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Purpose: To examine Wyoming physical education (PE) and physical activity (PA) policy and report current district-, school-, and classroom-level data. Method: A total of 175 public preK-12 PE teachers completed the 30-item Wyoming PE and PA Policy survey in April 2021. Results: Participants reported PE offered in elementary school was 73.1 (±34.3) min/week over 1.96 (±0.720) days, middle school 161.2 (±68.2) min/week over 3.13 (±1.29) days, and 229.8 (±85.3) min/week over 3.79 (±1.34) days in high school. Weekly recess minutes averaged 152.75 (±51.21). Recess was withheld as punishment in 51.8% of schools. About 10.2% of students earn PE credits for non-PE activities. Students earn online outsourced PE credits online in 12.5% of schools. Conclusions: PE in Wyoming schools is offered less than half the recommended weekly minutes, while recess is offered considerably more than the recommended amount. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Hospital foodservice is one of the key performance metrics that should be constantly monitored to maintain and improve the quality of hospital services. However, hospital foodservice must overcome obstacles and constraints that can impact the quality of services supplied. This study explored the barriers and challenges foodservice employees encountered during food production and serving meals to patients. Methods: A qualitative study was conducted with thirteen foodservice employees (N = 13) at a government hospital in Selangor, Malaysia, that outsourced its foodservice operations. The interviewees were chosen based on inclusion and exclusion criteria. The interviews were audiotaped, transcribed, and analyzed using narrative, and thematic analysis. Results: The narrative findings reported foodservice employees were able to define their job in the foodservice department and describe their responsibilities in delivering sufficient quality of service to patients. The findings showed foodservice staff confronts barriers and challenges related to the type of foodservice operation, budget allocation, menu served, employee issues, meal preparation, and equipment. Employees also proposed that the government should regularly revise the foodservice contract specifications, budget allocation, and upgrade the equipment used during meal preparation and delivery to patients for future improvement. Conclusion: Future studies should be conducted in different hospital settings, including government, semi-government and private hospitals or foodservice operation systems such as in-house and outsourced operations or centralized and decentralized plating systems to explore other barriers and challenges that may affect the overall foodservice performance. Therefore, intervention studies can be proposed to improve their operation in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: An opportunity exists to leverage the collective insights and experiences of phactMI™ member companies on current medical information (MI) services across the pharmaceutical industry. The collective insights provide considerations for refined MI strategies and enhanced MI services. The trend of organizational structure and challenge of resourcing for MI services are key areas to support efficiency and bring value to the overall organization. Methods: Between December 2017 and February 2018, all 27 phactMI™ member companies were electronically sent a 300-question survey to support the development of MI services across the pharmaceutical industry. The survey had 9 key areas of focus, including organizational structure and resourcing. Results: All 27 companies responded to the survey. Although the 27 companies survey differed in structure and size, the MI responsibilities performed both by in-house and outsourced groups were similar with each organization. Half of the groups outsourced various responsibilities which supported the non-product roles, such as quality assurance, compliance reporting, vendor operations management, reporting/analytics, technology and digital support, content-related process work, presentation specialists, and payer and health system support. Despite the ever-changing nature of the pharmaceutical industry, most responsibilities and outsourced work by MI groups remain the same over time. Conclusion: These findings provide MI teams various options for organizational structuring and resource strategies for MI services. These results highlight the services and focus areas that MI departments can explore and support the development of additional MI services across the pharmaceutical industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Innovation is essential for driving business survival, development, and growth. Today, managers within firms continuously search for new ways to gain competitive advantage. In many cases, this comes from the effective use of intangible assets such as workplace skills and abilities. Despite this, little is known about what types of skills are required for innovation, whether these vary by innovation-type, or whether it matters if these skills are outsourced. This paper addresses these issues using data collected on eight skill types as part of the 2008–2010 Irish Community Innovation Survey. We find that there is substantial heterogeneity in the effectiveness of skills at generating different kinds of innovation. In addition, for some types of innovation, it is best to develop the skills in-house (e.g., Engineering skills for product innovation) while for others it is best to outsource the skills (e.g., Multimedia skills for process and organisational innovation). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently, the demand for third-party logistics providers has become extremely relevant and the key subject for businesses to enhance their service quality and minimize logistics costs. The key success factor for an e-commerce business is product delivery, and the third-party logistics service provider is responsible for that. Each 3PLP has its own business characteristics, meaning it is important to select the most suitable logistics provider for the e-commerce business. This study uses a combination of grey relational analysis (GRA) and the Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) method, assisting decision makers in choosing the best logistics service provider for their e-business. A case study of an e-commerce company based in Faisalabad, Pakistan, was selected to demonstrate the steps of the proposed methods. In this process, seven criteria of logistics suppliers were considered, and then the best alternatives among four logistics provider companies were selected using the proposed method.

