beSMART

ASSESSING BUDGETING PROCESS IN SMALL AND MEDIUM ENTERPRISES IN NAIROBI’S CENTRAL BUSINESS DISTRICT:                        A CASE OF HOSPITALITY INDUSTRY

Beatrice Njeru Warue , Thuo Viviam Wanjira                                                                                               

Budgets are the foundation and the manifestations of a business plan and action. If the management of an SME has to maintain proper, updated and reviewed budgets then SMEs are bound to remain small, stagnant and possibly close down. There is a high risk of SMEs in the hospitality industry collapsing soon after they are established and one of the causes of this phenomenon is poor budgeting processes among the SMEs. To solve the problem of lack of proper budgeting processes among SMEs in the hospitality industry, there was need to first establish factors behind the poor budgeting process. This study assesses factors affecting the budgeting processes among Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in the hospitality industry in Nairobi’s Central Business district (CBD). Descriptive research design was used. Target population comprised 98,608 of all the registered small enterprises located within the CBD of Nairobi city. Stratified random sampling was employed in selecting the sample. The population strata were based on the nature of the business conducted by the SME in the Hospitality industry. The sample of 104 was shared proportionately among the 526 SMEs in Hospitality industry in the CBD. A self structured questionnaire of the Likert scale of 1 (for strong disagreement) to 5 (for strong agreement) and administered to SMEs managers, was used to measure the study variables. The data was analyzed using panel data analysis.The study finds evidence that computerized accounting system (β =-0.444) contributes to budgeting process at a higher magnitude than Firm Size (β =-0.2937), Participation of workers (β =-0.2674), Skills and Powers of Managers (β =0.2268) and ownership structure (β =0.1908). These results concur with Poon (2001), Joshi et al., (2003) and Krasauskaite (2011) findings. Overall, the factors under study contribute significantly to the budgeting process and in general performance of SMEs. Based on the findings the study recommends involvement of workers at all levels of budgeting, separation of ownership from management issues and continuous improvement of managers’ skills. In addition information technology should be given priority as its functionality in SMEs contribute more significantly to budget process compared with other factors under study.

Budget, Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs), workers participation, firm size, ownership, skills and power, computerized accounting system

ENTREPRENEURSHIP   SKILLS DEVELOPMENT AND GROWTH OF SMALL AND MEDIUM ENTREPRISES IN RWANDA (CASE STUDY: “CAPLAKI”) 2007-2011

KEROSI JOSEPHAT BOSIRE (PhD), KAYISIME NZARAMBA

Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) are important to economic growth and significantly essential to generate profit, increase sales and provide return on investment to the owners of SMEs. Therefore the SMEs growth depends to a great degree on the way entrepreneurship skills have been developed in SMEs. Entrepreneurship has been considered the backbone of economic development.  It has been well established that the level of economic growth of a region to a large extent, depends on the level of entrepreneurial activities in the region. The myth that entrepreneurs are born, no more holds good, rather it is well recognized now that the entrepreneurs can be created and nurtured through appropriate interventions in the form of entrepreneurship skills development programs. This research “Impact on entrepreneurship skills development on growth of SMEs in Rwanda” aimed at assessing how entrepreneurship skills development impacts on growth of SMEs in Rwanda, with    CAPLAKI “Cooperative des Artistes Plasticiens de Kigali’, an artisan’s cooperative in Rwanda selected as a case study. The research will benefit the researcher, the community, the government and other researchers. The study adopted mixed method approach that is, qualitative and quantitative methods.  The choice of using both is justified in the sense that the study has several objectives; and information relating to some of them was assessed using qualitative method, while other using quantitative methods. Basically the study was conducted in Kigali city specifically with all the 71 members of CAPLAKI Cooperative. Data were collected using structured and unstructured questionnaires. Also, secondary data were collected from various documents. The findings of the study show that on the whole, the respondents (CAPLAKI members) have limited entrepreneurship skills particularly in terms of recognising business opportunities, being innovative and   communicating effectively in business transactions. In particular, a percentage of 65 admitted that they lack skills of identifying business opportunities. Similarly, a considerable percentage of the respondents (96%) lamented that their sales are decreasing because of failure to communicate with clients especially foreigners who are their potential customers. Besides, a substantial percentage of   the respondents (63%) revealed that they lack innovative skills. Lack of these skills greatly affects the growth of their businesses in terms return on investment, net profit and sales turnover. Therefore, it is recommended that the cooperative should organize training for its members in entrepreneurship skills.  They need to be equipped with such skills as separating money between business and household, reinvesting profits in the business, maintaining records of sales and expenses, and thinking proactively about new markets and opportunities for profits. In addition to these strategies, business to business linkages should be explored by entrepreneurs to enable SMEs join global business chain to create new market and explore business opportunities.

