Organic agriculture has offered a more sustainable alternative to conventional agricultural production and has grown rapidly in many countries. By 2012, over 5,000 hectares of land will be farmed organically in Taiwan. To understand and predict Taiwanese farmers¡¦ intention to become engaged in organic agricultural production, this study assessed participants¡¦ behavior determinants based on an integrated model, including Ajzen¡¦s (1988) theory of planned behavior and Roger¡¦s (1995) theory of innovation diffusion. An extra variable¡Xresponsibility¡Xwas also added to the model. The study interviews 166 farmers from organic farming class held by Agriculture Reform Fields, and 187 farmers from conventional farming class held by local Farmers¡¦ Associations. Assessments show that for farmers who attended organic-farming classes, (a) attitude, perceived behavioral control and responsibility predict participants¡¦ intention behind engagement in organic agriculture, and that (b) complexity, compatibility and observability predict their attitude. As for farmers who attended conventional-farming classes, assessments reveal that (a) attitude, subjective norm, perceived behavioral control and responsibility predict participants¡¦ intention behind engagement in organic agriculture, and that (b) environmental concern, complexity and observability predict participants¡¦ attitude. Furthermore, results also suggest that farmers who have younger ages, degrees of higher education, ownership of larger land, or suspicions that acquaintances fell ill due to pesticides are more willing to engage in organic agriculture. Implications regarding how to construct organic agriculture policy and how to distribute to farmers relevant information (e.g., certification process, sales skills and skills in organic farming) are discussed.

As a result of tough competition in the marketplace and the shift form a resource-based economy to a knowledge-based economy, companies are looking more and more at gaining competitive advantage through managing and maximizing their most valuable asset ¡V knowledge. In line with the increasing need to manage knowledge systems (KMS), which involve the application of IT systems and other organizational resources to manage knowledge strategically, are growing in popularity. Given the fact that it is not difficult to find applications relevant to KMS in organizations, the topic of KMS has not been well explored by researchers and scholars. Besides, even among the limited literature on KMS, there is a scarcity of studies on the empirical perspective of KMS, especially in the area of adoption, which is an important issue of managerial capacity. This research tries to address this gap by studying the adoption of KMS in Taiwanese organizations. Specifically, we want to find the significant factors of the KMS adoption. This study is based on innovative perspective combining with some important factors to mold an integrated model. Three dimensions are involved in, including: (1) Innovative characteristics of KMS: includes relative advantage, complexity, compatibility and cost of KMS (2) Organizational factors: includes IT infrastructure inside organization, employees¡¦ IS knowledge, management support, slack resources and business size (3) External factors: only includes competitive pressure. We try to find out whether there is something critical to adopt KMS. An empirical survey methodology is applied to test the research model and hypotheses proposed in this study. Eight out of nine hypotheses are validated in our research model with Discriminant Analysis. The research result reveals that management support of a firm has the strongest discriminability; on the other hand, competitive pressure also affects the adoption of KMS of a firm strongly. In conclusion all the variables have discriminant power expect relative advantage.

This research focuses on developing a framework for Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (WiMax) technology adoption by Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA). WiMax has emerged as a technology to overcome the limitations of traditional and existing broadband technologies and support a great number of organisations and consumers/citizens in providing a higher speed over substantial distances i.e. in areas that are difficult for wired infrastructure to reach. Despite all the interest in the types of broadband adoption as demonstrated by SMEs in several countries, there seems to be slow progress and lack of information supporting the decision making process for WiMax technology adoption by SMEs specifically in the context of KSA. This may illustrate that SMEs adopt WiMax technology solutions at a slower pace and make them characterised as laggards in terms of new technologies adoption. This research takes into consideration this literature gap and makes a step forward and investigates on WiMax technology adoption by SMEs in KSA with an organisational cultural view, vendors’ commercialisation strategies and government policies by analysing the normative literature related to this research. The data collection of this study was carried out in two phases including quantitative and qualitative approaches. The first phase of the research provided results indicated that, the Saudi SMEs who participated in this research are strongly dominated by clan culture and adhocracy culture. These cultures also have a positive impact on the Internet technologies adoption such as WiMax by SMEs. It is found that, the combination of clan and adhocracy cultures in Saudi SMEs is making them more likely to adopt latest Internet technologies. In the second phase, the results showed a wide difference in views among SMEs, WiMax vendors and government agencies involved in WiMax technology diffusion to SMEs in Saudi Arabia. Although WiMax technology started as an innovation that has the potential to be disruptive and could replace the widely diffused fixed wire line Internet connection, the research findings showed an interesting deviation from this path. In particular, the WiMax technology market analysis in Saudi Arabia highlighted the vendors’ tendency to treat WiMax technology as a sustaining innovation. Research findings also indicated that, the Saudi government provided funds for Information and Communications Technology‘s diffusion in the country. However, the level of awareness displayed by SMEs is persistently low. Knowledge deployment, mobilisation, innovation directive and subsidy have been emphasised by SMEs as the most important government interventions that might have an impact on WiMax adoption by them. Finally, further important issues have been uncovered by the research such as taxation, experience exchange, herd culture/bandwagon, consumer right protection and customer service in relation to the adoption of WiMax by SMEs. The perceived future prospect of these additional issues has been considered as an influence on adoption of WiMax technology by SMEs. The findings of this research can be useful to guide analysts and researchers in determining critical aspects of the complex issues involved in technologies adoption, and lead to suggestions for further valid research.

Although a specific program called the Crisis Intervention Team (CIT) has been generally recognized as the best-practice model that addresses the needs of the police officers in responding to mental health calls, many jurisdictions across the country have not only adopted the full CIT model but also have taken the liberty of adding new components and/or removing components of the original model in order to create a unique program that fits the needs of their individual community. The issue of differentiated adaptations of the original CIT model has created a controversy around best practice in the area of police response to individuals with mental health issues who are in crisis. Using an on-line survey and interview methods, this study examined a relationship between the degree of variation within specialized policing response models and their corresponding community characteristics. Previous research shows that the components of the original CIT model have positive influence on officers’ confidence in interacting with people with mental illness. Therefore, this study also hypothesized that a rating of an SPR police officers’ job satisfaction was likely to correlate with the degree to which an SPR program adhered to the original CIT model. The study found that mental health resources, extent of presence of special populations in a community, existence of SPR policies in law enforcement, mental health, and dispatch departments, and how much law enforcement and mental health administrators supported the program, all predicted the degree of total deviation of a program from the original CIT model. Population density, related to a distinction between rural and non-rural communities, did not predict the degree of deviation from the original CIT model. The study also found that the degree of deviation of a program from the original CIT model did not strongly predict the rating of SPR officers’ job satisfaction. The study discusses the possible reasons for the results as well as implications for stakeholders who are considering implementation of a Specialized Policing Response model in their communities. Limitations of the current study’s research design are also discussed.

This diploma thesis deals with management of projects with specialized software. It contains principles of project management in general and in construction projects. For this purpose, it’s primarily devoted to MS Project (general), BUILDpower and CONTEC (construction projects). Thesis also offers a look at the possibilities of combining the advantages of both approaches. For practical examples, there is representative construction project in pre-investment phase. This project or its parts is elaborated in mentioned software.