With the intention of minimizing operating cost and/or leveling limited production resources, managers of manufacturing firms usually fully assess diverse fabrication alternatives for meeting demand in their decision-making processes. This study presents a quality-assured hybrid economic manufacturing quantity- (EMQ-) based replenishment system considering an outsourcing option, rework, and scrap. The objectives are to determine optimal lot size for the proposed system and learn in-depth characteristics of key system parameters. A precise model is carefully built to portray the proposed system. Through mathematical analysis and optimization, a closed-form optimal lot size is obtained. Using a numerical example, we further confirm the applicability of the research result and demonstrate that crucial joint effects of various system variables on the optimal lot size and on total system cost are obtainable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates factors associated with public companies' choices of eXtensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL) implementation strategies. These strategies include Disclosure Management Solution (DMS) versus Stand-Alone Solution (SAS), and outsourcing versus in-house XBRL implementation. Using survey data provided by the Financial Executive Research Foundation, we find that perceived helpfulness of educational resources and perceived difficulties with companies' reporting review process are positively related to the use of DMS. Concerns about XBRL compliance and perceived difficulties with companies' accounting processes are inversely related to the use of DMS. Moreover, advanced XBRL knowledge and perceived helpfulness of XBRL guidance materials are negatively related to the outsourcing of XBRL implementation. Finally, concerns about XBRL compliance and earnings announcement time lags are positively associated with the outsourcing of XBRL implementation. Our results provide guidance for policymakers in developing XBRL implementation policies and for XBRL service providers in designing XBRL solutions for their clients. JEL Classifications: M41. Data Availability: Contact data sources identified in the paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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In this paper, we address an interesting variant of the vehicle routing problem with time windows (VRPTW) faced by the China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC). The CNPC owns a limited number of tanker trucks for delivering the petroleum to oil stations within specific time windows in the regular seasons. However, during the peak seasons, some requests need to be outsourced to external third-party logistics companies. These companies provide several bids, each of which includes the oil stations to be served and the corresponding charges. The CNPC needs to select some bids and design routes for the self-owned trucks, so that all requests are satisfied and the total cost is minimized. To study this problem, we formulate it into an arc-flow model and a set-partitioning model, and propose six families of valid inequalities to strengthen the set-partitioning model. Based on the set-partitioning model, we propose a branch-and-price-and-cut algorithm and a branch-and-bound algorithm to solve the problem exactly. The proposed algorithms are tested on instances generated according to the well-known Solomon's benchmark instances for the VRPTW and read-world data of the CNPC. The computational experiments demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithms. The online appendix is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/trsc.2018.0835. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On the heels of the online shopping boom during the Covid-19 pandemic, the electronic commerce (e-commerce) surge has many businesses facing an influx in product returns. Thus, relevant companies must implement robust reverse logistics strategies to reflect the increased importance of the capability. Reverse logistics also plays a radical role in any business’s sustainable development as a process of reusing, remanufacturing, and redistributing products. Within this context, outsourcing to a third-party reverse logistics provider (3PRLP) has been identified as one of the most important management strategies for today’s organizations, especially e-commerce players. The objective of this study is to develop a decision support system to assist businesses in the selection and evaluation of different 3PRLPs by a hybrid fuzzy multicriteria decision-making (MCDM) approach. Relevant criteria concerning the economic, environmental, social, and risk factors are incorporated and taken into the models. For obtaining more scientific and accurate ranking results, linguistic terms are adopted to reduce fuzziness and uncertainties of criteria weights in the natural decision-making process. The fuzzy analytic hierarchy process (FAHP) is applied to measure the criteria’s relative significance over the evaluation process. The fuzzy technique for order preference by similarity to an ideal solution (FTOPSIS) is then used to rank the alternatives. The prescribed method was adopted for solving a case study on the 3PRLP selection for an online merchant in Vietnam. As a result, the most compatible 3PRLP was determined. The study also indicated that “lead time,” “customer’s voice,” “cost,” “delivery and service,” and “quality” are the most dominant drivers when selecting 3PLRLs. This study aims to provide a more complete and robust evaluation process to e-commerce businesses and any organization that deals with supply chain management in determining the optimized reverse logistics partners.

