This thesis analyses the changes in pay structures and systems in the banking sector of Pakistan within a wider organisational setting of changes in multiple HR practices. It examines the outcome of these changes as perceived by different employee workgroups in the milieu of their new set of expectations. The existing literature on pay and its influence on the employee psychological contract is mostly limited to studies in the Anglo-Saxon countries. It fails to adequately highlight the ensuing conflicts of institutionalizing HRM practices which may be considered socially legitimate in western societies, in a South Asian country. While the importance of employee involvement in the design and implementation of pay practices is established in the literature there have been few studies which link the implications of its absence with employee perceptions. Moreover, the limited emphasis on the implications and consequences of applying a differentiated HR architecture within organisations fails to recognize the complex and at times conflicting relationship between different HR practices and the associated impact on multiple employee workgroups. To address these gaps in literature a qualitative case study approach was employed and interviews were conducted with 94 employees and HR managers in six domestic banks in Pakistan. The analysis reveals the policies of deregulation and privatization as the key driver for changes in the pay practice which include a partial shift from seniority to performance based pay systems, adoption of broadband pay structures and discontinuation of defined pension benefits. The other HR practices varied only slightly in design features and were applied inconsistently across the differentiated employee workgroups indicating more investment in some than others and resulting in pronounced conflicts between them. The results suggest that interrogation of outcomes of changes in bundles of HR practices, framed by an organisation’s HR architecture requires a multi-level study which incorporates the perspectives of both the employers and the employees.

Ingeniero Civil Industrial / Las promociones de venta son fundamentales dentro de los esfuerzos de Marketing, por ejemplo, en E.E.U.U. el año 2004 las promociones de venta al canal en CPG (consumer packaged goods) representaron el 70% del presupuesto del área. En Chile el año 2002 representaron el 50,1% del presupuesto de Marketing. Una de las promociones de venta más importantes es el bundling, que es utilizado por muchas empresas y se encuentra entre las promociones preferidas por los consumidores. Un bundle es un paquete de dos o más productos que tienen mercado por sí solos, pero que se deciden vender conjuntamente. En general los consumidores asumen que los bundles incluyen un descuento en precio, lo que no es siempre cierto. De aquí nace el objetivo general de este trabajo: Analizar el ahorro presente en bundles y determinar el ahorro percibido por consumidores. Para cumplir este objetivo se realizaron mediciones de precio en tres supermercados y cinco locales de comida rápida. Se desarrolló una encuesta para medir la diferencia entre la percepción de ahorro en bundles y el ahorro real. Adicionalmente, se efectuó una encuesta para estudiar el efecto del ahorro de tiempo sobre la compra de bundles. Usualmente comprar bundles en las categorías de comida rápida y en las categorías de supermercados; aseo casa; aseo personal; y comida, implica ahorro en precio. Para todas las categorías el ahorro en promedio, es significativo y superior a 10%. No obstante, la compra de un bundle, no siempre se traduce en ahorro de dinero, se encontraron bundles con ahorros negativos o nulos en comida y en comida rápida. En general los consumidores perciben que los ahorros en bundles son positivos (inclusive en bundles con ahorros negativos), además considerando productos con precios similares, consideran que el ahorro en precio es relativamente constante. Esto independientemente de la cantidad de productos que incluye el bundle o de la categoría a la que los productos pertenecen. Sin embargo, si tiene influencia la cantidad total de productos que son una alternativa al bundle. Por ejemplo, un combo dentro de un menú de comida rápida es percibido con mayor ahorro si el menú tiene más productos. Por último, un bundle dentro de una lista amplia de productos es considerado como una alternativa que reduce el tiempo de decisión de compra. Cabe destacar que este efecto sólo se presenta entre los consumidores que efectivamente seleccionan el bundle. Se propone considerar para estudios futuros como afecta la manera de publicitar los descuentos sobre el ahorro percibido. Por ejemplo, comparando el caso en que se agrega un cartel que indica explícitamente cuanto es el ahorro que se recibe, versus el caso en que no se informa y el consumidor debe inferirlo. También se propone realizar un análisis de sensibilidad para estudiar para qué rangos de variaciones de precio los consumidores dejan de percibir que el ahorro en precio es constante y consideran que es mayor (o menor).

Renormalization procedures for families of dynamical systems have been used to prove many interesting results. Examples of results include that the bifurcation rate for the attractors of an analytic one-parameter family of quadratic-like maps is universal for all such families, unique ergodicity for almost every interval exchange mapping, a unique ergodicity criterion for the vertical translation flow of a flat surface in terms of its ``renormalization dynamics", known as Masur's criterion, and the classification of circle diffeomorphisms up to $C^{\infty}$ conjugation. We introduce renormalization procedures for $C^{*}$-algebras and étale groupoids using the concepts of $C_{0}(X)$-algebras and Morita equivalence for the former, and groupoid bundles and groupoid equivalence, in the sense of Muhly, Renault and Williams, for the latter. We focus on proving analogs to Masur's criterion in both cases using $C^{*}$-algebraic methods. Applying our criterion to our examples of renormalization procedures provides a unique trace criterion for unital AF algebras extending the one provided by Treviño in the setting of flat surfaces and the one provided by Veech in the setting of interval exchange mappings. Also, we recover the old fact that rotation of the circle by an irrational angle is uniquely ergodic, and the new fact that interesting groupoids associated to certain iterated function systems, recently introduced by Korfanty, have unique invariant probability measures whenever they are minimal. Lastly, we show how an étale groupoid renormalization procedure arises from an étale groupoid which factors down onto a groupoid associated to its renormalization dynamics, whenever it is a local homeomorphism. / Graduate

