Empowerment

Summary

Empowerment is the degree of autonomy and self-determination in people and in communities. This enables them to represent their interests in a responsible and self-determined way, acting on their own authority. It is the process of becoming stronger and more confident, especially in controlling one's life and claiming one's rights. Empowerment as action refers both to the process of self-empowerment and to professional support of people, which enables them to overcome their sense of powerlessness and lack of influence, and to recognize and use their resources. As a term, empowerment originates from American community psychology and is associated with the social scientist Julian Rappaport (1981). However, the roots of empowerment theory extend further into history and are linked to Marxist sociological theory. These sociological ideas have continued to be developed and refined through Neo-Marxist Theory (also known as Critical Theory). In social work, empowerment forms a practical app

Official source

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empowerment

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Effective long-term participation of communities in disaster risk reduction measures in landslide-prone areas continues to be a challenge. This study aims to evaluate the extent to which community-based soil-bioengineering techniques allow for effective mitigation of shallow landslide events given technical, environmental, economic and socio-cultural sustainability criteria. The Red Cross has been implementing community-based disaster risk reduction programs aimed at increasing resilience at the community level in Honduras since 2005. Since 2010, 230 landslide hazard sites have been stabilized using soil-bioengineering measures (the use of living plant material to provide certain engineering functions) based on a carefully and systematically developed partnership with local communities. In 2018, an assessment of 73 sites established between 2010 and 2014 showed that (1) 83% of the sites were adequately maintained and (2) 69% of the sites fulfilled the function of soil stabilization. A cost-benefit analysis was conducted for two sites and indicated a cost-benefit ratio of 4.5 and 6 respectively. Some of the key factors for these high success rates include the fact that bioengineering is a locally adapted, easily implemented, cost-effective technology that offers landowners multiple benefits by increasing food security and creating income-generation opportunities. The Red Cross has recognized the importance of empowering communities by building self-confidence so that they can ultimately take responsibility for their own future. The creation of well-functioning local emergency committees has proven highly effective in achieving this goal. When adequately trained, these committees are able to support the replication and maintenance of disaster-risk reduction measures at the community-level in the long term. This case study supports the hypothesis that carefully designed participatory approaches are essential for achieving sustainable, long-term transformative change and risk reduction.

2019

The role of the network lead company in integrating new product development processes across strategic partners

Yuosre Badir

In today's network world, advancement in new product development (NPD) is being driven by different types of networks, joint ventures, alliances, outsourcing and mergers. These business trends have resulted in complex organisations and development projects that cross location, company, country and cultural boundaries. The key success is no longer integrating the company's units and activities, but integrating the NPD process across a network of strategic partners. Managing the integration of an NPD process in this increased organisational complexity requires a sophisticated organisation design to facilitate and support the coordination of activities and the flow of information across the network. The research investigates the impact of organisational design of the network lead company (the main company in the network) on the NPD project's integration process elements with external partners and the subsequent effects on performance. The "integration process elements" in this research are: "communication and coordination." I focus on the R&D organisation in the network lead company. Within the R&D organisation, I adopt the project level of analysis and answer the main research question: How can the network lead company design its R&D organisation to support the NPD project's communication and coordination activities with the project strategic partners and improve project performance? The research centres on the integration with strategic partners in whom the network lead company has equity investments (minority holdings). Using data collected from three in-depth case studies of high-tech NPD projects conducted by three network lead companies from different industries, I attempt to extend and merge the knowledge of NPD management and the organisation theory by proposing a contingency model and developing a condition of fit between contextual conditions that characterise the high-tech NPD project and the organisation design of the network lead company. The model suggests that the efficient performance of the development project (shortest, cheapest, and highest quality possible) is contingent on how well the actual intensity levels of communication and coordination fits the required intensity levels. The research also indicates that the required intensity of communication and coordination between the network lead company and the project strategic partners in uncertain and complex project is dominated by the development cycle time (DCT) of the project. Conversely, the actual intensity of communication and coordination between the NPD project team of the network lead company and its project strategic partners is enabled by differentiated combination of R&D organisational attributes: centralisation, formalisation, number of hierarchical levels, team empowerment, and power of the leadership.

EPFL2006

Privacy-Aware Digital Mediation Tools for Improving Adolescent Mental Well-being: Application to School Bullying

Isabelle Barbara Marie-Hélène Cardia, Maria Gaci, Denis Gillet

In human-computer interaction, self-disclosure of sensitive information regarding distressing experiences requires the establishment of a trust channel between the user and the digital tool. As privacy and security have been identified as factors that contribute to increased levels of trust, they could be utilized to design digital tools that encourage and empower adolescents to disclose school bullying. This work-in-progress paper presents an interdisciplinary research project aimed at combining appropriate levels of usability and security to design a privacy scheme for adolescents in order to provide a digital solution that will help anti-bullying intervention at schools in Switzerland and beyond. The process for designing the interaction and interface of the digital tool is presented in the context of interviews with domain experts. Furthermore, participatory design workshops with Swiss teachers and students are used to inform the key trustful features that the tool should exhibit.

2020

The role of the network lead company in integrating new product development processes across strategic partners

Yuosre Badir

EPFL2006

2019