Scope Decision Research Articles

Firm Status and Scope: A Dynamic View

This paper extends the traditional transaction cost economics (TCE) perspective by taking account of status differences of transaction participants. Based on the status-based model of market competition proposed by Podolny (1993), I examine how transaction cost advantages or disadvantages originating from status differences affect market participants’ economic incentives and strategic objectives regarding their vertical and horizontal scope decision. I also examine long-term consequences of firms’ decisions and the implications of these consequences for high and low status firms. Considering status differences makes it clear that a considerable conceptual overlap exists between TCE and the resource-based view (RBV).

Pro-market reforms and the outsourcing tradeoffs: Evidence from the transition economies

What determines the firm scope is a fundamental question driving strategy and international business research. Extant literature examining a firm’s vertical scope decision has historically not accounted for the influence of institutional reforms. To fill this gap, we develop a theoretical framework based on insights from institutional economics to examine how pro-market reforms and firm-level R&D activity influence the likelihood of outsourcing production activities. Using data from the Business Environment and Enterprises Performance Surveys conducted by World Bank and European Bank for Reconstruction and Development in twenty-eight transition economies, we analyze the influence of pro-market reforms on the outsourcing decision. We do not find support for a strong direct influence of pro-market reforms on the likelihood of starting outsourcing. However, we find evidence that pro-market reforms influence the relationship between R&D activity and the likelihood of outsourcing. Interestingly, economic and legal reforms moderate the relationship between R&D activity and the likelihood to start outsourcing in different ways. While economic reforms weaken the positive relationship between R&D activity and outsourcing, legal reforms strengthen it.

Prestige of the Decision Ecology and Risk-taking in R&D Project in the Biopharmaceutical Sector

Knowledge-based organizations pose an innovation project ‘scope–risk paradox’ in their innovation projects. On the one hand, the uncertainty of the broader scope avails them opportunities to delegate responsibilities to the environment; on the other hand, an elevated risk–reward evaluation hampers their aspirations. This article suggests a solution: the prestige of the decision ecology inflates rewards and deflates risks in the scope decision. This decision ecology of the research and development (R&D) project consists of five prestige factors: (a) technological, (b) organization-specific, (c) nationality, (d) temporality and (f) structural. High prestige of these contextual elements implies that they influence the perceived reward to risk ratio. High prestige predicts high risk-taking, leading to a broader scope of the innovation project. The evidence supports that the technological prestige, organizational prestige, temporal prestige and structural prestige contribute to the broader scope decision of the R&D project in the clinical trial. However, the project nationality shows no difference. Overall, we conclude that the interpretative decisions based on the situation prestige influence the R&D project in the biopharmaceutical sector; therefore, the prestige of these ecological factors should matter in other disciplines. Other disciplines that draw value from the social context will show more pronounced effects of the prestige on decisions. Hence, this study sets a foundation for the theory and practice in other projects, organizations, sectors and nations.

An empirical study on decision making for quality requirements

ContextQuality requirements are important for product success yet often handled poorly. The problems with scope decision lead to delayed handling and an unbalanced scope. ObjectiveThis study characterizes the scope decision process to understand influencing factors and properties affecting the scope decision of quality requirements. MethodWe studied one company's scope decision process over a period of five years. We analyzed the decisions artifacts and interviewed experienced engineers involved in the scope decision process. ResultsFeatures addressing quality aspects explicitly are a minor part (4.41%) of all features handled. The phase of the product line seems to influence the prevalence and acceptance rate of quality features. Lastly, relying on external stakeholders and upfront analysis seems to lead to long lead-times and an insufficient quality requirements scope. ConclusionsThere is a need to make quality mode explicit in the scope decision process. We propose a scope decision process at a strategic level and a tactical level. The former to address long-term planning and the latter to cater for a speedy process. Furthermore, we believe it is key to balance the stakeholder input with feedback from usage and market in a more direct way than through a long plan-driven process.

Design evaluation of large-scale sodium integral effect test facility (STELLA-2) using MARS-LMR

The STELLA program is one of the key activities to support the development of PGSFR in Korea and the target is the DHRS. The STELLA-2 facility is an integral effect test facility and scaled-down components of PGSFR are included. For the STELLA-2 design evaluation, a representative DBE (LOF with LOOP) was selected for the MARS-LMR analysis with the same assumption and same approach of PGSFR safety analysis. The method and results of the transient analysis are described as well as the comparison with the PGSFR. The general trend was similar and showed reasonable results, but some differences were observed. However, the issues caused by these differences were found to be managed by adjusting the experiment scope and changing the experiment method. Furthermore, the validity of STELLA-2 was confirmed through collaboration with safety analysis group of PGSFR. The results of this work will be used as a base material for experiment condition setting and scope decision. Also, the valuable understanding of the facility’s characteristics will come out through the virtual experiment using MARS-LMR.

CM 산업 발전을 위한 정책 및 과제 추진 방안

As domestic construction investment has been gradually reduced, the issue of expanding overseas CM market has increased. Strengthening CM capability from the view point of project life-cycle is required in overseas CM market. However, current regulations institutionally force public CM services to focus on the construction phase. Therefore, Korean CM firms can hardly have the opportunities for accumulating technical competitiveness especially for pre-construction phase. Result of this study shows that the total efforts in terms of man-hours for the construction phase is found to be more than 78 percent in domestic public CM projects. In this context, this study proposes the policies and tasks for improving 'rigid man-hour placement', 'unreasonable CM fee standards', 'CM firm selection method', 'unreasonable business scope decision', and 'evaluation of owner's project management capability' in order to improve domestic CM Industry as well as to expand overseas CM market successfully.

Sistem Informasi Manajemen Surat pada Dinas Pendapatan, Pengelolaan Keuangan dan Aset Daerah Kabupaten Pati

Abstract - Documents handling at Dinas Pendapatan, Pengelolaan Keuangan dan Aset Daerah Kabupaten Pati was done manually and was not computerized. Because of that, it is needed to build documents management information system to automate the document control activity at department include the function of documents recording, documents making, and documents tracking. For gaining the purpose, a research must be done. That research used Framework for Application System Thinking (FAST) with eight phase, that is scope definition, problem analyst, requirement analyst, logical design, decision analyst, physical design and integration, construction and testing, and also installation and delivery. This research was implemented by using PHP, HTML, and Javascript as programming language and MySQL as database. System testing was done by using black box testing method.The result from this research is documents management information system.