Abstract The main purpose of this research & analysis report is to suggest a working model between a world leading connector distribution firm and a world leading connector manufacturer firm that will guide them to improved sales performance, increased profitability, and higher levels of customer satisfaction. However, a lack of trust and commitment is keeping them from accomplishing these outcomes. Without trust, there is no commitment. Without commitment, there can be no meaningful change. The method of this research is to first analyze the theories developed in the past for working partnership between distribution firms and manufacturer firms and then, the empirical studies conducted for the same period of time. Among the theories and empirical studies, we focus on how to bond the relationship by using influence (or power), dependence, functional conflict, and cooperation. More specifically, these factors or variables are somewhat related to idiosyncratic investments and contractual terms which provide the two parties with the options to compare pros and cons of taking the next step for relationship bonding. Other ways that may affect their common interest are to form a strategic alliance or joint venture that will provide a competitive advantage for both companies to win the business in this highly competitive environment. At the end of this research, we use a case study to represent potential relationship issues that still go on in today¡¦s business environment which occurred decades ago. Then, we apply the theories and studies and provide suggestions to both leading connector distributor and manufacturer on how to strengthen working relationship in today¡¦s competitive business environment.

Agricultural journalism and agricultural communication have been researched in depth, identifying job skills, job satisfaction, educational backgrounds, and curriculum issues. However, a study examining the spheres (subjective, institutional, contextual, and societal) that influence how agricultural journalists and communicators do their jobs—as indicated by Esser’s (as cited in Frölich & Holtz–Bacha, 2003) model of spheres of influence on journalists—could not be found. This study utilized Esser’s model to identify those factors and determine whether their influences differ demographically. A total of 256 members of the International Federation of Agricultural Journalists, American Agricultural Editors’ Association, North American Agricultural Journalists, and Association for Communication Excellence in Agriculture, Natural Resources, and Life and Human Sciences responded to a researcher-designed instrument and a thirdparty Web-based survey tool. The respondents demographically resembled populations in similar studies. Data were analyzed using statistical tools and quantitative content analysis. This study found a relationship between the jobs that agricultural journalists and communicators do and the societal sphere (p=.04), which includes personal values, desire for self-realization, professional values, and conception of a journalist’s role. The spheres of influence of international organization (IFAJ, AAEA, and NAAJ) members and domestic organization (ACE) members were compared. The difference in the societal sphere was of medium effect size (d = .39), indicating that organizational membership influences members’ perceptions about themselves and their roles. Respondents indicated the most important skills for new agricultural journalists were personal attributes and skills, such as curiosity and adaptability; writing; and communication. The most important skills for new agricultural communicators were communication, personal attributes and skills, and journalistic skills. The most important future issue for agricultural journalists and communicators was agricultural technology and development. The findings indicate that agricultural journalists and communicators are influenced by their personal and professional values, perception of their professional roles, and desire for self-realization. Future agricultural journalists and communicators should seek training in personal attributes and skills, writing, communication, and journalistic skills. This study contributes to research in agricultural journalism and communication because it encompasses a global perspective by including respondents outside North America.

This project examines the determinants of political responsiveness to bureaucratic performance. A large literature exists that has examined how bureaucratic agencies are responsive to political institutions. While policy theory contends that the reverse is also true – that is, political institutions engage in political assessment of policies – there is little empirical literature examining this important question. Indeed, research in public administration suggests that political responsiveness only occurs following massive bureaucratic failure or policy crises. Using data from Texas public school districts, this dissertation explores the role of policy salience in determining the likelihood of political responsiveness to bureaucratic outputs and outcomes. The findings suggest that issue salience is the key determinant of political involvement in administration. Furthermore, this project incorporates the concepts of descriptive and substantive representation in examining these questions. The results indicate that policy salience depends on the composition of the interests of political institutions. Furthermore, race and ethnicity work to shape those preferences and, in turn, condition what policy makers deem as salient. The findings suggest that descriptively unrepresentative political institutions are less likely to be responsive to the needs of those who are not represented (e.g. Latino students). Thus, representation is central to political responsiveness when the policy outputs or outcomes in question are not universally salient. Finally, this project examines whether political institutions can influence policy outcomes, and, more importantly, what factors – environmental, organizational, managerial – either facilitate or constrain the political influence of elected officials. The findings suggest that goal and preference alignment between political institutions and bureaucratic agencies is critical in enhancing political influence – a finding that is commonly argued in formal models of political control, but rarely tested empirically. This research also finds that bureaucratic power or independence can work to hinder political influence of policy outputs.

