The effects of service convenience and perceived quality on perceived value,satisfaction and loyalty in low-cost fitness centers

Due to its importance in fitness centers, a number of authors have explored and analyzed loyalty. However, two characteristics not yet examined are service convenience in fitness center chains and low-cost fitness centers (an emerging business model). In the present study, the authors sought to understand the relationship among perceived quality and service convenience on perceived value, satisfaction, and client loyalty in low-cost fitness centers. Clients (N = 763; 381 women and 382 men) from three low-cost Spanish fitness centers were surveyed, revealing a positive relationship among the variables studied. Findings demonstrate the importance of proper management of non-monetary sacrifices and perceived quality by the managers of these sport organizations, since client loyalty could depend on factors of these emerging sport models.     

Enabling customer relationship management: Multi‐channel content model and management for financial eservices

Abstract

This study examines convergence as both a concept and a process. It examines the current state of convergence, various definitions of convergence, convergence practices, and it identifies Seven Observations of Convergence to be used as a strategy for best practices for organizations to integrate new and old media. Everett Rogers (1995) diffusion of innovations and the five stages of the innovation process in organizations, coupled with innovation management research are theoretical foundations used to examine the infusion of technological changes into business practices in the media industry. The study is based on research conducted during the summer of 2002 that included in‐depth interviews, participation‐observation, and archival documents from three leading corporate media groups and convergence pioneers‐Tribune Company, Media‐General, and Belo Corp at their integrated business units in Chicago, Dallas, and Tampa, Florida. The three organizations were selected for field study because they are convergence pioneers that fell under the grandfather clause of the U.S. Federal Communications Commission 1975 cross‐ownership rule and were allowed to maintain ownership of their television broadcast and newspaper business units in the same market.     

Journal clustering using a bibliographic coupling method

The classification of journal titles into fields or specialties is a problem of practical importance in library and information science. An algorithm is described which accomplishes such a classification using the single-link clustering technique and a novel application of the method of bibliographic coupling. The novelty consists in the use of two-step bibliographic coupling linkages, rather than the usual one-step linkages. This modification of the similarity measure leads to a marked improvement in the performance of single-link clustering in the formation of field or specialty clusters of journals. Results of an experiment using this algorithm are reported which grouped 890 journals into 168 clusters. This scope is an improvement of nearly an order of magnitude over previous journal clustering experiments. The results are evaluated by comparison with an independently derived manual classification of the same journal set. The generally good agreement indicates that this method of journal clustering will have significant practical utility for journal classification.     

Scaling up Content Analysis

ABSTRACT

Employing a number of different standalone programs is a prevalent approach among communication scholars who use computational methods to analyze media content. For instance, a researcher might use a specific program or a paid service to scrape some content from the Web, then use another program to process the resulting data, and finally conduct statistical analysis or produce some visualizations in yet another program. This makes it hard to build reproducible workflows, and even harder to build on the work of earlier studies. To improve this situation, we propose and discuss four criteria that a framework for automated content analysis should fulfill: scalability, free and open source, adaptability, and accessibility via multiple interfaces. We also describe how to put these considerations into practice, discuss their feasibility, and point toward future developments.     

Agile Project Management in Libraries: Creating Collaborative,Resilient, Responsive Organizations

Libraries must continually adapt to meet the ever-changing needs of users. Doing so requires the ability to be flexible and respond quickly. This is a case study of how The George Washington University Libraries rethought its approach to collection development using a cross-functional, team-based strategy that leveraged the benefits of Agile project management. Adopting an Agile approach to collection development maximized the impact of the library’s financial resources and enabled staff to develop new skills. This project underscores the value of collaboration, agility, and experimentation in libraries.     

The politics of PISA: The media,policy and public responses in Norway and England

Using the PISA 2015 releases in Norway and England, this article explores how PISA has been presented in the media and how the policy level has responded to the results. England will be used as an example for comparison. The article presents early media responses from the 20 most circulated daily newspapers in the two countries and discusses them in relation both to the national PISA reports in Norway and England, as well as the international report of the OECD. The media responses are further interpreted in light of previous research in both countries, with a particular focus upon Norway, where previous Ministers of Education have been interviewed about assessment policy and education reforms.     

Incentives and effort in the public sector: Have US education reforms increased teachers’ work hours?

Beyond some contracted minimum, salaried workers’ hours are largely chosen at the worker's discretion and should respond to the strength of contract incentives. Accordingly, we consider the response of teacher hours to accountability and school choice laws introduced in US public schools over the past two decades. Total weekly hours of full-time teachers have risen steadily since 1983 by about an hour, and after-school instructional hours have increased 34 percent since 1987. Average hours and the rate of increase also vary widely across states. However, after accounting for a common time trend in hours, we find no association between the introduction of accountability legislation and the change in teacher hours. Education reforms are, however, associated with an increase in student test scores, presumably due to other types of changes in school and teacher behavior.     

Information and its value to health workers in rural Uganda: a qualitative perspective*

A study was conducted in 1998/99 to investigate the accessibility and use of information by health workers in rural Uganda. Data were collected qualitatively using semi‐structured interviews. As a qualitative study, it focused in‐depth on a relatively small sample of health workers selected purposefully. Different categories of health workers were interviewed. Data were analysed using a grounded theory approach. In this paper, two main categories that emerged from the data will be discussed, namely: value of information and constraints. Information was valuable in clinical work, information dissemination, decision making, administration and detection. Constraints to effective information use included the quality and relevance of the information as well as the difficulties of sometimes putting theory into practice. Finally, the concepts that emerged from the analysis of the use of information pointed directly to the information needs of the health workers studied, which shows that information was valuable in meeting those needs. Some implications of the study and areas for further research are highlighted.     

Shaping a culture: oral histories of academic development in Australian universities

Academic development has had an approximately forty‐year history within Australian higher education, paralleling the major expansions and changes in the sector, both nationally and internationally. Its principal concerns have been the improvement of teaching and the professional development of the academics who teach. The history of academic development has gone largely undocumented and unexamined at a national level, in Australia and elsewhere. However, as university teaching has increasingly become important in relation to quality in higher education, academic development has become a central player in the work of universities. It becomes of particular importance at this time to garner a more thorough understanding of the continuities as well as the discontinuities in the meanings and practices of university teaching and in the work of those whose role has been to support its development. This article presents a discussion of two key themes identified from a set of oral history interviews conducted with early leaders in academic development in Australia. These themes offer different insights into issues and understandings of academic development in today’s university. The first concerns a perennial issue in academic development – the struggle to define academic development’s emerging ethos in relation to research and service to the broader university’s endeavour. The second theme represents an issue that has been forgotten or marginalised in the official accounts of academic development but which lives on in the ‘lore’ of the field – the role of activism in the shaping of university teaching and academic development.