As of fairly recently, migrant workers from South East Asia are migrating to Canada for work in the agricultural industry. Little research has been conducted on migration routes and recruitment patterns of these migrant workers. Interviews with 13 workers and three support workers were conducted between May and July 2011 to learn about this process; specifically with how these individuals are getting to Canada, and how they maintain (or do not maintain) relationships with the private intermediaries and employment agencies that facilitate this movement. This research will fill a gap in the literature by describing the recruitment processes of ‘low-skilled’ workers into Canada and, more importantly, it will provide a much-needed space for South East Asian migrants to share their experiences about working in Canada.

The practicum explores 21st century retail design, with a specific focus on the emerging typology of guerilla retail. Through methodologies and performance theory from theatre, guerilla retail design is examined. The project was developed to explore a current disconnect that exists between producer and consumer. This disconnect has arisen out of a number of factors including, the geographical distance between producer and consumer and the lack of information provided to consumers about products. Ideas and theories from various forms of Guerilla theatre are examined to enhance the experience of the retail environment, creating a deeper emotional connection to the product, consumer, producer and act of shopping. A retail model is explored in three different sites to demonstrate the versatility. Through low construction cost, quick assembly and the strong impact of experience, this guerilla retail model aids these producers to survive in the midst of a globalized world.

This dissertation describes a study that investigated the perceptions of foster/whānau caregivers of support and training provisions in Canterbury, New Zealand. The study used both qualitative and quantitative methods. The qualitative component consisted of six questions presented to caregivers at individual or couple interviews. Major themes identified in the response to these questions indicated that participants are generally feeling under-supported and disrespected by social services staff, overwhelmed by the range, severity and difficulty of their children's behaviours, isolated in their role, unable to access relief care and a lack of provision and support for training in local areas. Participants also indicated a desire for training on the etiology and management of difficult child behaviours, managing birth family contact and legal issues relating to allegations and permanency. Areas of current support that caregivers indicated are useful included the support provided by Caregiver Liaison Social Workers, school and early childhood education staff, general practitioners, and other caregivers The quantitative component consisted of a survey covering basic demographic information. A modified child behavioural checklist, containing selected items from the 'Child Behaviour Checklist' and the 'Assessment Checklist for Children' was constructed to assess the range of problematic child behaviours caregivers are experiencing and how prepared they felt in dealing with them. Findings indicated that the participants are experiencing a range of severe behaviours well outside the normal experience of parents but are consistent with those reported in the international literature for children in care. The PSI was used to assess caregiver's stress levels relating to their parenting role. Participants reported high levels of stress particularly in the child domain of the PSI with sub-scales in the high to clinical range across this domain. Implications of theses results are discussed including implications for the caregivers, social welfare practices and the development of future training packages for caregivers.

Festivals and other events are often seen as important means for contributing to the positive image of a place and for increasing visitor numbers, for involving the local community and for creating job opportunities. Organising an event involves the temporary coordination of performers, an audience, volunteers, sponsors and other partners, and in the end an event is simultaneously produced and consumed. When the music has stopped or the actors have come off stage, when the audience has gone home and the premises have been cleared of rubbish, there might be few signs of an event having ever taken place. However, the value of an event is seen to extend beyond its immediate boundaries. This dissertation looks at event organising from a resources perspective. Which resources are engaged, and how do they contribute? Key questions that emerge concern the event’s connection to the place where it is held, how different actors are included or excluded and finally how the aesthetic aspects of an event attract resources. The study draws on observations of five cultural events and interviews with artistic directors, managers and collaboration partners. / <p>Diss. Stockholm : Handelshögskolan, 2008</p>

The face of the workplace has changed dramatically over the past decade and most organisations have to survive in a fiercely competitive global economy. The impact of the competitive changes, especially in the service environment has become critical and quality service is considered an essential strategy for success and survival in today's competitive environment. Organisations are continuously searching for ways to improve their performance and create a sustainable competitive advantage. Consumers are also continuously being made more aware of their rights and in today's fast paced world, with time constraints and increased stress, tolerance levels have been considerably eroded. In view of this, customer satisfaction has become a focus area, in particular, to investigate ways that it can be enhanced to gain a competitive edge. A better understanding of how organisations can apply resources to achieve these goals will be a useful instrument towards gaining sustainable competitive advantage. One way of doing this is for service firms to manage their capacity to achieve maximum and/or optimum utilisation at all times, if possible. But having trained staff on hand at the right times is no easy task. Overstaffing can lead to budget blow-out, while understating adds to staff stress levels, and can contribute to both customer and staff dissatisfaction. As a possible solution many employers tackle this problem by employing casual staff who are more flexible in their working hours and can be deployed to meet peak demands in service. The objective of this study was to investigate the importance of customer satisfaction and whether the utilisation of temporary staffing solutions could positively contribute in improving service levels. A survey research design was used with a questionnaire as data-gathering instrument. The study population consisted of customers (N=507) that visited Absa branches in the Vaal Triangle and were serviced by either permanent or flexi tellers. Contingency tables were used to record and analyse the relationship between the different variables, and statistical significance tests were used to show that the results are significant. Chi-square and Cramer's phi or V test were used as the basis of the analysis. The research confirmed that customer satisfaction has definite financial benefits for an organisation and that the effective application of temporary staffing solutions could further enhance these benefits. The results of the statistical analysis of the survey further confirmed that there was no significant difference in the perceived level of service received from either permanent or flexi tellers. Limitations in the research are identified and recommendations for future research are made. / Thesis (M.B.A.)--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2008.

