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The number of businesses in Serbia owned and managed by women is increasing, but female entrepreneurs are still in the minority. This study aims to explore characteristics, motivations, advantages, and disadvantages of female entrepreneurship in Serbia in relation to differences in the education level of female entrepreneurs. The main idea is that education level influences the motivation to become an entrepreneur and the choice of the business sector and that female entrepreneurs of different education levels perceive the advantages and disadvantages of entrepreneurship differently. The research was conducted during the first quarter of 2023. The research sample included 104 female entrepreneurs from different sectors and regions of the country. It was demonstrated that education level has an impact on female entrepreneurship. The choice of business sector was influenced by the education level of female entrepreneurs. The way female entrepreneurs perceived the advantages and disadvantages of entrepreneurship was, in some cases, associated with the level of education, while the decision and motivation to become an entrepreneur were not. The results of this study can be used for researchers and policymakers in the field of entrepreneurship to increase the number of female entrepreneurs in Serbia.

Corrosion effects on structural integrity and life of oil rig welded pipes are analysed by experimental, analytical, and numerical methods. Experiments were performed using standard tensile specimens and CT specimens for static loading, Charpy specimens for impact loading, and 3 Point Bending specimens for fatigue crack growth with amplitude loading. In each case new and old pipes were used to evaluate corrosion effects. Results indicated negligible corrosion effects in the case of tensile properties and impact toughness, and strong effects in the case of fracture toughness and especially fatigue crack growth rates, increasing the risk of static failure and reducing significantly structural life. Analytical expressions are used for oil rig pipe structural integrity and life assessment to quantify these effects. Recently introduced risk-based approach is applied to analyse oil rig drill pipe with a corrosion defect treated as a surface crack.

In modern business conditions, organizational culture is recognized as a powerful tool for long-term survival and development of the organization. The purpose of this paper was to research whether and in what way the characteristics of organizations - such as its size, ownership structure, activity, domestic or foreign - influence the organizational culture. Because of continuous and rapid changes and enormous competition, which are features of modern business, the Denison model of organizational culture was chosen because it emphasizes the need for balance between requirements for organizational stability (factors of mission and consistency) and requirements for its adaptability (factors of involvement and adaptability). The survey covered a sample of 1,000 employees and the data was statistically processed using the one-way ANOVA method. The obtained results show the influence of organizational characteristics on its ability to balance the internal and external focus of the organization, its stability, and its ability to change. Likewise, there should be a certain organizational cultural transformation as a response to the paradigm change in wider environment should be a certain organizational cultural transformation as a response to the paradigm change in wider environment.

In recent years, there have been numerous studies and pilot-projects both in Serbia and around the world, dealing with on-line learning. This paper analyzes the possibilities of online learning theoretically and empirically. The theoretical section presents an analysis of differences between traditional and on-line learning based on a review of the literature. The empirical study was carried out using a questionnaire distributed through various internet platforms in April 2020. The survey comprised 339 high school students in Serbia who attended on-line classes during the state of emergency imposed due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The data thus collected were processed using qualitative analysis. The aim of the study was to identify the advantages of on-line learning relative to the traditional model of instruction from the perspective of secondary school students, and to offer recommendations for further research and improvements in practice. The results of the study suggest that secondary school students in Serbia recognize the advantages of on-line learning in terms of time efficiency, the possibility to manage the learning process and improvement of the results of the instructional process.

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In the historiography of Serbian medicine, there is little data on the life and work of Dr. Dimitrije Radulović. He belonged to the first generation of Serbian doctors of the 19th century. He was born in 1814, in Bela Crkva, completed his studies of medicine in Pest, where he received his title Doctor of Medicine. After Pest, he went to Vienna, where he specialized in obstetrics. Among Serbs, he was the author of the first work in the field which we today call sports medicine. With this work, as well as with his later work, he established important foundations of sports medicine among the Serbian people. He was the first to write about the importance of physical exercise and the impact of different sports on the physical development of children, adolescents, and adults, thus contributing to the definition of optimal physical activity and hygienic-dietary regimes. His goal was to preserve and improve health, i.e. to improve the prevention and curative of various diseases and injuries, as well as the rehabilitation of patients.

