External Client Research Articles

Сопровождение проектной деятельности в вузе с использованием веб-сервиса

The sustained interest in using project-based learning in higher education is driven by the need to prepare students for solving real-world problems and the potential of project activities to develop students’ independence, cognitive, and creative abilities. Based on psychological and pedagogical literature, the authors emphasize the importance of pedagogical and organizational support for students’ project activities. Considering the project assignment, the project learning leader (instructor) forms project teams and participates in supporting the student project team, ensuring its development as a cohesive unit. A software platform for supporting project activities has been developed for the Project Learning Organization Center at Cherepovets State University — a web service designed for communication between the client and the executor, as well as for supporting the work of the Project Learning Organization Center staff at the stages of project management: initiation, planning, management, and control. The web service is developed using the Moodle educational electronic course management system. It includes four categories of users: administrator, instructor (project learning leader), student, and external client. This solution allows for the support of project-based learning, considering the interests of students, project learning leaders, clients, and the educational organization.

Enhancing the Reach of Socially Missioned Nonprofits: Insights from a TOC-LP Application

Socially missioned nonprofit organizations exist to connect at-risk populations to critical healthcare, food, and financial services. However, these organizations face several internal (resource infrastructure, management capability) and external (multiple stakeholders, client demographics and capabilities) constraints within which they must work to attain their goal of helping people in need. The extant academic literature offers a variety of solutions to such allocation problems for use in for-profit organizations. Yet noted differences in the operational systems of for-profit and nonprofit operations limit practitioners’ capabilities to readily leverage these tools. Thus, in this paper, we extend the applicability of classic resource allocation principles to the context of nonprofit operations’ outreach efforts. We describe a detailed case study analysis at one nonprofit organization (SC Thrive) wherein we implemented the theory of constraints–linear programming framework to help maximize the effectiveness of outreach initiatives carried out by the organization. Based on the results from our stepwise, nonlinear yield model, SC Thrive is now capable of doubling the annual number of applications submitted by potential beneficiaries for assistance services. History: This paper was refereed.

How to protect your money in the face of rising inflation

How to protect your money in the face of rising inflation

LISP-Based Control Plane for Service Connectivity in Multi-Cluster Cloud Systems

In mobile networks, the edge cloud environment has emerged to provide various services to users. When the mobile user moves to another location while connecting the edge cloud service, to maintain an optimal service path, it is necessary to migrate the service to a new edge cloud close to the location where the user is newly connected. Several methods have been proposed to integrate edge cloud service migration technology with existing mobility management protocols in mobile networks, and a location/ID separation protocol (LISP)-based service optimal path management method between edge clouds was recently proposed. However, for real implementation of edge cloud with existing platform specified to containerized infrastructure, where the address of service is allocated randomly and locally, it is hard to discover appropriate service from the external client as well as maintain service connectivity when service location is changed. To solve that, this paper proposed the LISP-based service ID management system which provides uniform access for equivalent services running on different edge clouds. To apply the proposed ID management system on real distributed edge cloud systems, the mobility management and edge cloud networking systems were integrated as shown in the testbed implementation. This shows the possibility of combining the isolated mobility management for mobile users and internal identification of edge services using LISP for reducing the interruption and delay of edge service for mobile users. As a result of the experiments conducted on a real testbed, our proposed system was verified to enable a change in the routing path while maintaining a single service ID between different edge clouds, and the delay time for path reconfiguration is reduced compared to the existing method.

THE ROLE OF INTERNAL MARKETING IN ACHIEVING EMPLOYEE`S SATISFACTION - A FIELD STUDY ON A SAMPLE OF ALGERIA TELECOMMUNICATIONS COMMERCIAL AGENCY EMPLOYEES IN THE CITY OF (LAGHOUAT) ALGERIA-

