Globalisation and rapid environmental change have created many challenges for public and private organisations across Iraq as a developing country, particularly in the higher education sector. This includes, for example, decreases in government funding; increased demand for higher education; a need for economic transformation, and related competitiveness of organizations. Such challenges require exceptional leaders and strategic planning in order to take action to improve. In Iraq, the higher education sector is still one of the main foundations in progressing the knowledge economy. Studies into leadership style, strategic planning processes, and the importance of leadership and organisational culture to an organisation’s success have been used to assist both public and private Iraqi colleges in responding to the challenges they face. Although, some studies have examined the interaction between leadership and strategic planning, and leadership and organisational success, there has been no empirical study that has investigated how these three variables interact together. Thus, this study aimed, firstly, to identify the current leadership styles and strategic planning processes in the colleges and the challenges they faced, and to gain an understanding from the perspective of the senior leaders themselves as to how they might best respond to the current situation. Secondly, based on the participants’ experiences, knowledge and perceptions, the study aimed to identify implications for both practice and policy to help improve the colleges’ outcomes. The study involved a mixed-methods approach and was conducted in two stages. During the first stage, the researcher gathered quantitative data by administering a survey package to 129 leaders (deans, associate deans, and heads of departments) across both public and private colleges in the capital city of Baghdad. During the second stage, the researcher gathered qualitative data to more deeply explore the survey results by conducting individual interviews with a sub-sample of 21 leaders from both college types (ten public and 11 private). In the data analyses stages, both descriptive statistics and inferential statistics were applied to compiling tables and charts, and to test hypotheses, by employing the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS), Microsoft Excel, and NVivo. The results of study showed that both transformational and transactional leadership styles played a varied and vital role in the colleges’ strategic planning processes, and in turn their success. The fact that private colleges were ‘for profit’ and public colleges were ‘not for profit’, as well as their contrasting funding models, highlighted key differences between the two college types’ leadership and general modus operandi. While it was found that both transformative leadership and transactional leadership styles were necessary to address the challenges colleges faced in the Iraqi educational context, the impetus for change extended far beyond the need for professional development of leaders. The embracing of information communication technologies, and reliable Internet was seen as necessary in all aspects of the colleges’ work and provision for teaching and learning, and students’ success. This applied to both college types along with the need for closer adherence to government regulations and more focused government coordination of colleges’ administrative functions. Furthermore, implications for making successful improvements to practice also identified the need to manage the challenge of sociocultural influences on the appointments and promotions of leaders. It was concluded that a greater emphasis on teamwork and provision of incentives for staff, along with a ‘boost’ to pedagogy and practice, which could be provided through the adoption of information communication technologies and appropriate professional development strategies, would enhance the colleges’ ranks and the status of their qualifications. Also, theoretically, the study offers a value-add to leadership, strategic planning process, and organisational success literature in the form of a conceptual model that links these variables in the context of Iraqi higher education sector.
In this research, the removal of cadmium (Cd) from simulated wastewater was investigated by using a fixed bed bio-electrochemical reactor. The effects of the main controlling factors on the performance of the removal process such as applied cell voltage, initial Cd concentration, pH of the catholyte, and the mesh number of the cathode were investigated. The results showed that the applied cell voltage had the main impact on the removal efficiency of cadmium where increasing the applied voltage led to higher removal efficiency. Meanwhile increasing the applied voltage was found to be given lower current efficiency and higher energy consumption. No significant effect of initial Cd concentration on the removal efficie
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The main purpose of this paper, is to characterize new admissible classes of linear operator in terms of seven-parameter Mittag-Leffler function, and discuss sufficient conditions in order to achieve certain third-order differential subordination and superordination results. In addition, some linked sandwich theorems involving these classes had been obtained.