With the development of cloud computing, more and more mobile devices have the requirement to outsource expensive computations in an untrusted environment. Among all such computations, exponentiations modulo a large prime are basic and frequent operations in many discrete-logarithm-based cryptographic protocols. Currently the most efficient outsourcing algorithm of modular exponentiations is under a one-malicious version of a two-untrusted-program assumption. And the result of the algorithm is checkable with a probability at most 2/3. We here propose an efficient algorithm under a two-untrusted- program assumption and improve the probability of checkability to be about l-2/3s for a suitable s configured by a client. Further, we provide practical results to show the energy saving about outsourcing modular exponentiations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An old and well-worn joke has a driver stopping to ask for directions and being told: 'I wouldn't start from here'. This paper will explore how adversity, both present and historical, can offer securities services providers an opportunity for cost reduction and business growth through selective partnership and collaboration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper outlines research exploring differences in approach to outsourcing and offshoring by multinational corporations. In particular, a comparison is drawn between German and UK headquartered organizations in the airline / transport and also the engineering sectors. A novel conceptual framework is developed that uses differing varieties of capitalism (VoC) to compare and contrast a series of criteria. Underlying theory that is drawn from the resource based view (RBV) of the firm and global production networks (GPNs) are also considered. The initial findings from two case studies are that German organizations are less inclined to outsource (in both sectors) preferring to retain control as a wholly owned business offshore. The UK businesses were less risk adverse and seemed to be more flexible and agile in their sourcing policies being prepared to outsource, offshore and partner or acquire as appropriate, even using competitors when there is a sound business case. The relationships' with trade unions / works council was alsofound to be very different, with reluctance by management in Germany to progress radical initiatives. A favorable economy in Germany has also created an environment in which overseas expansion could take place without a significant loss of jobs at home. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, domestic and foreign outsourcing practice was widespread. In the transition to outsourcing there are difficulties associated with the practical organization of the interaction between the customer and the performer. An algorithm of management of the relationship with the performer (outsourcer). Particular attention is given to the criteria for evaluation of potential contractors.

Purpose To compare the risk of postoperative endophthalmitis ( PE) after cataract surgery at eye departments in public hospitals and private hospitals/eye clinics and to evaluate if the Danish National Patient Registry ( NPR) is a reliable database to monitor the PE risk. Methods Postoperative endophthalmitis cases were retrospectively identified via the NPR and chart review in order to confirm PE cases that had cataract surgery in the calendar period 2002-2010. Results We identified 39 cases of PE after 107 701 registered public cataract operations; PE risk = 0.036 per 1000 operations and 27 cases of PE after 36 760 registered private operations; PE risk = 0.073 per 1000 operations. There was homogeneity in the PE risk among the eye departments in public hospitals (p = 0.6), but heterogeneity in the PE risk among the private hospitals/eye clinics (p = 0.0001). Six private hospitals/eye clinics had a statistically significantly higher PE risk compared with the eye departments in public hospitals. In all, 98% of public cataract surgery was registered in the NPR compared with 38% of private cataract surgery. The private hospitals/eye clinics with the highest PE risk after registered cataract surgery had many cases of PE where the causative cataract operation was not registered with the NPR. Conclusion A few private hospitals/eye clinics had a statistically significantly higher PE risk than the PE risk at the eye departments in public hospitals. The lack of registration with the NPR by the private hospitals/eye clinics suggests that better monitoring of cataract surgery is needed in Denmark to reduce risk and to improve quality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the advent of cloud computing, it becomes desirable to outsource graphs into cloud servers to efficiently perform complex operations without compromising their sensitive information. In this paper, we take the shortest distance computation as a case to investigate the technique issues in outsourcing graph operations. We first propose a parameter-free, edge-based 2-HOP delegation security model (shorten as 2-HOP delegation model), which can greatly reduce the chances of the structural pattern attack and the graph reconstruction attack. We then transform the original graph into a link graph $$G_l$$ kept locally and a set of outsourced graphs $$\mathcal G _o$$. Our objectives include (i) ensuring each outsourced graph meeting the requirement of 2-HOP delegation model, (ii) making shortest distance queries be answered using $$G_l$$ and $$\mathcal G _o$$, (iii) minimizing the space cost of $$G_l$$. We devise a greedy method to produce $$G_l$$ and $$\mathcal G _o$$, which can exactly answer shortest distance queries. We also develop an efficient transformation method to support approximate shortest distance answering under a given average additive error bound. The experimental results illustrate the effectiveness and efficiency of our method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The architecture of IT infrastructure has evolved from what was once a mainframe system to personal computing in recent decades. As cloud computing proliferates in today's environments, we see a reversion to the mainframe system. The level for computing and processing power in the asset management industry, and in general, allows for cloud computing to be widely used. The business of asset management can also allow a discipline of having low capital expenditure and minimising of depreciation assets. A cost-benefit discussion in this paper reveals many ways in which cloud computing makes sense from the facets of e-mail, file storage, and trading and accounting applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Securities Clearing, Settlement and Custody as a business segment has gone through a long period of metamorphosis. Consolidation and sophistication has occurred at a business level; however, from an operating point of view there is an on-going need to constantly review operating systems and process in order