Sharif Digital Repository

The purpose of this study is providing a framework for the evaluation of process and content of development programs and evaluating the fourth and fifth law development program of Iran. Policy evaluation is one the most important measures in the policy cycle and is implemented with the purpose of learning from the results of stage. Given the wide dimensions of policy making, achieving a model for evaluating policy is faced with many complexities. In this study with reviewing previous experiences in the field of policy evaluation, an integrated model for evaluating policy, is presented from two main aspects of the process and the content and then with using this model, the Fourth Program and... 

Residential and commercial sectors, share a significant portion of energy consumption in Iran; 37 percent of the total per capita consumption. Therefore, identification of the relation between revenue and energy consumption could be a great assistance to policy makers for clarification of policies employed in energy sector. This paper attempts to explore and analyze the relationship between revenue and energy consumption in residential and commercial sectors for the years 1969 to 2009 in Iran by Smooth Transition Regression Models. Smooth transition regression model is a nonlinear time series model which can be considered as a developed form of Switching Regression Model. The obtained... 

The advancement in technology, information and communication has forced banks and financial institutions into hard competition. In this new era technology, people and customer are the elements which the banks are concentrating on them to manage customer relationship and success of banking in customer satisfaction. Electronic customer relationship management (e-CRM) is seen to arise from the consolidation of traditional CRM with the e-business applications marketplace and has created a flurry of activity among companies. The purpose of this study is to examine the competitive advantages on e-CRM in financial institutions and banks and obtain better understanding of the e-CRM benefits. A... 

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore the process and competitive factors of entrepreneurship in digital space in Iran. Design/methodology/approach: In the last decades, the development and advancement of information and communication technologies (ICTs) and the business innovations related to them have defined a new economy which is known as "digital economy". Establishing and running businesses in this digital space means carrying out a kind of electronic commerce by exploiting the internet and other electronic networks. The new digital economy provides exceptional opportunities for many entrepreneurs to create new ventures in different business areas according to electronic... 

Nowadays information technology has been applied in various fields. Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) is one of the most important applications of IT in Iranian organizations. These systems can create competitive advantages for organizations. Companies which intend to use ERP systems have difficulties in selecting optimum system because of the diversity of such systems. On the other hand according to the considerable changes that the implementation of such systems at all levels of the organization willbring about, lack precision in selecting appropriate ERP systems leads to irreparable damage for the organization. This study attempts to resolve problems in selecting and implementing... 

Using mixed method research the current study has analyzed Iranian researchers' information searching behavior on the Web. Based on extracted concepts, the model of their information searching behavior was revealed. Forty-four participants, including academic staff from universities and research centers were recruited for this study selected by purposive sampling. Data were gathered from questionnaires including ten questions and semi-structured interview. Each participant's memos were analyzed using grounded theory methods adapted from Strauss & Corbin (1998). Results showed that the main objectives of subjects were doing a research, writing a paper, studying, doing assignments, downloading... 

This study was a prototype segmentation of Iran's inbound tourism market with a concentration on culture. The focus of this paper was to introduce a step by step description of the methodology used to segment Iran's inbound tourism market. In the first phase, cluster analysis was employed to segment the entire market based on two dimensions of tourists' expenditure and cultural traits. In the second phase, the resulting clusters were divided into further subgroups using a common sense approach. Additional variables were utilised to profile the segments, and finally, the segmentation process was verified through outcome analysis  

The purpose of the research is to define and analyze the dominant organizational culture in Kish and to conduct a pilot research in Iran. Designed as a survey, the research employs the five cultural dimensions of Hofstede in organizations, and by different methodology, defines the ranking of each dimension. The sample consists of 254 employees working in two public and five private organizations on Kish-Island. In addition to define the ranking for each of the five dimensions, for the first time in Iran, the survey measures the ranking of long-term orientation, and shows differences between dominant culture in Iran and the Arab countries (opposed to Hofstede's recommendation). The... 

Transaction cost theory is largely used to investigate the formal domain of land and housing. In the informal domain, however, this perspective has been employed largely as a supplement in addressing the other fundamental notion in new institutional economics—property rights—despite the possibility that informality in land development can emerge regardless of the informality or formality of such rights. To cover this gap, this study developed a theoretical framework based on transaction cost theory to explain the formal–informal dichotomy in land development. The proposed framework maintains that land development depends on engaging in transactions that involve total or partial ownership of... 