Educated and talented people drive progress in every country. That’s why no country can neglect these people; that would mean losing one’s own potential. This paper emphasises the importance of educating scholarship students abroad as a means of developing and accumulating human resources and a key determinant of sustainable development in the modern world. Investing in the education of the best students (scholarship holders) is an investment in the future, which brings multiple benefits on a social, economic, and political level. Migration is an important phenomenon that attracts public attention, especially when it comes to highly educated experts leaving their home country in search of better education. Highly educated experts have been leaving Serbia for several decades, which poses an obvious problem for local society. The topic of permanent migration is dominant both in foreign and domestic literature, but studies on the temporary migration of highly educated students (scholarship holders) is almost nonexistent. The aim of this paper is to point out the value of returnee scholarship holders and the importance of creating the appropriate conditions for them to stay in the country. A survey conducted on a group of 96 returnee scholarship holders identified factors that affect their satisfaction with living in Serbia. The survey involved experts from Serbia who were educated abroad as scholarship holders, where they acquired academic titles and are now employed: as faculty teachers (32); as researchers at scientific institutes (24); in the private sector (21); at universities (12); in state administrative departments (5); and in medical institutions (2). The criterion for selecting this group of respondents was that they had stayed abroad as scholarship holders, whether they used scholarships from domestic (24) or foreign (72) funds. Scholarship students go abroad mostly because of their personal aspirations for training, gaining new experiences, and because of the inability to study the desired discipline in their country, as was the case for 74 respondents. The main reasons for deciding to return are family (25) and the belief that they have a good chance to work in Serbia (18), while 16 respondents could not stay abroad. In this paper, we used the factor analysis method. The main factors that create satisfaction with life in Serbia are isolated. These factors are: satisfaction with work and a set of factors that strongly correlate with it (the ability to make decisions, the implementation of acquired knowledge, peer acceptance), as well as the recognition of their diploma in Serbia without any difficulties. By improving these factors, there might be a significant increase in the chance that returnee scholarship holders remain in Serbia for a long time. Based on this, it would be wise to build a strategy on how to encourage returnee scholarship holders to stay in the country. The results obtained in this study represent a contribution to a search for a strategy that will attract, involve, and retain educated people in the country. [Project of the Serbian Ministry of Education, Science and Technological Development, Grant no. TR 35030]

This paper deals with our highly educated professionals who studied abroad as scholarship holders at post-academic studies and then returned and found employment in Serbia. The aim of this paper is to examine how this group of returnees employed at faculties and scientific institutes in Serbia assess their experience of studying abroad. The assessments of the returnees were gathered through a questionnaire. These assessments were on the extent to which the returnees felt their education abroad influenced their employment in Serbia, the opportunities to apply the acquired knowledge and to participate in decision-making at the workplace, and, finally, on how different they felt from their colleagues who acquired all their education and work experience in their own country. To better understand the situation of returnees, a special questionnaire also gathered the assessments of their colleagues on these issues.

Welded joints are analysed as critical regions in a pressure vessel in respect to structural failure due to the elastic-plastic fracture/crack growth. To assess structural integrity of pressure vessels used in chemical industry the risk based procedure has been introduced and applied in the case of a large spherical pressure vessel used as a vinyl-chloride monomer (VCM) storage tank in HIP Azotara Pančevo. The risk matrix has been used, taking into account the basic definition of risk, being the product of the probability and consequence, and applied to different regions of welded joints, having different mechanical properties, i.e. crack resistance. To estimate probability, the failure assessment diagram (FAD) has been used, as an engineering tool, defined according to the position of the operating point for different regions of the welded joint, relative to the critical point on the limit curve. Generally speaking, consequence is estimated based on pressure vessel parameters, or by detailed analysis of health, safety, business and security issues, but in the analysed case, the worst case scenario is assumed, with the highest consequence due to potential disaster for environment and fatalities. [Project of the Serbian Ministry of Education, Science and Technological Development, Grant no. TR 33044 and Grant no. 35017]