Entrepreneurship, Entrepreneurship development, Development, Skills, Ability to recognize opportunity, Communication skills, Innovative skills, Return on Investment, Profit

PRIVATE FINANCE INITIATIVE (PFI) / PUBLIC PRIVATE PARTNERSHIP (PPP) IN MALAYSIA CONTEXT

Wan Zahari Wan Yusoff, Jolene Wong May Xuen

Competitive global environment of today has led governments around the world to seek new ways to finance projects, build infrastructure and deliver services. The adoption of PPP/PFI is to bring together the strengths of both sectors, public and private to facilitate the delivery of projects and services. However, each country uses different type of mechanism in procurement design of projects based on the needs and nature of the development project. PPP/PFI is still new in Malaysia especially in HLI development. From the lack of knowledge on the mechanism in PPP/PFI procurement, criticisms on the early stage of development are becoming more and more significant. Thus the objectives of this paper it to study the mechanisms of PPP/PFI in Malaysia by identifying the projects implementing PPP/PFI especially in the context of campus development in HLI. Further on to that the constraint and challenges of PPP/PFI implemented in Malaysia was studied as well. This study was carried out through the adoption of qualitative method and the review of past findings and citations from reading materials on the similar research. The elements and mechanism of PPP/PFI is being collected via interview session with personnel from Unit Kerjasama Awam Swasta (UKAS) which is responsible for public-private procurement in Malaysia. Personnel from private company involve in PPP/PFI is included as respondent for interview as well. Data was analyzed based on interview carried out together with example of case study. Research analysis used is interview analysis, content analysis and SWOT analysis. The outcome of research is Built-Lease-Maintain-Transfer (BLMT) mechanism being used in most of PPP/PFI campus development project while financial aspect of the campus development is the main constraints and challenges faced by both public and private sector for PPP/PFI procurement

Public Private Partnership (PPP), Private Finance Initiative (PFI), Mechanism, Higher Learning Institutions (HLI), Constraints and Challenges.

ADAPTIVE USER INTERFACE CONCEPT FOR PERSONAL DESKTOP

GDS Ranaweera, DK Withanage

The concept of adaptive user interface is commonly used in current systems to adapt displays and desired actions of users by monitoring their prevailing activities. Adaptive user interfaces help to improve user interaction with systems by facilitating user productivity, minimizing the need to frequently request for help, and making it easier to deal with complex systems, avoiding cognitive overload problems. Adaptive user interfaces are becoming more popular among web and mobile applications built for business needs. However, they are rarely practiced in offline mode applications and systems. Especially this concept is infrequently used for operating systems to adapt computer desktops according to the interests or desires of the users.

This paper includes a study on how the adaptive user interface concept can be applied for personal desktops and how the desktop environment can be personalized for each user. The output of the research brings a system which enables the computer desktop to adapt its layout and screen elements automatically according to user needs or preferences.

Adaptive user interface, Desktop Environment, Graphical User Interface, Application programs

DIAGNOSIS BREAST C.ANCER USING INTELLIGENCE TECHNIQUE

Dr.Jamal S. AL- Neamy , Dr.Mudather A.Al-aziaz, Noor A.AL-monim

Breast cancer is the second largest cause of cancer deaths among women. Breast cancer is one of the major tumor related cause of death in women. Various artificial intelligence techniques have been used to improve the diagnoses procedures. In this work we use tow intelligence techniques such as  Ant colony optimization and Particle swarm optimization.

Breast cancer, Soble , Registration ,Wavelet ,Seven invariant moments, Ant colony optimization (ACO),Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO).

THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN LEADER-MEMBER EXCHANGE (LMX) AND COWORKER EXCHANGE (CWX) THEORY IN THE IMPLEMENTATION OF ELECTRONIC HEALTH RECORDS

David W. Hays, D.P.A., SPHR and Jennie Q. Lou, M.D., M.Sc.

