Archives-December  

This study investigated the main effects of leadership styles on organizational performance at state-owned corporations in Kenya. It specifically sought to determine the impact of laissez-faire, transactional and transformational leadership styles on organizational performance at state-owned corporations in Kenya. A descriptive survey research based on the perceptions of middle and senior managers in thirty (30) state-owned corporations based in Mombasa, Kenya was undertaken. A structured self-completed research questionnaire was thereafter distributed and collected after one week. The completed questionnaires were checked for plausibility, integrity and completeness resulting in 72 usable cases. Three independent variables with various factors were identified and measured using a five-point scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). These were laissez-faire; transactional; and transformational leadership styles. The dependent factor was represented by the degree to which the organization has achieved its business objectives in the previous financial year. To discover the leadership styles that influence organizational performance, correlation analysis was employed. Correlations between the transformational-leadership factors and organizational performance ratings were high (0.518 to 0.696, P < .05), whereas correlations between the transactional-leadership behaviors and organizational performance were relatively low (0.219 to 0.375, P < .05). As expected, laissez-faire leadership style is not significantly correlated to organizational performance. Based on the findings, the following recommendations are given: managers should discard laissez-faire leadership style by becoming more involved in guiding their subordinates; public managers should formulate and implement effective reward & recognition systems. It was further recommended that managers should: strive to become role models to their subordinates; inspire subordinates by providing meaning and challenge to work; stimulate subordinate efforts to become more innovative & creative; and lastly, pay greater attention to each individual’s need for achievement and growth.

Code switching is defined as the practice of selecting or altering linguistic elements so as to contextualize talk in interaction (Nilep,2006). The main purpose of this study is to investigate and closely examine the role and the effects of code-switching on material learning in a classroom context and also students' attitudes towards this linguistic phenomenon. For this purpose, the students’ notes, which were taken from the teachers’ speech, were studied and then their written notes were analyzed qualitatively with a focus on code switching. Then, the questionnaire was distributed among participants to investigate their attitudes. According to the quantitative and qualitative data analysis obtained from the questionnaire –distributed among 60 participants – and the interview, code switching during delivering materials was completely helpful to the students' learning and also it helped them to remember better for their exams.

This study aims at analyzing the relations between EFL learners’ locus of control, self-directed learning readiness and the choice of vocabulary learning strategies. The participants were 137 undergraduate students from Islamic Azad university- Rasht branch. Oxford Placement Test (2004) was administered to them in order to specify the homogeneity of the participants in terms of language proficiency. In order to measure the variables of the study self-report questionnaires of locus of control, self-directed learning readiness and vocabulary learning strategies were used. To achieve the purpose of the study spearman rank-ordered correlations, independent sample t-tests, two Man-Whitney tests, two-way factorial MANOVA, simple linear regressions and one-way ANOVA analyses were conducted. The results revealed that self-directed learning readiness positively correlated with both discovery and consolidation vocabulary learning strategies and that self-directed learning readiness’s levels predict the use of two types of vocabulary learning strategies.

In this paper the three dimensional wave propagation in a homogenous Isotropic generalized thermo elastic cylindrical panel is investigated in the context of the linear theory of thermo elasticity. The analysis is carried out by introducing three displacement potentials so that the equations of motion are uncoupled and simplified. A modified Bessel function solution with complex arguments is then directly used for the case of complex eigenvalues , To clarify the correctness and effectiveness of the developed method the dispersion curves of different panel parameters are computed and presented for Zinc material with the support of MATLAB.

Research and Realization of a Web Information Extraction based on Xpath expansion. This algorithm marks importance weight of semantic blocks and obtains a model of block importance. This information extraction method based on Xpath expansion forms extraction rule corresponding to web site. Lastly, this algorithm extracts the text information blocks of theme-based web pages. It uses a case to confirm that this algorithm can accurately complete the extraction task of text information blocks in the theme-based web pages.

One psychological factor which has recently gained importance in translation studies is the concept of willingness to translate (WTT). As a new notion, this willingness has not been probed regarding its relationship with translators' personality. Therefore, the present study, at first, focused on the analysis of the relationship between MA students’ three levels of WTT and their personality types, and then in the second step it tried to test this relationship between students’ WTT levels and their eight personality dichotomies. The quantitative data of this study were gathered through the administration of two questionnaires: willingness to translate (WTT) and the Persian version of the Myers Briggs type indicator (MBTI). The first hypothesized relationship was examined via One-Way ANOVA Test. The result demonstrated no relationship between these two variables. On the other hand, for testing this relationship between students’ WTT levels and eight personality dichotomies, a correlation test was applied. The results indicated a weak and positive correlation between Thinking and WTT and a weak and negative correlation between Feeling and WTT. Based on the results, it can be concluded that students’ personality types and dichotomies can have no effect on their three levels of WTT.

This paper aims to examine the key drivers for employee engagement within an organization. It seeks to answer the question: what are the keys to improving the level of employee engagement? A case study illustrates a strategy for employee engagement that was based on research on the key drivers of engagement. The paper presents practical case study material from Kia Motors – the South Korean automotive manufacturer. It shows how Human Resources (HR) worked to develop a strategy to address very poor levels of employee engagement. A clear set of engagement measures was developed to assess the impact of the engagement strategy. This paper ascertains some of the key drivers of employee engagement as illustrated by the case study. It demonstrates a number of practical tools HR professionals can utilize to build employee engagement within their organizations.

Customer satisfaction is end result of the service and products quality. This study measures the service quality dimensions given by Parasuraman (1990). The present study is taken up with an objective to measure the opinion of respondents on service quality such as product quality, price, product availability, store environment and design of product display. To assess the customer satisfaction; and to suggest specific steps to improve service quality of the retail store 120 samples are considered to pool up the opinions by structured questionnaire. This study tries to find interrelationship between various Retail Service Qualities dimensions, which will help the retailers to identify the steps needed to improve the overall quality of service.

Transferring heat using conduction and convection requires the presence of a temperature gradient in some form of matter ,while the heat transfer by thermal radiation requires no matter. It is extremely important process, and from physical sense it is perhaps the most interesting form of the heat transfer modes. It is relevant to many industrial heating, cooling, and drying processes, as well as to energy conversion methods that involves fossil fuel combustion and solar radiation. In this paper, our objective is studying the radiation in Circular Finned-tube heat exchanger. Finned-tube heat exchangers are predominantly used in space conditioning systems, as well as other applications requiring heat exchange between two fluids. One important widespread use is in cooling applications. The results show that the heat transfer in the mode of the radiation is just about 2% compared with forced convection , but when there is natural convection in the system the term of radiation is considerable.

In this study, surface water and sediments were collected from twenty-four (24) different sites in four different locations along the longitudinal transect of the Lower Pra river and evaluated for their quality using several multivariate statistical methods including Principal Component Analysis and pollution index model. Environmental parameters such as heavy metals, water nutrients and physicochemical parameters were determined in the dry and wet periods. The PCA indicated that heavy metals Fe,-Mn,-Ni and-Zn were from predominantly natural sources, whilst Hg,-Cu and-Pb were from anthropogenic sources. Fe-Mn-Zn-Ni had an association with TSS whilst Hg-Se-Pb had an association with TDS.