Adequate and timely response in terms of permanent changes is essential for the survival of any company. The capacity for such response is measured by degree of flexibility, whereby flexibility is the ability of the company to change itself or to be easily changed according to any given situation. The phenomenon of flexibility can be achieved by more complete involvement of employees in the system of organization functioning, including development of their resources, participation in decision-making and self-organization of work, freedom to undertake initiatives, a good system of information, and encouragement of team orientation and interactivity of employees in achieving organizational goals. The study's aim is to show, through empirical research, a degree of employees' involvement in companies in Serbia, to identify the factors that influence its development and analyze difference in involvement in domestic and foreign companies. The survey was conducted through a questionnaire based on Denison model of organizational culture whereby the sample size 1000 respondents. Data were statistically analyzed and interpreted. The results showed that companies in Serbia still need to work on improving involvement of employees in a company life, that there is difference between domestic and foreign companies in decisions making and that the team work is the main factor of involvement of employees.

Intermodal freight transportation refers to a multi-modal chain of container-transportation services which usually links the initial shipper to the final consignee of the container (door-to-door service) and takes place over long distances. Container transportation is a major component of intermodal transportation and international commerce. Container flow should be optimal to ensure proper resource utilization and profitability to players. Various multi-objective evolutionary algorithms have been developed to efficiently solve optimization problems in container flows. This paper presents a short review of optimization problems in intermodal transport using sea and land legs together regarding three mostly observed objectives (transport cost, transit time and CO2 emissions).

Organic production is becoming increasingly significant, not just because of its positive impact on the rural development, protection of the environment, and advancement of human health, but also because of its impact on economic prosperity. In the developed economies, this method of production represents a dominant factor of progress. The purpose of this paper is to present possibilities for organic production and provide the guidelines for its development in Serbia, through the application of an extended model of marketing mix, developed specifically for the purpose of this research, aimed at economic development.

Motivation is one of important issues in the management of modern organizations. The organization would be more effective if they had balanced personal interests and the interests of the organization. The importance of motivation is reflected in the fact that the organization achieves the objectives and results based on the work performance of employees. Most employers today want their employees to be motivated to work, take initiative and improve the way of working, but do not really understand what motivates a person. In order to determine how employees, and various personal characteristics and working conditions, evaluate incentives, research was conducted in two organizations. Perceiving and comparing the result of the research we have found some of the driving, motivating factors, their mutual relations and their impact on organizational performance.

Investigation of risk in complex industrial systems, as well as evaluation of main factors influencing decision making and implementation process using large petrochemical company as an example, has proved the importance of successful project risk management. This is even more emphasized when analyzing systems with complex structure, i.e. with several organizational units. It has been shown that successful risk management requires modern methods, based on adequate application of statistical analysis methods.

The paper shows the results of a research conducted in a large petrochemical company, in a state under transition, with the aim to "shed light" on the decision making process from the aspect of personal characteristics of the employees, in order to use the results to improve decision making process and increase company efficiency. The research was conducted by a survey, i.e. by filling out a questionnaire specially made for this purpose, in real conditions, during working hours. The sample of the respondents is representative for the goal of the research and consists of 82 employees, of all level of decision making, education, age structure, and years of service. The data has been processed by appropriate mathematical-statistical techniques: factor analysis, cluster analysis, correlation. For determining the important factors in decision making process, a type of factor analysis was used - the principal components analysis and the normalized Varimax rotation procedure. The basic hypotheses of research related to the readiness of the employees for independent decision making, readiness for risk taking, determining the level of usage of intuition, organization atmosphere, general and personal characteristics of employees, have been proved. The results of the research indicate that the process of decision making is complex one in the organization and that there is a tendency of the employees towards collective decision making, as it was used to be done. A significant result is that the employees at the managing positions are more ready for independent decision making than the employees at the executive positions. Based on the results of the research, it is possible to draft managerial and organizational measures for increasing the level of readiness for independent and individual decision making, and increase company efficiency, as well.