This paper presents the effect of relativistic and ponderomotive nonlinearity on cross-focusing of two intense laser beams in a collisionless and unmagnetized plasma. It should be noted here that while considering the self-focusing due to relativistic electron mass variation, the electron ponderomotive density depression in the channel may also be important. Therefore/these two nonlinearties may simultaneously affect the self-focusing process. These nonlinearities depend not only on the intensity of one laser but also on the second laser. Therefore, one laser beam affects the dynamics of the second beam and hence the process of cross-focusing takes place. The electric field amplitude of the excited electron plasma wave (EPW) has been cal
... Show MoreThis paper deals with a Twin Rotor Aerodynamic System (TRAS). It is a Multi-Input Multi-Output (MIMO) system with high crosscoupling between its two channels. It proposes a hybrid design procedure that combines frequency response and root locus approaches. The proposed controller is designated as PID-Lead Compensator (PIDLC); the PID controller was designed in previous work using frequency response design specifications, while the lead compensator is proposed in this paper and is designed using the root locus method. A general explicit formula for angle computations in any of the four quadrants is also given. The lead compensator is designed by shifting the dominant closed-loop poles slightly to the left in the
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This paper presents a study to investigate the behavior of post-tensioned segmental concrete beams that exposed to high-temperature. The experimental program included fabricating and testing twelve simply supported beams that divided into three groups depending on the number of precasting concrete segments. All specimens were prepared with an identical length of 3150 mm and differed in the number of the incorporated segments of the beam (9, 7, or 5 segments). To simulate the genuine fire disasters, nine out of twelve beams were exposed to a high-temperature flame for one hour. Based on the standard fire curve (ASTM – E119), the temperatures of 300◦C (572◦F), 500◦C (932◦F), and 700◦C (1292◦F) were adopted. Consequently,
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In this work, the switching nonlinear dynamics of a Fabry-Perot etalon are studied. The method used to complete the solution of the differential equations for the nonlinear medium. The Debye relaxation equations solved numerically to predict the behavior of the cavity for modulated input power. The response of the cavity filled with materials of different response time is depicted. For a material with a response time equal to = 50 ns, the cavity switches after about (100 ns). Notice that there is always a finite time delay before the cavity switches. The switch up time is much longer than the cavity build-up time of the corresponding linear cavity which was found to be of the order of a few round-trip ti
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Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks on Web-based services have grown in both number and sophistication with the rise of advanced wireless technology and modern computing paradigms. Detecting these attacks in the sea of communication packets is very important. There were a lot of DDoS attacks that were directed at the network and transport layers at first. During the past few years, attackers have changed their strategies to try to get into the application layer. The application layer attacks could be more harmful and stealthier because the attack traffic and the normal traffic flows cannot be told apart. Distributed attacks are hard to fight because they can affect real computing resources as well as network bandwidth. DDoS attacks
... Show MoreThis paper presents a study to investigate the behavior of post-tensioned segmental concrete beams that exposed to high-temperature. The experimental program included fabricating and testing twelve simply supported beams that divided into three groups depending on the number of precasting concrete segments. All specimens were prepared with an identical length of 3150 mm and differed in the number of the incorporated segments of the beam (9, 7, or 5 segments). To simulate the genuine fire disasters, nine out of twelve beams were exposed to a high-temperature flame for one hour. Based on the standard fire curve (ASTM – E119), the temperatures of 300◦C (572◦F), 500◦C (932◦F), and 700◦C (1292◦F) were adopted. Consequently,
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This study investigates the improvement of Iraqi atmospheric gas oil characteristics which contains 1.402 wt. % sulfur content and 16.88 wt. % aromatic content supplied from Al-Dura Refinery by using hydrodesulfurization (HDS) process using Ti-Ni-Mo/γ-Al2O3 prepared catalyst in order to achieve low sulfur and aromatic saturation gas oil. Hydrodearomatization (HDA) occurs simultaneously with hydrodesulfurization (HDS) process. The effect of titanium on the conventional catalyst Ni-Mo/γ-Al2O3 was investigated by physical adsorption and catalytic activity test. Ti-Ni-Mo/γ-Al2O3 catalyst was prepared under vacuum impregnation condition to ensure efficient precipitation of metals within the carrier γ-Al2O3. The loading percentage of met
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