It has become imperative for enterprises that are active in the face of intense competition, to provide all the appropriate conditions in which they keep their employees, as they are a major source of success and superiority, so they must achieve their satisfaction. The most important marketing mechanisms on which the enterprise depends in achieving excellence are: "Internal Marketing", a modern marketing concept that cares about employees and focuses on ensuring their satisfaction, where they feel that they are an effective partner that does not spare him and contributes to the growth of the enterprise and its superiority, because the employee is an internal client and his satisfaction will inevitably achieve the satisfaction of the external client. Therefore, this research aims to identify its theoretical concepts, and the extent to which it is applied in practice through a study: the role of internal marketing in achieving the satisfaction of Algeria telecommunications commercial agency employees in the city of (Laghouat) Algeria. The study found a statistically significant role for the internal marketing of Algeria telecommunications commercial agency in Laghouat city in achieving the satisfaction of employees at the 5% level of significance, and the factor that has the biggest role is "internal distribution

Оцінка використання шаблонів проектування програмного забезпечення

The subject of study in the article is software development processes using design patterns. The aim is to improve the quality of modern software development projects through the use of experience and knowledge, to build software subsystems that are focused on infrastructure and work with an external client. Objectives: to review the methodology, programming paradigms and the possibility of their application at the design and coding stages of the software development life cycle; development of the concept of using design patterns in software design as knowledge available for reuse, propose an approach to the practical implementation of design patterns to node.js projects. The models used are the Composite design pattern, the Chain of responsibility design pattern. The used methodologies are object-oriented programming, as the most common programming paradigm, a unified modeling language UML for displaying the structure of design patterns. The following results are obtained. Modern methodologies and design paradigms are considered, a classification is formed in the form of a tree structure with a division into declarative and imperative subspecies, it is concluded that within the framework of the study we will use an object-oriented methodology as the most common design paradigm. An example of building an information system of the node.js project is considered. Analyzed the main errors that arise when developing and writing code for working with an external client. The elements of the node.js project and the concepts of structuring their relationship with existing design patterns are considered. An example of a practical implementation of a node.js project and its relationship with the Composite and Chain of responsibility design patterns is considered. In this connection, the work provides the structure of these templates. Findings. The scientific novelty of the results obtained is as follows: the model of design patterns was further developed through their use in the concept of building a node.js application, which makes it possible to improve the quality of interaction between the project team and reduce its execution time.

Preparing Sustainable Engineers: A Project-Based Learning Experience in Logistics with Refugee Camps

This article describes an intrinsic case study of project-based learning (PBL) experience involving an NGO as an external client to promote sustainability competencies. Two research questions are posed: (1) How did this experiential PBL approach impact students learning to develop sustainability competencies by incorporating a responsible engineering perspective? (2) How did college students become engaged with social and sustainable PBL projects when external clients of developing economies were involved? The project-based design involved two subjects in the second year of an Industrial engineering degree. The client was an NGO with an existing project to improve the supply chain logistics of three refugee camps managed by women. Students had to cooperatively develop a sustainable proposal for the NGO with a global mindset. Findings obtained from the analysis of the reflections of students and teachers indicate that this methodology helps students to acquire comprehensively learning outcomes and to develop sustainability competencies. Sustainable and socially responsible engineering were achieved through a methodology that considers the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and engages students in real projects. This approach promotes student awareness on the importance of their actions and their personal behavior as engineers, including a gender perspective, while training them to move towards SDG4 and 5.

Valoración de la utilidad de la materia de probabilidad y estadística en la carrera de IGE en el ITSOEH

SICES in 2017 requests ITSUR and deSoft to develop the SUREDSU platform, a web platform that will be developed to detect the educational expectations of students in the upper secondary schools of the state of Guanajuato. With this project, deSoft faces new challenges: making software for an external client, developing a platform aimed at users between 17 and 22 years old, and also developing software with a high level of concurrency. The members of deSoft, share a great interest in the quality of software generation, their quality strategy is certification in the CMMI-DEV model which was achieved in 2013 and which involves the application of software tests. To overcome the challenges faced with the SUREDSU platform, system tests have been applied: stress, usability, functionality, interface and data validation. Achieving identify the defects before delivery of the software and thereby meet the expectations of the client and end users.

