and unmanned aircraft systems. The edge computing paradigm provides a basic functional infrastructure for across‐domain business task computing on distributed edge servers. With this observation, a trade‐off between the mobile devices and the fixed edge servers is needed to run moving task computing in a low‐latency way. Given this challenge, an intelligent server selection method, named SeeMe, is proposed in this paper. Technically speaking, this method aims at minimizing the communication capacity and the transferring capacity in a multiobjective optimization way to find a low‐latency edge server. The experiments and comparison analysis verify the availability of our method.

Prospects of Using Artificial Intelligence in Business Tasks

Prospects of Using Artificial Intelligence in Business Tasks

Застосування дескриптивних логік з конкретними доменами до вирішення задач виявлення та композиції семантичних веб сервісів

This research is one of the branches of a general scientific and applied problem, namely, the problem of using and developing ontological approaches with descriptive logics (DL) apparatus to obtain the effective automated solution of complex business task based on service-oriented architecture. The base idea of the proposed method is the maximal ontologization, that is, all aspects of the task are determined by means of DL ontologies. The proposed ontology system is based on five basic types of ontologies, namely: (1) an ontology of general entities for defining the characteristics of the service’s context, (2) an ontology of the application domain to formalize and unify semantical descriptions of web services, (3) the top-level ontology of web services for the DL formalization of the definition of the web services in general, (4) the ontologies of the web services tasks, which provide a formal representation of the tasks on all stages of web services life cycle, and (5) the ontologies of specific web services. All listed ontologies are related. Such, ontologies of the last type include links to all other above-mentioned ontologies and, together with them, provide a unified formally defined semantic resource, which enables the automatic solution of web service tasks. The focus of this study is the applying descriptive logics with concrete domains to the formalization of such basic semantic web services tasks as the web services discovery and composition. In this article, the ontologies of the web services tasks are defined as an extension of the general top-level web service ontology with special complex concepts. Their elements are pairs of “web service-goal (request)”/”web service-web service”, which are compared according to the task being solved. Also, on their basis, special complex concepts are determined, which specify a set of found similarities between existing services and a goal in the discovery task, or «predecessor-follower» type responsibilities of web services to build a composite service. The proposed TBox statements are constructed using descriptive logic with concrete domains 𝓐𝓛𝓒(𝓓). For this purpose, a concrete domain is defined as a pair of sets: (1) the union of sets of possible subsets of the set of individuals of the Parameter concept and possible subsets of the set of individuals of the Context concept, and (2) a set of predicates defined on it. Such definition of the concrete domain provides possibility of using only functional roles to construct the DL statements of complex concepts DiscoveryServices and CompositionObject for determining corresponding web services tasks. Note, the defined tasks and web services ontologies cover only simplified model of the representation of web services, in particular, functional Input/Output model extended by contexts descriptions. They provide the basis for further improvement by expanding this model and involving additional characteristics of both functional and process models of representation to the specified task ontologies. This will certainly increase the accuracy of the obtained result, but is the subject of further research.