The practicum explores 21st century retail design, with a specific focus on the emerging typology of guerilla retail. Through methodologies and performance theory from theatre, guerilla retail design is examined. The project was developed to explore a current disconnect that exists between producer and consumer. This disconnect has arisen out of a number of factors including, the geographical distance between producer and consumer and the lack of information provided to consumers about products. Ideas and theories from various forms of Guerilla theatre are examined to enhance the experience of the retail environment, creating a deeper emotional connection to the product, consumer, producer and act of shopping. A retail model is explored in three different sites to demonstrate the versatility. Through low construction cost, quick assembly and the strong impact of experience, this guerilla retail model aids these producers to survive in the midst of a globalized world.

Agency workers are a fundamental part of modern work being characterised in the workplace by a triangular employment relationship between them, the employment agency and the third party employer. The thesis was concerned about the job satisfaction of agency workers on two counts. Firstly, what contributed towards the job satisfaction of this unique type of worker? Secondly, what differences in job satisfaction and related variables arise between agency workers and permanent workers? Preliminary research along with a literature review on job satisfaction and agency workers formulated two sets of hypotheses, those variables relating to agency worker job satisfaction (relational hypotheses), and differences between permanent workers and agency workers (differential hypotheses). Both sets of hypotheses were tested by a quantitative survey, which surveyed 96 agency workers for the relational hypotheses and 157 call centre workers for the differential hypotheses. For the differential hypotheses a control group was used to address the possible influence that the employment of agency workers may have on permanent workers that hitherto has not been controlled for in studies of a similar nature. Semi-structured interviews with workers and employers were used to enlarge the quantitative findings. Organisational commitment, permanent and agency worker relationship were found to be significantly related to job satisfaction in both a correlation and hierarchical multiple linear regression analysis. Involuntary work status had no correlation challenging previous research. Significant differences were seen between agency workers and permanent workers on a number of variables including skill variety, job satisfaction, organisational commitment and job security satisfaction. These results both supported and contradicted previous studies primarily as preceding research had not accounted for the possible influence that agency workers may have on the permanent workers under research.

Deploying networks onboard mass transit vehicles, e.g., trains and buses, and connecting these moving networks to the Internet using cellular or satellite services is seen as a promising technology to meet the broadband demand in the transport sector. This thesis examines the problem of service disruptions in such moving networks and proposes original solutions to manage these disruptions. Service disruption is caused by two main reasons. First, unavailability of wireless resources in the back-haul (e.g., cellular) network may prevent successful handoff of all passenger calls when the moving vehicle leaves the coverage of one radio tower and enters another. Second, the moving network may face frequent network disconnections when the vehicle travels through environments with severe radio coverage, e.g., tunnels. To address service disruption due to back-haul resource unavailability, an advance resource reservation frame work is proposed whereby the deterministic mobility of public transport is exploited to reserve bandwidth at target radio base-stations along the route of the vehicle. The viability of the proposed advance reservation framework is validated by (i) a predictability analysis of resource demand of moving networks using real passenger data, which show that it is possible to predict the demand at an upcoming location based on past data and the passenger count at the current location, and (ii) design of cellular extensions which show that advance reservation not only can be accommodated in existing cellular architectures with minimal modifications, it can also guarantee fast and scalable access to massive reservation data. To quantify the effect of temporary network disconnections on the probability of service disruption, new mathematical models have been developed and validated by computer simulation. Finally, a novel proactive admission control (PAC) approach is proposed to reduce service disruption by rejecting new call requests when the moving network is predicted to experience an imminent network disconnection. Using mathematical modelling, it has been demonstrated that PAC reduces service disruption probability exponentially as a function of the proactive decision time with only a linear increase in the new call blocking probability. Practicality of the PAC approach has been confirmed using empirical data from actual vehicular trips.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--West Virginia University, 2004. / Title from document title page. Document formatted into pages; contains x, 158 p. : ill., maps. Includes abstract. Includes bibliographical references (p. 143-158).

Thesis (M. Sc.)--University of Hong Kong, 1999. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 151-158).