Formation of a healthy corporate culture in a medical organization

The health care system is a complex socio-economic mechanism, which is designed to ensure the implementation of the most important social principle - maintaining and improving the health of the population, providing highly qualified treatment and prevention care. Important to remember that healthcare organizations have two stakeholders: doctors and patients (internal and external client). Often, attention is paid only to patients, but it is worth starting with the formation of the commitment of health professionals to the work organization, to create a positive image. Unfortunately, the image of the organization is often formed spontaneously. The reason for this is not only the reluctance of managers to deal with this problem but also the lack of experience and knowledge in the field of image formation and corporate culture of the organization. Culture is elusive, but its impact is easily traced in the daily behavior of employees of any level. Defining goals, setting goals, developing patterns of behavior and attitudes at work and the actual activity within the organization are mediated by its ideology. Elements of culture are reflected in the official vision of the medical institution, and thus become accessible to the external environment - patients, partners, competitors and society as a whole. An established healthy corporate culture is an important management tool, creates strong competitive advantages, increases the social responsibility of medical organizations to society and patients, improves the quality of medical activities. The presence of corporate culture, values and behaviors allow improving the processes of strategic development, internal communication, unity and cohesion of the team, to reduce staff turnover in the organization. The system of continuing professional education of doctors and heads of health care institutions should provide for the implementation of educational programs in the field of formation and development of the corporate culture of medical organizations.

The Role of Customer-Centric, Cross-Functional Integration in Data Governance

Objective - The paper sheds light on customer database dynamics, dimensions and characteristics of adapted benefits connected with their business potential in a circular economy. The study suggests that allocating funds on data compliance could bring added value to the companies in specific conditions linked to the processing of client data. Methodology/Technique - This study examines the impact of a Customer-Centric approach in relation to Data Governance. The empirical part of the study is based on data gathered from middle and top level managers and owners of projects responsible for managing customer data in multinational enterprises across EMEA region. EU companies could use Data Protection legislation as a springboard, as their financial benefits are higher than the respective costs necessary to comply with. Thus, a perspective management practice investigates the following roles: cross-functional management and combining wide customer-centric units (marketing, sales, service, product), external client process integration, data governance engagement (there is a balance of the current expertise from the customer's data that is nested within functions and capacity to evaluate inter-functional influence of client data-driven management). Finding - The paper outlines evidence of the effect of customer centricity on data governance in selected companies from emerging markets. Type of Paper - Empirical Keywords: Customer Centricity; Data Governance; Cross-functional Integration. JEL Classification: M30, M31, M39.

Los costos ocultos de la Cartografía

La Información Geográfica de calidad y oportuna cada vez toma mayor importan- cia. Es imprescindible en todas las actividades de un país, jugando un rol esencial la Infraestructura de Datos Espaciales (IDE) al compartir esa información. Hay que generarla y mantenerla, pero también hay que financiarla; es común que se utilice un análisis Costo-Beneficio para tomar decisiones con respecto a la realización de proyectos de inversión en Información Geográfica, sin embargo hay algunos costos “ocultos” en la generación de los datos geográficos que generalmente no se tienen en cuenta en estos análisis, pero deberían serlos. Ellos son los llamados “Costo de Oportunidad” y el “Costo de la Mala Calidad”. El Costo de Oportunidad es el Valor de la mejor opción no realizada. Si no se hubiera decidido hacer el vuelo fotogra- métrico de 1966-1967, entonces, ¿cuál hubiera sido el impacto y cuánto el costo de oportunidad? En cambio los costos de la mala calidad correspondiente a fallos ex- ternos, son todos aquellos errores en que incurre el productor porque al cliente externo se le suministran productos o servicios inaceptables. Por errores en planos provistos por el Estado a una empresa constructora, hubo que pagar a esta última alrededor de 15 millones de dólares, que se podría haber evitado si se hubiera dis- puesto de cartografía de calidad y oportuna. Ambos costos pueden ser de utilidad para ayudar a la toma decisiones de inversión. 
 ¿Estos costos ocultos, aislada o conjuntamente con un análisis Costo-Beneficio, podrán ser utilizados realmente para tomar decisiones de inversión en Información Geográfica? 
 ¿Podrán estos costos, tanto el de la mala calidad así como el costo de oportunidad, ser de tal magnitud como para influir en esa decisión?

