Theses and Dissertations from UMD
Permanent URI for this communityhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/2
New submissions to the thesis/dissertation collections are added automatically as they are received from the Graduate School. Currently, the Graduate School deposits all theses and dissertations from a given semester after the official graduation date. This means that there may be up to a 4 month delay in the appearance of a give thesis/dissertation in DRUM
More information is available at Theses and Dissertations at University of Maryland Libraries.
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Item PAY SYSTEM EFFECTIVENESS IN ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE: UNDERSTANDING HOW AND WHEN PERCEIVED PAY EQUITY AND PAY EQUALITY AFFECT ADAPTIVE TEAM PERFORMANCE(2017) Li, Ning; Liao, Hui; Business and Management: Management & Organization; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)In today’s fast-paced economy, organizations undergo changes almost constantly in order to survive or maintain competitive. Under such backdrop, it is important to understand how pay system can help teams adapt and perform well when organizational change disrupts existing ways of collective functioning. However, little theoretical effort has been given to this important topic. The main purpose of this dissertation is to develop theory that explains how pay system can be leveraged to facilitate adaptive team performance. I extend the management literature by clarifying 1) what pay system characteristics are important for promoting adaptive team performance, 2) how such pay system characteristics take effects to shape adaptive team performance and, 3) when such pay system characteristics are more or less instrumental for benefiting adaptive team performance. Specifically, I first propose that adaptive team performance is a function of two pay system characteristics: pay equity and pay equality. Next, I argue that pay equity and pay equality contribute to adaptive team performance through distinct mechanisms. That is, the pay equity operates through facilitating planned coordination; while pay equality operates through facilitating emergent coordination. Last, I predict that interdependence uncertainty serves as a boundary condition to weaken the effects of pay equity on team coordination and adaptive team performance, but strengthen the effects of pay equality on team coordination and adaptive team performance. I tested these hypotheses in a manufacturing firm during a period it went through a major organizational change. Using a sample of 207 production teams, I found evidence that largely supported my theoretical model. This dissertation not only offers a more sophisticated understanding of pay system effectiveness in organizational change, but also provides improved prescriptions for organizations and managers.Item PASSIVE SCALAR DISPERSION IN A TURBULENT MIXING LAYER(2004-08-23) Li, Ning; Wallace, James M; Mechanical Engineering; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Experimental and numerical studies of spatially developed turbulent mixing layers with passive scalar concentrations was performed. In the experiment, a mixing layer was created by an S-shaped splitter plate in a wind tunnel, with a velocity ratio of 2:1. A concentration field was realized by injecting incense smoke into the high-speed side of the mixing layer. Simultaneous measurements of the velocity, vorticity and concentration fields were performed. A 12-sensor hot-wire probe was used to measure the velocity field and its gradients, while the concentration field was recorded by taking digital pictures of the laser-illuminated smoke. The statistics of the velocity and vorticity fields agree well with previous research. By synchronizing the velocity and concentration measurements, concentration fluxes were determined. Octant analysis was performed on the flux data to explore the scalar transport processes. Conditional planar average of flow properties was also performed to determine their spatial distribution with respect to the large-scale vortices. A large-eddy simulation, designed to match the experimental conditions, was performed to provide three-dimensional pictures of the mixing layer. A new approach to effectively specify the inflow boundary condition was proposed. Passive particles were released and tracked to simulate the scalar concentration field. Numerical interpolation schemes were examined for performing the particle tracking tasks. The simulation statistically supported the experimental result while providing insight about the flow topology, from which scalar transport models by the rib vortices and roller vortices were proposed and examined.