The effect of vehicles’ compatibility on the odds of death or injury of drivers involved in two-vehicle crashes was investigated. This was done through indexing Crashworthiness (CW) and Crashaggressivity (CA) of major vehicle types. For this purpose, a dataset consisting the information about 551,138 drivers involved in two-vehicle crashes in Iran was used and a two-step analysis framework was employed. In this regard, the Classification and Regression Tree (CART) method was applied in the first step to identify the most significant factors contributing to drivers’ Injury Status (IS). Next, Generalized Estimating Equations (GEE) with a Binomial distribution and a Logit link function were... 

The effect of vehicles’ compatibility on the odds of death or injury of drivers involved in two-vehicle crashes was investigated. This was done through indexing Crashworthiness (CW) and Crashaggressivity (CA) of major vehicle types. For this purpose, a dataset consisting the information about 551,138 drivers involved in two-vehicle crashes in Iran was used and a two-step analysis framework was employed. In this regard, the Classification and Regression Tree (CART) method was applied in the first step to identify the most significant factors contributing to drivers’ Injury Status (IS). Next, Generalized Estimating Equations (GEE) with a Binomial distribution and a Logit link function were... 

Standard-form contracts facilitate the sophisticated public-private partnership (PPP) procurement process. Special care should be taken during the preparation of these documents since any remaining flaws affect subsequent projects. Reviewing the standard-form contract capabilities after its application help to identify its major flaws and improve the contract clauses. This research proposed a novel structured method to address this need and verified its capability. In the proposed method, a comprehensive list of risks is first created for the PPP projects in the specified project environment. The identified risks are prioritised to highlight the priority of the required adjustments in the... 

Purpose: Healthcare failure mode and effect analysis (HFMEA) identifies potential risks and defines preventive actions to reduce the effects of risks. In addition, a discrete event simulation (DES) could evaluate the effects of every improvement scenario. Consequently, a proposed integrated HFMEA-DES model is presented for quality improvement in a general hospital. Design/methodology/approach: In the proposed model, HFMEA is implemented first. As any risk in the hospital is important and that there are many departments and different related risks, all defined risk factors are evaluated using the risk priority number (RPN) for which related corrective actions are defined based on experts'... 

Nowadays "as everywhere in the world", so much attention is drawn to performing safety and HSE management rules in Iran. Considering the long life of oil and it's relevant industries in Iran (since 1908, first oil well in Middle East, Masjid Soleyman), many units with more than 50 years old are still in operation. This situation posed special problems in performing safety and HSE regulations that some of them are communal among these units. This paper reveals the result of industrial projects, collecting numerous technical checklists in such units and author's experiences in recent years in Iran, which is aimed to announce some of these major problems and also present solutions for them  

Numerous projects are underway in emerging countries, such as Iran, where technology transfer and economic expansion are the primary national objectives. However, majority of these projects either fall, according to world class standards, or faced with significant time delays. An Initial analysis of selected projects reveals that over 60% of causes belong to organization factors, while environment and personal causes are less than 40%. The overwhelming evidence points of lack of proper project management and education within organization factors. Some prescriptive interventions are proposed to counter organization deficiencies and overcome consistent time delays. A planning stage using... 

Purpose: Healthcare failure mode and effect analysis (HFMEA) identifies potential risks and defines preventive actions to reduce the effects of risks. In addition, a discrete event simulation (DES) could evaluate the effects of every improvement scenario. Consequently, a proposed integrated HFMEA-DES model is presented for quality improvement in a general hospital. Design/methodology/approach: In the proposed model, HFMEA is implemented first. As any risk in the hospital is important and that there are many departments and different related risks, all defined risk factors are evaluated using the risk priority number (RPN) for which related corrective actions are defined based on experts'... 

The paper studies the optimum panel horizontal orientation angle toward the Sun and the optimum time interval of the panel’s movement. The optimum time intervals or panel movement can change the rate of input energy to the panel surface in Iran. For this purpose, a neural network has been trained to estimate the intensity of solar radiation in Iran. After model validation, the intensity of solar radiation has been estimated by selecting adequate geographical regions. Based on the intensity of sunlight, Iran has been divided into ten regions. In these regions, 40 cities have been randomly selected to study the effect of the panel’s angle variations within appropriate time inter-vals, as well... 

In this study, the traffic parameters were collected from three work zones in Iran in order to evaluate the queue length in the work zones. The work zones were observed at peak and non-peak hours. The results showed that abrupt changes in Freeway Free Speed (FFS) and arrival flow rate caused shockwaves and created a bot-tleneck in that section of the freeway. In addition, accel-eration reduction, abrupt change in the shockwave speed, abrupt change in the arrival flow rate and increase in the percentage of heavy vehicles have led to extreme queue lengths and delay. It has been found that using daily traffic data for scheduling the maintenance and rehabilita-tion projects could diminish the...