Alignment and Success: Applying the Hierarchy of Planning and the Needs‐Assesment Hierarchy

Performance Improvement is conventionally focused on the workplace and on work. That is successful some of the time. However, the symptom of a problem may be at the work level, while the problem or opportunity is somewhere else, such as with a faulty product or service, poor supervision, offering a deliverable that isn't what the customer really requires, or not starting planning at the external client's or the societal level. Knowing and using the hierarchy of planning and the needs assessment hierarchy (Kaufman, 2018) may help to ensure that what you do and deliver is worthy. This article is about how to avoid quick fixes by dealing, not with the symptoms, but with the root causes.

An overview of today's project-based learning and how it has been implemented in the Chemical Engineering School at Universidad de Los Andes

This paper builds on a project-based engineering learning strategy called RAIS ‘Reproducing an Innovation Environment in the Classroom’ applied in courses in the Chemical Engineering curriculum at the Universidad de Los Andes (ULA). It follows a previous investigation where the practical implementation of RAIS strategy is presented (Marquez et al., 2016), and in this occasion the theoretical fundamentals of the RAIS strategy are outlined. Authors take the common project-based learning to a new level by directly involving the students in the common start-up company practice where the final product to be formulated and manufactured is not a requirement from an external client but comes from real entrepreneurship students’ interests. In previous work it has been shown that this strategy allows interconnecting the course objectives with the development of a product. RAIS strategy has reported successful outcomes in the accomplishment of this goal for Chemical Engineering students at ULA.

Improving reusability of software libraries through usage pattern mining

Modern software systems are increasingly dependent on third-party libraries. It is widely recognized that using mature and well-tested third-party libraries can improve developers’ productivity, reduce time-to-market, and produce more reliable software. Today’s open-source repositories provide a wide range of libraries that can be freely downloaded and used. However, as software libraries are documented separately but intended to be used together, developers are unlikely to fully take advantage of these reuse opportunities. In this paper, we present a novel approach to automatically identify third-party library usage patterns, i.e., collections of libraries that are commonly used together by developers. Our approach employs a hierarchical clustering technique to group together software libraries based on external client usage. To evaluate our approach, we mined a large set of over 6000 popular libraries from Maven Central Repository and investigated their usage by over 38,000 client systems from the Github repository. Our experiments show that our technique is able to detect the majority (77%) of highly consistent and cohesive library usage patterns across a considerable number of client systems.

Servicio al cliente: una opción de mejora empresarial


 Objetivo: definir el servicio al cliente como una mejora empresarial en las organizaciones, donde la finalidad es que el cliente obtenga el producto o servicio en el momento y lugar adecuado, garantizando la calidad de los mismos. Resultados y conclusiones: existen dos tipos de clientes que interceden en los servicios de las organizaciones, esto son los internos (empleados operativos, administrativos o ejecutivos, que tienen mucha incidencia con el cliente externo y de los cuales depende en parte un buen servicio brindado) y externos (no pertenecen a la organización y van a solicitar un servicio o adquirir un producto. Siendo esenciales para el éxito del negocio, dado que proporcionan el flujo de ingresos); en la empresa los clientes internos y externos deben tener igual importancia siendo tratados de una forma equitativa. Para llevar una política exitosa de atención al cliente, la empresa debe poseer fuentes de información sobre su mercado objetivo, el comportamiento de sus consumidores, pero sobre todo una fluidez en la comunicación.

Quality of Experience Framework for Cloud Computing (QoC)

Cloud computing provides platform for pay-per-use services, such as software, hardware, and platforms. Previous cloud frameworks use fix policies that do not have the functionality to upgrade services on demand when the user does not receive services according to Service Level Agreement (SLA). In addition, there was a lack of functionality to monitor external network and client device resources. This paper presents Quality of experience framework for Cloud computing (QoC) for monitoring the Quality of Experience (QoE) of the end user using video streaming services in the cloud computing environment. The management platform is used for administration purpose in QoC framework that provides facility to easily manage the cloud environment and provide services according to SLA via runtime policy change. The objective QoE/Quality of Service (QoS) section will automatically monitor the QoS data. It will also compare and analyze the subjective QoE submitted by the users and objective QoS data collected by agent-based framework for accurate QoE prediction and proper management. The proposed QoC framework has new features of real-time network monitoring and client device monitoring and allows changing policy in runtime environment, which to the best of our knowledge is currently not provided by existing frameworks.

