Thesis (M.S. in Management)--Naval Postgraduate School, March 2005. / Thesis Advisor(s): Stephen L. Mehay. Includes bibliographical references (p. 67-68). Also available online.

This study used focus groups to explore the nature and effects of gender-related microinequities on women in the upper levels of government. Microinequities were defined as subtle forms of differential treatment toward any person who is different than the others in a group. Subjects were selected from eight federal agencies and included 114 women and 30 men at the SES and GS/GM 13-15 grade levels. Each focus group was asked questions pertaining to the nature of microinequities, and the effects of microinequities on self concept, productivity, and career development. Female subjects reported experiencing a wide range of microinequities, primarily related to interpersonal relationships between men and women, attitudes about women, social support, family roles, and physical characteristics. Despite the large number of women who reported experiencing microinequities, a substantial number of women reported that men and women were treated equally in the workplace. The research question regarding the effect of microinequities on self concept yielded a small number of responses and diverse views. Some women reported experiencing self doubt when confronted with microinequities; other women reported that microinequities had no affect on self concept. Views about the effect of microinequities on energy or productivity were also diverse. Some women reported that microinequities had no effect on their energy. Other women reported that microinequities affected their energy; comments were related to stress, long hours, aggression, strategy, anger, superwoman tendencies, and coping strategies. With regard to career development, female participants generally reported that microinequities did not affect their career success. When effects were reported, they were described as short-term. Recommendations for managers based upon reported experiences were described, and implications for managers were explored. / Ph. D.

Merit pay refers to the awarding of differential amounts of financial rewards to deserving employees based on their individual performances as measured by Performance appraisal and Rating. The idea is that such a practice would act as a spur to all employees -- both deserving and undeserving-- to improve their productivity to earn the extra pay. The systemic effect would be enhanced organizational productivity and effectiveness. Although it has fallen in and out of favor over the years, as its long history in the public sector shows, interest in the concept endures. So has the controversy surrounding its efficacy or the lack thereof. This dissertation is an attempt to further our understanding of the potential of merit pay in the public sector. To this end, it makes a critical assessment of the efficacy or the lack thereof of merit pay programs in the public sector. This has been done by integrating the findings of thirty-six empirical studies that examined such programs. Twenty-nine of these studies elicited from employees their perceptions affected of how merit pay in their organizations has employee motivation, productivity, and organizational effectiveness. The remaining seven represent authors' (non-respondent) conclusions regarding the effect of merit pay on the above variables in the organizations they examined. Taking all in all, the findings of this study show that merit pay has not significantly enhanced employee motivation, productivity, or organizational effectiveness. In addition, virtually all of the shortcomings and organizational behavioral problems identified in the literature with regard to the implementation of merit pay were found to have plagued the merit pay programs examined in these empirical studies. These problems seem to be ubiquitous and endemic. However, the goal-setting aspect of the merit pay process was found to have led to improvement in employee performance. Two main recommendations are made. First, organizations should use goal-setting. It can yield beneficial results without the headaches of merit pay. Second, and more desirably, efforts at enduring motivation and productivity improvement should be directed toward promoting teamwork in the workplace and creating a culture that fosters commitment to organizational purposes and cooperation among persons and units within the organization. / Ph. D.

In this dissertation an iterative procedure, due to Hartley [9], for obtaining the maximum likelihood estimators of the parameters from underlying discrete distributions is studied for the case of grouped random samples. It is shown that when the underlying distribution is Poisson the process always converges and does so regardless of the initial values taken for the unknown parameter. In showing this, a rather interesting property of the Poisson distribution was derived. If one defines a connected group of integers to be such that it contains all the integers between and including its end points, it is shown that the variance of the sub- distribution defined on this connected set is strictly less than the variance of the complete Poisson distribution. A Monte Carlo study was performed to indicate how increasing group sizes affected the variances of the maximum likelihood estimators. As a result of a problem encountered by the Office of Naval Research, combinations of distributions diff kb were introduced. The difference between such combinations and the classical mixtures of distributions is that a new distribution must be considered whenever the random variable in question increases by an integral multiple of a known integer constant, b. When all the data are present, the estimation problem is no more complicated than when estimating the individual parameters from the component distributions. However, it is pointed out that very frequently the observed samples are defective in the fact that none of the component frequencies are observed. Hence, horizontal grouping of the sample values occurs as opposed to the vertical grouping encountered previously in the one parameter Poisson case. An extension of the iterative procedure used to obtain the maximum likelihood estimator of the single parameter grouped Poisson distribution is made to obtain the estimators of the parameters in a horizontally grouped sample. As a practical example, the component distributions were all taken to be from the Poisson family. The estimators were obtained and their properties were studied. The regularity conditions which are sufficient to show that a consistent and asymptotically normally distributed solution to the likelihood equations exist are seen to be satisfied for such combinations of the Poisson distributions. Further, in the full data case, a set of jointly sufficient statistics is exhibited and since, in the presence of sufficient statistics, the solutions to the likelihood equations are unique, the estimators are consistent and asymptotically normal. It is seen that such combinations of distributions can be applied to problems in item demands. A justification of the Poisson distribution is given for such applications, but it is also pointed out that the Negative Binomial distribution might be applicable. It is also shown that such a probability model might have an application in testing the efficiency of an anti-ballistic missile system when under attack by missiles which carry multiple warheads. However, no data were available and hence the study of this application could be carried no further. / Ed. D.

What this project endeavors to do is to take the complex issue of twenty-first century governmental administration and, through historic analysis using some of the classical and renowed literature of the past, paint a broad brush picture of where we are today, how we got here, and where we are going. This study includes an examination of the dominant ideologies of past reform eras.

This qualitative study of representative bureaucracy examines the extension and limitations of liberal democratic rights by connecting environmental and social history with policy, individual decision making, gender, race, and class in American history. It documents major cultural shifts in a homogeneous patriarchal organization, constraints, advancement, and the historical agency of women and minorities. "Creating a Multicultural Forest Service" identifies a relationship between natural and human resources and tells a story of expanding and contracting civil liberties that shifted over time from women and people of color to include the differently-abled and LGBT communities. It includes oral history as a key to uncovering individual decision points, relational networks, organizational activism, and human/nature relations to shape meaningful explanations of historical institutional change. With gender and race as primary categories, this inquiry forms a history that is critical to understanding federal bureaucratic efforts to meet workforce diversity goals in natural resource organizations.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / Conventional interpretations of WWII hold that the war brought the United States out of the Great Depression and laid the path for future economic prosperity. However, this was not the case for all businesses and industries. During WWII, unprecedented production output was required of U.S. industries to supply the great “Arsenal of Democracy.” Industrial mobilization required the creation of new agencies and commissions to manage the nation’s resources. These organizations created policies that deeply impacted U.S. industries involved in war production. Policies governing such areas as the allocation of raw materials, transportation of finished goods, and distribution of war contracts created challenges for businesses that often resulted in lost productivity and in some cases, loss of profitability. Government regulation of the labor force and labor problems such as labor shortages, high absenteeism and turnover rates, and labor disputes presented further challenges for businesses navigating the wartime economy. Most studies of WWII industrial mobilization have focused on large corporations in high priority industries, such as the aircraft, petroleum, or steel industries, which achieved great success during the war. This thesis presents a case study of The Real Silk Hosiery Mills of Indianapolis, Indiana, a company that is representative of small and mid-sized companies that produced lower priority goods. The study demonstrates that the policies created by the military and civilian wartime agencies favored large corporations and had a negative affect on some businesses like Real Silk. As such,the economic boost associated with the war did not occur across the board.