Electronic health records (EHRs) have fuelled more sophisticated leadership models and shorten product lifecycles. Managers must understand how the relationships between biomedical informatics technicians and healthcare providers contribute to the survival and profitability of business operations. However, little research exists regarding this relationship. This study postulates a positive correlation between biomedical informatics technicians and administrators leader-member exchange (LMX) relationship with their supervisor and relationships between biomedical informatics technicians and administrators relationships with healthcare provider co-workers (CWX) they assist in implementing EHRs.  An invitation to participate in a survey to measure LMX and CWX was posted by the Health Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) Web site, in which 72 usable surveys were analyzed. The research discovered a statistically significant positive correlation between LMX and CWX scores, measured by the LMX7 questionnaire. The research also found younger, more educated employees with less time in their work profession are training more healthcare providers in the implementation of EHRs. These younger workers report having strong co-worker relationships with the healthcare providers they are helping in the adoption of EHRs.  This study provides insights for managers in their search for factors that influence the successful implementation of EHRs in their organization.

electronic health records, leader-member exchange, co-worker exchange.

INCREMENTAL AND COMPREHENSIVE IT STRATEGIC PLANNING AT PT XYZ

Dr. Hoga Saragih, ST, MT. & Sashi raz

This paper aims to research what is needed for strategic IT PT XYZ and plan what will be done to implement the IT strategy. But the barriers that exist how to make improvement in accordance with company and describe how those needs are basic needs so that they can cover all aspects of the company. Embodied in a document and the strategic IT plan needed to implement the strategic IT. This becomes a challenge for the writer in making an assessment framework to be able to do it. Based on the journals of journals and books related to strategic planning tool used to determine the condition of a company could use SWOT, Critical Success Factors (CSF), Competitor analysis, The Five Competitive Force, IT BALANCE SCORECARD, and APPLICATION PORTFOLIO. The six tools are used for three different aspects of SWOT and CSF is used to measure the internal condition of the company, Competitor analysis and Five Competitive Force aims to measure the external condition of the company. and IT Balanced Scorecard and Portfolio Applications aims to find out what it takes to perform incremental and comprehensive IT to support existing business processes or IT will propose changes to business processes. And resulting in any tools will be into a strategic IT Planning which aims to make the incremental IT resources.

IT, Strategic plan, Business processes, Incremental

IRIS DETECTION AND STEGANOGRAPHY

Sara Kh. Ayoub , Dr. Ahmed S. Nori

The term "biometrics" is derived from the Greek words bio means “life” and metric means “to measure”
The iris recognition system that was developed proved to be a highly accurate and efficient system that can be used for biometric identification. In this paper, for preprocessing canny edge detection then use morphology operation  for  iris detection, pca algorithm apply  for  extract feature. and steganography using Logical exclusive-OR.

biometric, morphology ,detection, feature extraction,  steganography.

CUSTOMER SATISFACTION ANALYSIS ON BIRTH CERTIFICATE REGISTRATION IN DEPOK, WEST JAVA

Amita Rizka Windyani, Aida Vitayala S.Hubeis, and Idqan Fahmi

Birth certificate is a basic civil right that should be granted to every citizen. Population and Civil Registration Offices (Disdukcapil) as a birth certificate registration organizers seek to provide excellent service with attention to people’s satisfaction. This study aim to analyse the commitment of Disdukcapil in the service of registration of birth certificate, analyse the level of public satisfaction about Disdukcapil’s public service, and formulate a strategy to improve the quality of service. The research method is descriptive analysis. The data used are primary and secondary derived from observations, interviews, and questionnaires. Internal officer’s perceptions were analyzed using the test of customer service and customer-focused test characteristics. Customers’s perceptions were analyzed using SERVQUAL method, Importance Performance Analysis, and Customer Satisfaction Index. The results show that Disdukcapil structural officers have had community-oriented in the implementation of public service. Characteristics that stand out in the application of quality management is readiness to find and eliminate the problems of the people on birth certificate registration. Servqual analysis results show that acceptable performance is still below people’s expectations so that the gap is negative. Importance-performance analysis show that the attributes need immediate attention is the service support materials, attitude immediately provide service and a helpful attitude when busy. Overall community satisfaction index had reached Satisfied level.

public service, customer satisfaction, service quality dimension

PARADIGM OF CHILD JUSTICE SYSTEM IN INDONESIA

 (Study to  the Law No.11 of 2012 on the Child Criminal Justice System)

Dr. SUPRIYANTA, SH.MHum

Diversion is a new paradigm in solving child crimes stipulated in the Law of the Republic of Indonesia No.11 of 2012 on the Child Criminal Justice System. Diversion mechanism is possible in every stage of the judicial process. Diversion carried out in terms of criminal offenses committed: punishable by imprisonment under the 7 (seven) years and not a recidive of criminal acts. Diversion is done through a process of consultation involving the child and parent/guardian, the victim and/or parent/guardian, Supervisor Community, and Professional Social Worker based Restorative Justice approach.

Paradigm, Diversion, Law  No. 11 of  2012 on the Child Criminal Justice System