Satisfaction of the External Client with the Provision of Health Services in the Emergency Area of a First Level Hospital of Complexity

Introduction: The satisfaction of users of health services is an issue that has been awakening a growing interest among the administrators of institutions that provide such services. Objective: To identify the degree of satisfaction of the external client with the provision of health services in the emergency area of a first level hospital in Cundinamarca in order to generate and implement strategies to improve quality for the benefit of the community and the institution itself. Methodology: The method used was an observational descriptive study of cross section and qualitative nature, with data collection through the SERVQUAL survey. Results: The results obtained show the satisfaction of the users based on their perception of the quality of the service received, mainly with the dimension of reliability and empathy with 84.63% and 84.15% respectively. The satisfaction in relation to response capacity, security and tangible elements is 61.41%, 79.26% and 80.15% respectively. Conclusion: Patient satisfaction overall with the provision of health services in the emergency area of the institution where the study was developed is 77.92%. It is recommended to initiate continuous improvement actions, especially in terms of response capacity, such as review of staff availability in case of contingencies or increase in the usual volume of patients.

Integrating Entrepreneurship into the Design Classroom: Case Studies from the Developing World

Developing countries are more and more committed to building a knowledge-based economy as a means to diversify from their current resource-based economy. The current focus of many governments is on technology with real insights on creative economy and arts. In this context, universities are seen as a key partner of the government. This article presents the results of two innovative case studies of professors working in the College of Art and Design collaborating with a professor in the College of Business to integrate the concepts of entrepreneurship into their interior design courses. This was done through designing space for entrepreneurial projects and by the students acting as entrepreneurs themselves with an external client. This dual model of training combines (1) learning processes about the habits and the needs of entrepreneurs and (2) learning by acting as an entrepreneur. Such methods demonstrate the role of universities to provide a proper theoretical background for students and to foster entrepreneurial behaviors through arts entrepreneurship education. Furthermore, the central role of professors to introduce innovative teaching methods to combine entrepreneurship and the creative economy into non-business courses is an important finding in these case studies.

Service diversification and growth of professional service firms

This study investigates the impact of service diversification on the rate and mode of firm growth in professional service firms (PSFs). Drawing on the extant PSF literature, we identify differing views regarding the growth impact of service diversification. Specifically, some scholars suggest that the external client benefits associated with service diversification should allow PSFs to expand revenues at a rapid pace and pursue less merger and acquisition activity, whereas others imply that increased diversification can cause internal challenges with respect to learning costs, coordination and innovation that can limit the rate of revenue growth and encourage more mergers and acquisitions. We test these competing views using longitudinal data on 137 accounting firms and cross-sectional data on 125 law firms and find that service diversification is negatively associated with the rate of firm revenue growth and positively associated with the use of mergers and acquisitions.

Marketers’ expanded role to increase internal customer satisfaction in organizational change

Abstract During times of change, when companies are going through major transformations like mergers, acquisitions, organizational re-structuring or culture change, marketing faces the challenge to implement the new strategy as scheduled, with no delays or changes. Internal customer change acceptance plays a significant role in this endeavor and marketers need to expand their role and complement Human Resources strategy to building trust between decision makers and employees, to learn and understand past issues and to find solutions. In this circumstance, marketers’ have to identify the variables that generally influence internal customer satisfaction and develop them in marketing tools aimed to increase it to the level that strategy is accepted and implemented faster than using only Human Resources mechanisms. This paper is a result of marketing practice in medium and large companies that went through organizational change. The goal of this case study is to create, based on time, discipline and cross-functional skills variables, a model of efficient processes and evaluation of marketing actions that will increase employees’ trust in change management decisions and will lead to their support and engagement. The three independent variables allowed researcher to study the complex relationship between internal client satisfaction phenomena, organizational change context and thirty-six cross-functional employees including management, ultimately to answer how these variables can be used by marketers to get the internal customer change buy-in. The research showed that the new developed marketing tools, that is to say a process flow associated with sustainable procedures and Service Level Agreements, increased internal customer satisfaction and contributed to smooth and consistent marketing strategy implementation, as scheduled. This result means the theory that marketers role in times of organizational change, besides regular Key Performance Indicators regarding the external client, expanded to complement Human Resources towards increasing internal customer satisfaction, determines a faster change acceptance, was validated.