Earticle

In a dynamic business environment, the enterprise mobility solution for a mobile office (EMS) has been adopted to increase the competitive edge of organizations. By using an EMS, performance is expected to be enhanced. However, the related literature has paid little interest to the impact of system quality in an EMS on the information quality produced by the system. On the basis of socio-technical theory, we posited that the system quality in an EMS influences information quality. In addition, we investigated the relationships between the above two qualities, use and job performance by considering task mobility and task inter-dependence as control variables. Survey respondents were from many industries using EMSs. The result of structural equation modeling shows that system quality positively affects information quality, and other relation-ships in the model are proven statistically significant. We also found that system quality has stronger impacts on use and job performance than information quality does in EMS. However, system quality does not affect use in case both task mobility and task inter-dependence exist. The theoretical and practical implications of the result are discussed in the paper.

The ubiquitous accessibility of information through mobile devices has led to an increased mobility of workers from their fixed workplaces. Market researchers estimate that by 2016, 350 million workers will be using their smartphones for business purposes, and the use of smartphones will offer new business benefits. Enterprises are now adopting mobile technologies for numerous applications to increase their operational efficiency, improve their responsiveness and competitiveness, and cultivate their innovativeness. For these reasons, various organizational aspects concerning “mobile work” have received a great deal of recent attention. Moreover, many CIOs plan to allocate a considerable amount of their budgets mobile work environments. In particular, with the consumerization of information technology, enterprise mobile applications (EMA) have played a significant role in the explosive growth of mobile computing in the workplace, and even in improving sales for firms in this field. EMA can be defined as mobile technologies and role-based applications, as companies design them for specific roles and functions in organizations. Technically, EMA can be defined as business enterprise systems, including critical business functions that enable users to access enterprise systems via wireless mobile devices, such as smartphones or tablets. Specifically, EMA enables employees to have greater access to real-time information, and provides them with simple features and functionalities that are easy for them to complete specific tasks. While the impact of EMA on organizational workers’ productivity has been given considerable attention in various literatures, relatively little research effort has been made to examine how EMA actually lead to users’ job performance. In particular, we have a limited understanding of what the key antecedents are of such an EMA usage outcome. In this paper, we focus on employees’ perceived job performance as the outcome of EMA use, which indicates the successful role of EMA with regard to employees’ tasks. Thus, to develop a deeper understanding of the relationship among EMA, its environment, and employees’ perceived job performance, we develop a comprehensive model that considers the perceived-fit between EMA and employees’ tasks, satisfaction on EMA, and the organizational environment. With this model, we try to examine EMA to explain how job performance through EMA is revealed from both the task- technology fit for EMA and satisfaction on EMA, while also considering the antecedent factors for these constructs. The objectives of this study are to address the following research questions: (1) How can employees successfully manage EMA in order to enhance their perceived job performance? (2) What internal and/or external factors are important antecedents in increasing EMA users’ satisfaction on MES and task- technology fit for EMA? (3) What are the impacts of organizational (e.g. organizational agility), and task- related antecedents (e.g., task mobility) on task-technology fit for EMA? (4) What are the impacts of internal (e.g., self-efficacy) and external antecedents (e.g., system reputation) for the habitual use of EMA?Based on a survey from 254 actual employees who use EMA in their workplace across industries, our results indicate that task-technology fit for EMA and satisfaction on EMA are positively associated with job performance. We also identify task mobility, organizational agility, and system accessibility that are found to be positively associated with task-technology fit for EMA. Further, we find that external factor, such as the reputation of EMA, and internal factor, such as self-efficacy for EMA that are found to be positively associated with the satisfaction of EMA. The present findings enable researchers and practitioners to understand the role of EMA, which facilitates organizational workers' efficient work processes, as well as the importance of task-technology fit for EMA. Our model provides a new set of antecedents and consequence variables for a TAM involving mobile applications. The research model also provides empirical evidence that EMA are important mobile services that positively influence individuals’ performance. Our findings suggest that perceived organizational agility and task mobility do have a significant influence on task-technology fit for EMA usage through positive beliefs about EMA, that self-efficacy and system reputation can also influence individuals’ satisfaction on EMA, and that these factors are important contingent factors for the impact of system satisfaction and perceived job performance. Our findings can help managers gauge the impact of EMA in terms of its contribution to job performance. Our results provide an explanation as to why many firms have recently adopted EMA for efficient business processes and productivity support. Our findings additionally suggest that the cognitive fit between task and technology can be an important requirement for the productivity support of EMA. Further, our study findings can help managers in formulating their strategies and building organizational culture that can affect employees perceived job performance. Managers, thus, can tailor their dependence on EMA as high or low, depending on their task’s characteristics, to maximize the job performance in the workplace. Overall, this study strengthens our knowledge regarding the impact of mobile applications in organizational contexts, technology acceptance and the role of task characteristics. To conclude, we hope that our research inspires future studies exploring digital productivity in the workplace and/or taking the role of EMA into account for employee job performance.

This paper presents an optimized integrated task planning and control approach for manipulating a nonholonomic robot by mobile manipulators. Then, we derive a kinematics model and a mobility of the mobile manipulator(M2) platform considering it as the combined system of the manipulator and the mobile robot. to improve task execution efficiency utilizing the redundancy, optimal trajectory of the mobile manipulator(M2) platform are maintained while it is moving to a new task point. A cost function for optimality can be defined as a combination of the square errors of the desired and actual configurations of the mobile robot and of the task robot. In the combination of the two square errors, a newly defined mobility of a mobile robot is utilized as a weighting index. With the aid of the gradient method, the cost function is minimized, so the path trajectory that the M2 platform generates is optimized. The simulation results of the 2 ink planar nonholonomic M2 platform are given to show the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm.

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study is to examine how task-oriented training focused on lower extremity strengthening can affect mobility function and postural stability. METHODS: The study's subjects included 10 children with cerebral palsy: 7 girls and 3 boys between the ages of 4 and 9 whose Gross Motor Functional Classification System (GMFCS) level was I or II. Their functional mobility was gauged using the Gross Motor Function Measurement (GMFM), and their postural stability was evaluated using a force platform. Participants received task-oriented training focused on lower extremity strengthening for 5 weeks. The study used a paired t-test to investigate the difference in mobility function and postural stability of children with cerebral palsy before and after the lower extremity strengthening exercise. RESULTS: The GMFM dimensions D (standing) (p<.02) and E (walking) (p<.001) improved significantly between the pre-test and post-test. A significant increase in the posturographic center of pressure (CoP) shift and surface area of the CoP were found overall between the pre-test and post-test (p<.001). CONCLUSION: The present study provides evidence that an 8-week task-oriented training focused on strengthening the lower extremities is an effective and feasible strategy for improving the mobility function and postural stability of children with cerebral palsy.