Intelligence capital: a capability maturity model for a software development centre

Knowledge assets have become relevant to every organization and society since they are the most valuable product and production means in the knowledge economy. But measuring intangible assets still remains a challenge. The emerging knowledge-based view is still far from being a widely accepted theory. Researchers in this field are faced with knowledge-based value dynamics, changing environments and uncertainty. Knowledge assets are embedded capabilities in individuals, organizations or societies. This research is focused on the design of artifacts that enhance Intelligence Capital. Intelligence, understood in a comprehensive manner, is a knowledge asset that leverages adaptive capabilities through information gathering, sense-making and adaptation. From this approach, developing Intelligence Capital means to increase adaptive capabilities to make better decisions supported on internal and external knowledge. The purpose of this research is to apply the Intelligence Capital framework to a Technology Development Centre at the Tecnologico de Monterrey. It is expected that through this intervention, Intelligence Capital capabilities of this Centre can be assessed and managed. This model is an innovating proposal that deals with Capital Systems, adaptive capabilities and complexity.     

Assessing the influence of personal preferences on the choice of vocabulary for natural language generation

Referring expression generation is the part of natural language generation that decides how to refer to the entities appearing in an automatically generated text. Lexicalization is the part of this process which involves the choice of appropriate vocabulary or expressions to transform the conceptual content of a referring expression into the corresponding text in natural language. This problem presents an important challenge when we have enough knowledge to allow more than one alternative. In those cases, we need some heuristics to decide which alternatives are more appropriate in a given situation. Whereas most work on natural language generation has focused on a generic way of generating language, in this paper we explore personal preferences as a type of heuristic that has not been properly addressed. We empirically analyze the TUNA corpus, a corpus of referring expression lexicalizations, to investigate the influence of language preferences in how people lexicalize new referring expressions in different situations. We then present two corpus-based approaches to solve the problem of referring expression lexicalization, one that takes preferences into account and one that does not. The results show a decrease of 50% in the similarity error against the reference corpus when personal preferences are used to generate the final referring expression.     

Professional Doctorates and Careers: the Spanish case1

This article analyses the determining factors weighted by doctoral graduates when choosing their professional careers. In Spain, the analysis of such a group has been traditionally excluded from the empiric studies. On the one hand, the lack of databases made it difficult to see their professional situation, and on the other, a university career was understood as this group's innate purpose. The growing demand for qualified professionals in general and for those with a scientific training in particular has prompted the developed countries to carry out research on how to match the third-level training cycle and labour market needs. The analysis of this group's labour conditions allows one to assess whether the current doctoral education programmes satisfy labour market needs. The estimation of a multinomial logit model reveals the different factors when choosing a professional career depending on the area of knowledge. Personal characteristics, such as age, training, area of knowledge or job, as well as the expected wages become fundamental when determining doctors' professional future. Moreover, the results prove that a job outside the university is becoming a preferred option for doctors in certain fields.     

Establishing Media Partnerships in Crisis Response

Social protests in the United States of America (U.S.) are increasing in frequency, including the Dakota Access pipeline protests, the Women’s March in 2017 and 2018, and March for our Lives. Thousands of other protests have also emerged across digital platforms and in interpersonal contexts. This study explores the identity work processes individuals navigate as they engage with or avoid social protest. I conducted interviews with self-identified protesters who discussed the complexities of their experiences. Using CTI and identity gaps, dialogical wisdom are introduced to deepen this analysis. This scholarship provides insights for those interested in the interplay between individual identities and protest, as well how multiple identities and the gaps between them can address conflict.     

Leadership,an essential requirement for effecting change in media companies: An analysis of the Spanish market

Abstract

As afield of study, company leadership can be examined from many angles. In this paper our aim is to study leadership in the way it effects change. The qualitative value of the information compiled is considerable since it helps to understand the grounds on which the success of the directors who effected change of the Spanish media market was based. The interviews afford us a closer look at the minds of the leading players in action.

The cases analysed show that, in media companies, radical transformations do not come about without the existence of one or several leaders, capable of mobilising the organisation where they work.

Through the literature review, the companies'internal documentation and interviews with the directors we have been able to demonstrate that our hypotheses on leadership are not only reasonable but also help to explain, to a great extent, the profound transformations which the Spanish media market has undergone in the last 25 years.     

Acute effects of static and dynamic stretching on hamstrings’ response times

Abstract

The main purposes of this study were to (a) investigate acute effects of static and dynamic lower limb stretching routines on total response time, pre-motor time and motor time of the medial and lateral hamstrings during maximal eccentric isokinetic knee flexion; and (b) determine whether static and dynamic routines elicit similar responses. A total of 38 active adults completed the following intervention protocols in a randomised order on separate days: (a) non-stretching (control condition), (b) static stretching and (c) dynamic stretching. After the stretching or control intervention, total response time, pre-motor time and motor time of the medial and lateral hamstrings were assessed during eccentric knee flexion movements with participants prone. Measures were compared via a mixed-design factorial ANOVA. There were no main effects for total response time, pre-motor time and motor time. The results suggest that dynamic and static stretching has no influence on hamstrings response times (total response time, pre-motor time and motor time) and hence neither form of stretching reduces this primary risk factor for anterior cruciate ligament injury.     

Evaluating university performance using reference point based composite indicators

In this paper, we propose the application of a novel methodology to build composite indicators, in order to evaluate university performance. We analyse separately the three basic dimensions of our university system (research, teaching and technology transfer), because we are interested in getting a more accurate vision of each of them. In order to build the composite indicators, we use a multi-criteria analysis technique, based on the double reference point method. One advantage of this technique is the possibility to use reference levels, in such a way that the results obtained are easily interpreted in terms of the performance of the university with respect to these levels. Besides, aggregations for different compensation degrees are provided. In order to illustrate the advantages of this method, it has been applied to evaluate the performance of the public universities of the Spanish region of Andalucía, for year 2008. The results show that the performance of the Andalusian public universities in the teaching block is better than in the research and technology transfer blocks. The application lets us conclude that the methodology offers a warning system to assist in strategic decision making, and the values of the indicators allow us to find fields of improvement in all areas.     

Between the prescribed and the lived in physical education lessons

This study examines physical education (PE) curriculum development in an elementary school. Our goal was to understand the daily construction of a curriculum. We sought to analyse the theoretical and methodological framework and documents that a PE teacher uses each day while putting a curriculum into practice (lived curriculum). The data collection instruments included participant observation, interviews and document analysis. The analytical process revealed the influence of internal and external factors that affect both the authorship and the autonomy of a teacher working on the daily construction of a lived PE curriculum and that create tensions, struggles and conflicts.     

Media Archeology in Spain

Based on a carefully selected list of references in Spanish, the following text presents a brief history of the magic lantern in Spain, from its invention to the beginning of its decadence as a social medium of communication. The magic lantern emerged in the seventeenth century, with the application of a series of physical principles that allowed the first attempts and experiences of image projection, such as the one described by Juana Inés de la Cruz in Sueño, a silva strophe published in Seville in 1692. As a device, the magic lantern finally was consolidated during the last quarter of the eighteenth century, mainly due to the popular sessions of phantasmagorias, which, in Spain, were run by projectionists such as Juan González Mantilla, or Robertson himself. After the magic lantern became institutionalized and commercialized throughout the whole Iberian Peninsula—the same as in the rest of Europe—its decline took place in the last decade of the nineteenth century, when it had to compete with the cinematograph.