to evolve a sustainable business model for growth. Systems and operating process that had previously ensured success are no longer the recipes for success in the new, changing world. Customised solutions, greater scrutiny of price and value, and cross synergies are dominating buyer behaviours in this demanding segment, which continues to play a key role in global capital flows. In this context, optimising cost equation in securities clearing and settlement is an attempt to look at an ideal operating model from a practitioner's perspective. Focus on operation flows, constant attention to details, the holistic view of client relationship, and the cross-sell of capabilities are some of the success criteria recommended by the author as successful traits for a nimble forwardlooking operating model required for the current and future needs. This paper provides a practical framework to readers, especially within the clearing and settlement domain to review their operating model on an on-going basis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Problem Statement: Today establisments are in a very big global competition. From this they must give great effort for making their function continuous and for having a good place in the market. With this aim in available conditions they are making their structure suitable. Outsourcing is giving possibility as a strategic management vehicle. Establishments have tandency to make outsource couse of focus to their basic function. They give out other functions from their basic functions to develope their competition structure. In addition to outsource decreasing costs, share in risks, developing quality, making elastic structure ets helps to ıncrease performance of establishments. Resarch Aims: The aim of this study effects on efficiency using of outsourcing in the hospitals. Method: A questionniare has been applied to a total of 85 managers which works in university hospital (1), state hospital (15), special hospital (2) and branch hospital (2). The data have been evaluated by doing frequency distribution with correlation analysis which aims to reveal the existence of relation using SPSS program. Findings and Results: It has been observed that outsourcing helps to reduce the costs in hospitals and a positive relation between oursourcing and efficiency exists. Thus, it has been concluded that outsourcing increases efficiency in hospitals. Proposals: In hospitals which are the most important health care providers in a sector intense with service, it is obvious that outsourcing focuses respectively on cleaning, catering, security and automation with changes in understanding of providing health services it is thought that health services may also be provided by means of outsources in future. Because in may sector outsourcing is utilized effectively and efficiently. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Increasingly, organizations are jumping onto the information technology (IT) outsourcing bandwagon in an effort to create value. However, evidence indicating the positive economic consequences of such initiatives has been limited. This study attempts to fill this void by synthesizing the process-oriented research in IT business value literature and the resource-based theory to develop an integrative research framework for assessing the value proposition of IT outsourcing. With a process-oriented lens, the framework suggests that the effects of IT outsourcing are best documented at the process level and hence, it is imperative that one takes into consideration the impact of IT outsourcing on performance at both the process level as well as the firm level. Grounded in the resource-based view, the framework also accounts for the complementary role of firms' core IT capability as a critical condition for the value creation of IT outsourcing. Consistent with the process-oriented prediction, the findings suggest that the positive effects of IT outsourcing appear mostly at the process level, but not at the firm level. Moreover, it is found that the level of business value created by IT outsourcing is contingent on firms' core IT capability. Firms with superior core IT capability are found to enjoy an advantage in leveraging their outsourcing initiatives to enhance firm value. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article provides an overview of the process of incorporating shelf-ready materials into the University of Nevada Las Vegas Libraries. It outlines the planning process undertaken, the evolution of the implementation, and the lessons learned throughout the project. In conclusion, the authors speculate on the future of further outsourcing at UNLV. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As company-collected data increases in value, it attracts interest from unauthorized persons to access, misappropriate, and misuse it. Despite such risks, companies and financial institutions increasingly contract business processing of data (and other activities normally handled inhouse) to third parties - affiliates or independent service providers located in another country that will perform such tasks on a continuing basis. These outsourcing relationships with an offshore entity, or outsourcing candidates, often involve crossborder transfers of indeterminately large proportions of a client's proprietary and confidential information assets. Organizations must carefully select among third-party outsourcing candidates, because they could be entrusted with core business functions and mission-critical data that the client cannot afford to have compromised, damaged, rendered inaccessible, or handled in ways that fail to comply with legal regulations in the client's country or in the outsourcing candidate's country. This article explores some of the security-related issues and mechanisms to consider when constructing or managing outsourcing relationships. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Recently, the demand for third-party logistics providers has become extremely relevant and the key subject for businesses to enhance their service quality and minimize logistics costs. The key success factor for an e-commerce business is product delivery, and the third-party logistics service provider is responsible for that. Each 3PLP has its own business characteristics, meaning it is important to select the most suitable logistics provider for the e-commerce business. This study uses a combination of grey relational analysis (GRA) and the Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) method, assisting decision makers in choosing the best logistics service provider for their e-business. A case study of an e-commerce company based in Faisalabad, Pakistan, was selected to demonstrate the steps of the proposed methods. In this process, seven criteria of logistics suppliers were considered, and then the best alternatives among four logistics provider companies were selected using the proposed method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]