Electronic customer relationship management (e-CRM) emerges from the Internet and web technology to facilitate the CRM implementation. It focuses on internet- or web-based interaction between companies and their customers. Especially, e-CRM enables service sectors to provide appropriate services and products to satisfy the customers so as to retain customer royalty and enhance customer profitability. This research is to explore the key research issues of e-CRM performance influence. A research model is proposed based on the widely applied technology- organization-environment (TOE) framework. Survey data from the questionnaire are collected to empirically assess our research model. With the structural equation modeling (SEM) analysis, the results show that e-CRM technology and organizational support are positively related to the e-CRM performance, while environmental pressure, though a drive to e-CRM adoption, does not impact the performance. More interestingly, it is observed that organizational support has a greater impact than e-CRM technology adoption. It is always a good principle to care customers¡¦ relationship more from human nature perspectives than from technology-oriented considerations. Also, in the aspect of organizational support, skilled and knowledgeable e-CRM personnel are the most important impacting factor among others. Finally, the contributions of our research lie in that not only the results can provide researchers a good starting point for e-CRM studies, but also can they provide practitioners of service sectors in Taiwan a good reference.

ABSTRACT One of the most important issues in Knowledge Management is ¡§knowledge transfer¡¨ and ¡§knowledge share¡¨. The knowledge transfer in organization needs some carriers and medias, and that is one of the factors to influence knowledge management performance. Base on the issue, this reaserch wil study the importance of media richness perception and it¡¦s influence factor from system effective perspective. This study develops based on the channel expansion theory (Carlson and Zmud,1994) and social influence (Fulk et al., 1990) . Four experiences of constructs in channel expansion theory were theexperience with the channel, experience with the messaging topic, experience with the organizational context, and experience with communication coparicipants. And, we will survey the e-learning environment in the NSYSU as our study sample. An empirical survey methodology is applied to test the research model and hypotheses proposed in this study. Five out of seven hypotheses are validated in our research model with Path Analysis. The research result reveals that the social influence dimension has the most impact on the perception of channel; on the other hand, experience with the channel and communication partner also result validates. Keywords: knowledge management, channel expansion theory, information systems effectiveness

This study investigates the relationship between upward influence tactics and job satisfaction from the employees in Taiwan , According to the results of analyses conducted on data collected from 2761 employees. The seven personal characteristics variables examined were gender, age, education, marriage, With subordinates the manager to work together as colleagues the period of service, in office the organization work period of service and position . Results indicated the importance of upward influence tactics and individual differences on assessments of job satisfaction as follows: First, the upward political line obtains five constructions surface by way of the host ingredient analysis, the naming is: (1) rationality convinces (2) exchange and upwardly demands (3) image to manage (4) fawns on (5) hindrance to exert pressure Second, the work satisfies the feeling to obtain six constructions surface by way of the host ingredient analysis, the naming is: (1) work achievement feeling (2) compensation satisfies (3) boss to satisfy (4) is promoted the opportunity (5) colleague to relate (6) work support Third, personal characteristics variable and relations upward political behavior: (1) male are more than in the upward political behavior activity the female. (2) work period of service 3~10 year or 30~40 year-old age level for political behavior operation degree most exuberant time. (3) high school record, mostly also is the upward political behavior highly by chance. (4) with subordinates the manager to work together as colleagues the period of service to be longer, the upward political behavior utilization regulation goes past high. (5) in management level, Regarding upward political behavior by chance degree, the high social class position manager and center the social class position manager obviously is higher than the basic unit social class managers. Fourth, personal characteristics variable and satisfies the relations with the work: (1)different personal characteristics variable all has in the work achievement feeling reveals the difference. (2)besides the education level, different personal characteristics variable and satisfies in the compensation on all has reveals the difference. (3)except outside the sex, the age, the education level, other four item of personal characteristics variable and satisfies in the boss on all has reveals the difference. (4)except outside the age, the education level, the marriage, other four item of personal characteristics variable in is promoted in the opportunity to have reveals the difference. (5)only has the sex, is in office the organization work period of service, work official rank three item of personal characteristics variable relates in the colleague on has reveals the difference. (6)except outside the sex, the education level, the marriage, other four item of personal characteristics variable all has in the work support reveals the difference. Fifth, controls personal characteristics variable, satisfies the relations in view of the upward political behavior and the work, after correlation analysis result: (1)regarding the work achievement feeling influence, "the rationality convinces" and "fawns on" presents is being connected, but "the exchange and the upward demand" presents causes the negative effect. (2)regarding salary satisfied influence, "exchange and upward demand" the upward political behavior effect is best, but uses "the hindrance exerts pressure" the way, then possibly instead causes the negative effect. (3)regarding the boss satisfied influence, the utilization "fawns on" the effect is best, adopts "the hindrance exerts pressure" the way to be able to appear the negative effect. (4)regarding is promoted the opportunity influence, adopts "the exchange and the upward demand" is easiest to achieve the expectation goal. (5)influence which relates regarding the colleague, "the rationality convinces" and "fawns on" has the frontage to strengthen the influence, but "the exchange and the upward demand" and "the hindrance exerts pressure" has the negative destruction influence. (6)regarding the work support influence, adopts "the exchange and the upward demand" the upward political behavior effect is best, but "the hindrance exerts pressure" can have the negative effect.