We will compute relative Gromov--Witten invariants of maximal contact order by applying the virtual localization formula to the moduli space of relative stable maps. In particular, we will enumerate genus 0 stable maps to the Hirzebruch surface 𝔽₁ = ℙ(𝒪_ℙ¹ ⊕ 𝒪_ℙ¹ (1)) relative to the divisor 𝐷 = 𝐵 + 𝐹, where 𝐵 is the base and 𝐹 the fiber of the projective bundle. We will provide an explicit description of the connected components of the fixed locus of the moduli space 𝑀̅₀,𝑛 (𝔽₁ ; 𝐷|𝛽 ; 𝜇) using decorated colored graphs and further determine the weight decomposition of their virtual normal bundles. This thesis contains explicit computations for 𝜇 = (3) and 𝛽 = 3𝐹 + 𝐵), and additionally 𝜇 = (4) and 𝛽 ∈ {4𝐹 + 𝐵, 4𝐹 + 2𝐵}. The same methodology however can be applied to any other ramification pattern 𝜇 and curve class 𝛽.

This licentiate thesis consists of two papers. In paper I the tautological ring of a Hilbert modular variety at an unramified prime is computed. The method of van der Geer in the case of A_{g} is extended to deal with the case of the Hilbert modular variety, which is more complicated. An example involving the unitary group is given which shows that this method cannot be used to compute the tautological rings of all Shimura varieties of Hodge type. In paper II we compute the pushforward map from a sub flag variety defined by a Levi subgroup to the Siegel flag variety. Specifically, this is the Levi factor of the parabolic associated with the maximal rational boundary component of the Siegel Shimura datum. The method involves an explicit understanding of the pullback map and an application of the self intersection formula.

京都大学 / 新制・課程博士 / 博士(理学) / 甲第23564号 / 理博第4758号 / 新制||理||1682(附属図書館) / 京都大学大学院理学研究科数学・数理解析専攻 / (主査)教授 泉 正己, 教授 COLLINS Benoit Vincent Pierre, 教授 加藤 毅 / 学位規則第4条第1項該当 / Doctor of Science / Kyoto University / DFAM

No description available.

Natural fibers have the potential to replace glass fibers in fiber-reinforced composite applications. However, the natural fibers’ intrinsic properties cause these issues: 1) the mechanical property variation; 2) moisture uptake by natural fibers and their composites; 3) lack of sound, cost-effective, environmentriendly fiber-matrix compounding processes; 4) incompatibility between natural fibers and polymer matrices; and 5) low heat-resistance of natural fibers and their composites. This dissertation systematically studied the use of kenaf bast fiber bundles, obtained via a mechanical retting method, as a light-weight reinforcement material for fiber-reinforced thermoset polymer composites for automotive applications. Kenaf bast fiber bundle tensile properties were tested, and the effects of locations in the kenaf plant, loading rates, retting methods, and high temperature treatments and their durations on kenaf bast fiber bundle tensile properties were evaluated. A process has been developed for fabricating high fiber loading kenaf bast fiber bundle-reinforced unsaturated polyester composites. The generated composites possessed high elastic moduli and their tensile strengths were close to specification requirements for glass fiber-reinforced sheet molding compounds. Effects of fiber loadings and lengths on resultant composite’s tensile properties were evaluated. Fiber loadings were very important for composite tensile modulus. Both fiber loadings and fiber lengths were important for composite tensile strengths. The distributions of composite tensile, flexural and impact strengths were analyzed. The 2-parameter Weibull model was found to be the most appropriate for describing the composite strength distributions and provided the most conservative design values. Kenaf-reinforced unsaturated polyester composites were also proved to be more cost-effective than glass fiber-reinforced SMCs at high fiber loadings. Kenaf bast fiber bundle-reinforced composite’s water absorption properties were tested. Surface-coating and edge-sealing significantly reduced composite water resistance properties. Encapsulation was a practical method to improve composite water resistance properties. The molding pressure and styrene concentrations on composite and matrix properties were evaluated. Laser and plasma treatment improved fiber-to-matrix adhesion.

Hair cells are transducers found found in the inner ear of vertebrates. They convert a mechanical signal, detected by the deflection of a bundle of cilia extending from their top surface, into an electrochemical signal. This dissertation studies the mechanical influence of the structure and materials on the function of the cells. I introduce two methods to conduct the mechanical analysis. The first uses strength of materials formulae to solve the simplified hair cell bundle models. The second is a finite element analysis, used to better account for the observed complexity of the structure. I then use these two techniques to build a fundamental understanding of the hair cell bundle structure. By first studying simplified models, then adding complexity, the effects of geometric and material variation can be deduced. I then study three actual bundles. These are all taken from vestibular organs of turtles, two from the posterior semicircular canal and one from the utricle. I present estimations of stiffness, tip link tensions, and nonlinear response. Finally, I investigate a single cilium forced by a fluid flow. The problem is solved by finite difference technique. Three different initial conditions are solved. / Ph. D.

O objetivo desse trabalho é fazer uma enumeração dos fibrados planos reais sobre algumas superfícies, como por exemplo, a esfera e o g-toro. Entre outras ferramentas, utilizamos a co-homologia das superfícies, com coeficientes locais, e também o método desenvolvido por Larmore para contar classes de homotopia de levantamento de funções. / The aim of this work is enumerate the plane bundles over some surfaces, for example the sphere and the g-torus. Among other tools we used cohomology of the surfaces with local coefficients and also the method developed by Larmore to count homotopy classes of lifting of functions.