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PurposeThe aim of this study is to increase the understanding of collaborative relationships and assess according to the project size, the influence of the contributory factors in shaping collaboration network structure in projects developed in global supply chains (GSC).Design/methodology/approachThe paper used a case study methodology applied to eight global projects developed by an Austrian company leader in global market intra-logistics solutions and warehouse automation. The cases were studied by two approaches in network analysis. First, visual and descriptive analysis to describe structural aspects of the network. Second, stochastic network analysis to evaluate the influence of contributory factors in the structure of the collaboration network.FindingsThe results evidence that independently of the project size and project manager influence, project team roles (PTR) who have a reciprocal communication among other PTR tend to have a higher collaboration intensity (CI). Additionally, the results highlight the influence of the project manager in shaping the collaboration network in standard projects (STP) and small projects (SMP). According to the project size, the results show that the PTR that form complete triangles or cluster or who communicate frequently among each other tend to have a high CI, being more evident these tendencies in large-scale projects than STP and SMP.Originality/valueThis research provides a framework to identify the key actors and contributory factors in shaping collaborative relationships in GSC. The findings could be used to support the decision-making process and formulation strategies for effective collaborative relationship management in GSC.

PurposeIn Latin America and the Caribbean, the access of students to higher education has presented an extraordinary growth over the past fifteen years. This rapid growth has presented a challenge for increasing the system resources and capabilities while maintaining its quality. As a result, the networked universities (NUs) organized themselves as a collaborative network, and they have become an interesting model for facing the complexity driven by globalization, rapidly changing technology, dynamic growth of knowledge and highly specialized areas of expertise. In this article, we studied the NU named Red Universitaria Mutis (Red Mutis) with the aim of characterizing the collaboration and integration structure of the network.Design/methodology/approachNetwork analytic methods (visual analysis, positional analysis and a stochastic network method) were used to characterize the organizational structure and robustness of the network, and to identify what variables or structural tendencies are related to the likelihood that specific areas of a university would collaborate.FindingsRed Mutis is a good example of regional NUs that could take advantage of the strengths, partnerships, information and knowledge of the regional and international universities that form the network. Analyses showed that Red Mutis has a differentiated structure consisting of academic and non-academic university areas with a vertical coordination (by steering and management) of the different university areas.Originality/valueThe methodology could be used as a framework to analyze and strengthen other strategic alliances between universities and as a model for the development of other NU in local and global contexts.

Purpose – Overweight, obesity, and physical inactivity have in recent years become an important public health problem worldwide. Investigations that study obesity using a systemic approach in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) are limited. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to study the nutritional stages dynamics within the Colombian urban population. Design/methodology/approach – The authors used a population-level systems dynamics (SD) model that captures the transitions of population by body mass index (BMI) categories. The authors proposed a heuristic to estimate the transference rates (TRs) between BMI categories using data from the Colombian Demographic and Health Survey 2005 and 2010. Findings – The Colombian urban population is moving to overweight and obese categories. The TRs from not overweight to overweight and from overweight to obese (0.0076 and 0.0054, respectively) are higher than the TRs from obese to overweight and from overweight to not-overweight (1.025×10e−7 and 3.47×10e−7, respectively). The simulation results show that the prevalences of overweight and obesity will increase by 6.2 and 7.5 percent by 2015, and by 13.4 and 18.9 percent by 2030, respectively. Originality/value – Investigations that study obesity using a systemic approach in LMICs are limited. A SD model was proposed to examine changes in the population’s nutritional stages using population accumulation structures by BMI categories. The authors propose a heuristic to estimate the TRs of individuals between BMI categories. The proposed model can be used to study the effects of policy interventions to prevent overweight and obesity. The authors analyze a few policy intervention strategies.