We present twelve propositions constituting a contribution to a contingency view of time in organizations and synthesize apparently opposite perspectives of time. To articulate them, we relate the ‘planning’, ‘action’ and ‘improvisation’ strategic orientations to the ‘dependent’, ‘independent’ and ‘interdependent’ perspectives of the environment. Then, we relate these strategic orientations rel...

The urban development process displays regressive tacit-dominant knowledge areas and their tacit level would impede their movements during multi-level knowledge transfers among stakeholders. The accuracy of a knowledge may be distorted when recipient stakeholders fail to understand a specific knowledge for its purpose. Earlier studies by the authors had highlighted complex yet dynamic environme...

Locating known objects is an important task for robots. When a robot has a single camera located in its arm, the robot can use it to get pictures from multiple points of view. These pictures can be used for locating in 3D a desired object, when the object is found on the floor within a bounded distance from the robot. Here we propose a technique for planning a sequence of arm positions to be us...

There is a significant need for orthopaedic care in developing countries. For the past 10 years, the United States Army has supported annual orthopaedic hand surgery humanitarian missions to Honduras. The goal of this article is to compare the premission planning to the realities of mission execution to provide a template for future missions. Premission planning began 1 year before the mission....

The post-hurricane recovery processes of two universities are presented in this chapter, with an emphasis on the experiences specific to their library facilities and holdings. Interviews were conducted with library staff and campus leaders at both institutions. Case studies are constructed of the experiences of these libraries with Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in the Fall 2005 Semester. One libr...

A key question in conditional planning is: how many, and which of the possible execution failures should be planned for? One cannot, in general, plan for all the possible failures because the search space is too large. One cannot ignore all the possible failures, or one will fail to produce sufficiently flexible plans. In this paper, we describe an approach to conditional planning that attempts...

Systems for managing the risks associated with foodborne pathogens are based on detailed knowledge of the microorganisms and the foods with which they are associated--known hazards. An emerging pathogen, however, is an unknown hazard; therefore, to control it, key data must be acquired to convert the pathogen from an unknown to a known hazard. The types of information required are similar despi...

A generic risk matrix is presented for use identifying and assessing project risks quickly and cost effectively. It assists project managers with few resources to perform project risk analysis. The generic risk matrix (GRM) contains a broad set of risks that are categorized and ranked according to their potential impact and probability of occurrence. The matrix assists PMs in quickly identifyin...

Locating known objects is an important task for robots. When a robot has a single camera located in its arm, the robot can use it to get pictures from multiple points of view. These pictures can be used for locating in 3D a desired object, when the object is found on the floor within a bounded distance from the robot. Here we propose a technique for planning a sequence of arm positions to be us...

People process uncertainty information in two qualitatively different systems. Most climate forecast communications assume people process information analytically. Yet people also rely heavily on an experiential processing system. Better understanding of experiential processing may lead to more comprehensible risk communication products. Retranslation of statistical information into concrete (v...