In Mao¡¦s era , Mao Zedong had a dominant leadership role, and PLA political role was affected by Mao¡¦s authority. PLA had to subordinate to Mao¡¦s order. PLA only played a role as a tool. After the 1978 reform, Deng Xiaoping promoted military modernization in the 1980s to reduce the political influence of the military. After Deng¡¦s death, Jiang Zemin lacked the personal authority and military background. As a result, Jiang had to grant concessions to PLA in order to ensure its support. One concession had obviously been the unprecedented participation of military chiefs in foreign affairs decisions that were of concern to PLA, including issues related to Taiwan and relations with the United States. Besides, in Jiang¡¦s era, the opportunities and channels which PLA participated in foreign policies increased. PLA influence in foreign policy was stronger than Mao¡¦s era and Deng¡¦s era. The research motivation of this essay is to expect that can understand the change of PLA political influence. The research aims of the essay include the following: 1. exploring the factors that affect PLA political influence; 2.probing into PLA participation in foreign policy, and realizing PLA political influence; 3.analying military diplomacy, and understanding the cooperation between PLA and Ministry of Foreign Affairs; 4.probing into the conflict between PLA and Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and understanding PLA strong attitude; 5.analying the decision model, Party-Military relations, political situation, the issues related to the national security, and deducing PLA political influence in the future.

This dissertation examines the types of messages used for organizational dissent, and argues for connections between dissent messages, choice of audience and influence goals. The organizational dissent literature has explored the situations that may trigger dissent and the variables that lead a dissenter to approach various audiences, but few studies have examined dissent messages. Additionally, this line of research has tended to neglect coworkers as a possible audience for dissent and has been characterized as atheoretical (Waldron, 1999). Much of the research on interpersonal influence has examined influence in romantic relationships, but influence may play an important role in workplace relationships as well, suggesting that interpersonal influence is an appropriate theoretical perspective from which to examine dissent. This dissertation examines the messages, audiences, and goals associated with dissent using a two-part study with interviews and surveys. Messages differed according to audience, but, surprisingly, not according to the quality of relationship between the dissenter and the audience. Dissent expressed to supervisors is more likely to involve message types such as assertiveness, rational arguments, solution presentation, humor, ingratiation, sanctions, threatening resignation, while dissent expressed to coworkers is more likely to involve message types such as displaying emotion or coalitions. The primary goal of expressing emotion and the secondary goal of identity were most prevalent in terms of considerations as study participants expressed dissent. The analyses indicate that the goal of expressing emotion was significantly related to messages of displaying emotion, goals of providing guidance or changing opinion were significantly more associated with solution presentation than with asking for information, the goal of gaining assistance was significantly more associated with coalitions, and the goal of relational resource was significantly less associated with messages threatening resignation. These results suggest that interpersonal influence offers a fruitful perspective from which to view dissent messages, and more research is needed to examine the goals associated with workplace influence as the goals that motivate interpersonal interactions differ from the goals that motivate organizational dissent. Additionally, these results indicate that the position of a person is more important than a relationship in determining how a person will express dissent.

With the popularity and growth of blog users, blog is well-known in the world. Many domestic or international enterprises started to be aware of the influence power and have put in more resources and investments. To explore the motivation of blog users¡¦ attitudes as well as the behavioral intentions in blogging is an important issue of research. This research used technology acceptance model, also called TAM, sharing motivation and social influence to examine the relationships of user¡¦s attitudes and behavioral intentions. This study used questionnaires to collect data and implemented statistical analysis by SPSS. The result found blog female user is more than male, the main user is young groups under 25-age student. Most respondents spend less than one hour for every time using blog; 90% of the respondents to participate in the blog 1 ~ 3 days per week. 55% of the respondents have blog using experience less than 2 years. "Online Diary", "Expression of emotion" and "Information sharing" is the main purpose of the respondents participating in the blog. Wretch, blog-hosting service provider, has the most members of blog users, Yahoo is followed by the second, and MSN Space is third. The research results indicated that perceived of usefulness, perceived of enjoyment, reciprocity and reputation were positively related to attitude toward blogging. On the other hand, subjective norm and attitude toward blogging significantly influenced a blog participant¡¦s intention to continue to use. However trust and relationship can not predict the attitude toward blogging, primarily the Internet users in general do not believe the information quality. The factor of feedback in social influence also can not predict the user¡¦s intention in blogging mainly was because the current blog functions and services can not attract or satisfy users in blogging. Therefore, blog-hosting service providers should continue to improve the evaluation mechanisms to strengthen the information content and quality. In addition, they also need to create more entertaining interactive features to attract more users or encourage users¡¦ intention to continue in blogging.

Texte remanié de: Th. doct.--Psychol.--Université de Genève, 2000. Titre de soutenance : Prosélytisme, élaboration du conflit et changement d'attitude. / Bibliogr. p. 255-276.