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The main objective of this study was to determine whether the adoption of e-commerce in Colombia presents problems of social massification; specifically, we wanted to verify whether the socioeconomic variables and level of education have a moderating effect on the adoption of electronic commerce. An empirical study was conducted, 936 surveys were collected through a form on the Web, the data were analyzed and a prediction was made of the model using the PLS technique. The results confirm in an exploratory way this moderating effect of the socioeconomic and educational level on the relationship between the variable conditions that facilitate electronic purchasing. The main contribution to the theory of these findings empirically validates that, in countries with high levels of social inequality, the use of e-commerce is conditioned by the socioeconomic and educational characteristics of those who can access it.

The changes occurring in the business world, due to major challenges such as competition, globalization and technological development have posed major challenges to accountants. They have been urged to play more proactive and demanding roles in organizations, because they hold privileged information about the economic and financial situation, which allows them to participate in boosting economic activity by anticipating problems and creating value. Based on these assumptions, this study presents exploratory research focused on the distinct roles played by accountants in a Portuguese medium-sized company, which contributes to the academic and professional debate about the increasing business partner role of accountants through a different organizational context.

In the last twenty years the relationship between Management Control Systems (MCS) and strategy has become a relevant issue to management control investigation. This study aims to understand how managers use the Balanced Scorecard (BSC) to support the processes of implementation and formulation of strategy. The research adopts an exploratory case study approach and was conducted on a business unit of a large industrial Portuguese company. Results were analyzed from the standpoint of Simons’ four control levers (1995, 2000), and demonstrate that the BSC methodology may be used under a diagnosis mode to implement deliberated strategies and, simultaneously, under an interactive mode to promote learning, support strategy revision, and provide conditions for new strategies. The research provides insights into the relationship between MCS and strategy, as it identifies the characteristics of using the BSC in the several levers of control.

The main goal of this investigation is to study the relationships between society and audit in Portugal, through a methodology based on a questionnaire sent in 2015 to public companies listed in the stock exchange and insurance companies, as well as to financial analysts. For this purpose, a group of 25 questions addressing audit main issues was developed. A five-point Likert scale, followed by an appropriate statistical treatment – percentage, p-value, correlations of Spearman, test of Mann–Whitney, allowed us to discover correlations and statistical associations of strong and moderate intensity. The results suggest that audited financial statements users’ perception regarding the auditors’ independence, the audit report, the audit market, the going concern assumption and the search and disclosure of fraud and illegal acts committed by companies are aligned with the international tendencies.

This study reports Dutch local government civil servants’ intention to voluntarily leave their current position for various post-exit destinations in times of austerity. It is concluded that local government civil servants’ intention to leave to public sector destinations is determined by their superiors’ quality of leadership (with job satisfaction fully mediating this relation), perceived job security and work-life balance issues (with job satisfaction mediating these relations). For private sector destinations, leadership quality (mediated by job satisfaction) explains intention to leave.

Hospitality is a growing sector in the service field and it sustains a representative position in the tourism productive chain. Rio de Janeiro's hospitality market expects to expand itself with the creation of 6.160 new ones until 2016. That intensifies the need to improve services in order to keep competitiveness. Ergonomics is a science focused on both well-being and performance improvement. This research aims to identify how organizational ergonomics can help creating value on hospitality services. A literature review is the first step, followed by a field research. The Ergonomics Work Analysis (EWA) methodology was applied on a hotel front desk, located in Copacabana, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The preliminary results showed how Human Resources Management and Operational Management works separately, causing difficulties to service quality management. We propose then that Ergonomics might bridge this gap, supporting organizational innovations so as to help increasing system performance and customer satisfaction.

This study is aimed to model and forecast the tourism demand for Mozambique for the period from January 2004 to December 2013 using artificial neural networks models. The number of overnight stays in Hotels was used as representative of the tourism demand. A set of independent variables were experimented in the input of the model, namely: Consumer Price Index, Gross Domestic Product and Exchange Rates, of the outbound tourism markets, South Africa, United State of America, Mozambique, Portugal and the United Kingdom. The best model achieved has 6.5% for Mean Absolute Percentage Error and 0.696 for Pearson correlation coefficient. A model like this with high accuracy of forecast is important for the economic agents to know the future growth of this activity sector, as it is important for stakeholders to provide products, services and infrastructures and for the hotels establishments to adequate its level of capacity to the tourism demand.

The Imam Al Bukhari Complex is a unique pilgrimage site in Hartang, Samarkand region, Uzbekistan. This site is requiring a better visitation flow by its present administration as unique stakeholder. The goal of this article is to spot the solutions that could further increase the experience at the site as well as the benefits to the local community. The main study methods used were the qualitative observation during fieldwork, the interview with visitors and stakeholders as well as the analysis of online resources. The analysis of the demand and offer of this tourist attraction has highlighted an imbalance towards a wide range of weaknesses that could be fixed in a short-term perspective. The solutions envisage several measures to increase the accessibility and online visibility of the Complex, to enhance the experience of the visitors, to involve the community in order to obtain larger benefits.

Accessible tourism is an under-researched area in tourism studies. There are also problems regarding its definitions and concepts because of different approaches within the scientific world. It is crucial to understand this theme using a multidisciplinary approach. This could mean bringing all stakeholders to common solutions in the future. In this study, a model of sustainable accessible tourism (SAT) will be introduced. This helps to understand how disabled people can intensively join in tourism activities and have the highest level of experience. Exploratory research will be used in order to develop a universal model combining sustainable tourism approaches. This proposal represents different layers of SAT's understanding and it will be discussed from various perspectives of recommendation series.

The gradual importance devoted to policies focused on new challenges faced locally by destinations, in addition to those policies providing awareness about local stakeholders and their needs, is inseparable from the general knowledge about the potentialities of the surrounding environment, as well as the inevitability of measuring results and impacts (Lozano-Oyola, Blancas, & Caballero, 2012). For these reasons, this paper intends to contribute to the understanding of tourism destination competitiveness, specifically how it can be evaluated, in which indicators it is based on, and what is the open access information available in Portugal. Data resulted from in-depth research in the main Portuguese official open access databases, collected between May and June 2014. Results show that little attention has been given to the operationalisation of strategic and comprehensive information to facilitate tourism development in Portugal or, at least, little attention has been given to ease its access.