Quality function deployment (QFD) is one such extremely important quality management tool, which is useful in product design and development. Traditionally, QFD rates the design requirements (DRs) with respect to customer requirements, and aggregates the rating to get relative importance score of DRs. An increasing number of studies emphasize on the need to incorporate additional factors, such as cost and environmental impact, while calculating the relative importance of DRs. However, there are different methodologies for driving the relative importance of DRs, when several additional factors are considered. TOPSIS (technique for order preferences by similarity to ideal solution) is suggested for the purpose of the research. This research proposes new approach of TOPSIS for considering the rating of DRs with respect to CRs, and several additional factors, simultaneously. Proposed method is illustrated using by step-by-step procedure. The proposed methodology was applied for the Sanam Electronic Company in Iran.

This paper presents an empirical investigation to study the effect of product quality on behavioral and attitudinal loyalty. The study is accomplished among small and medium enterprises (SMEs) located in province of Kerman, Iran. The study designs a questionnaire in Likert scale and distributes it among 180 randomly selected full time employees who work in this region. Cronbach alphas for product quality, behavioral and attitudinal loyalty have been calculated as 0.944, 0.865 and 0.913, respectively. Using structural equation modeling, the study has confirmed a positive and meaningful relationship between product quality and behavioral (B = 0.807 Sig. = 0.000) and attitudinal loyalty (B = 0.926 Sig. = 0.000).

Medical tourism is considered as one of the tourism dimensions and it can contribute to the stabilized and dynamic development of a country & apos; s economy. Since it is cost-effective industry, most developing countries have focused on this industry and they are planning to develop this industry. Not only does Zanjan province, as the central region in medicine services, enjoy different kinds of variety and acceptable medical specialties but also it has historical, natural, and religious tourism potentials. In this survey, the researcher investigated the existing potentials of Zanjan province based on descriptive - analytical tourism in offering and providing medical services and accommodation. The survey reports that offered services in tourism were not acceptable and satisfactory.

This paper studies the effects of Quality of Management Education (QME) at universities on knowledge creation, application and distribution in knowledge based economy(KEI). The study also investigates the influence of QME on effective use of knowledge in economic development(KI).Using some regression technique, the study has determined a positive relationship of the effects of QME on KEI and KI in members of organization of Islamic cooperation (OIC). In addition, the study investigates the position of Iran in terms of quality of management education and the level of knowledge based economy.

Identification of critical traffic conditions based on analysis of traffic variables in a route allows the planners to react timely under such conditions. In this paper, a Decision Support System (DSS) is proposed to determine traffic condition in a route based on the data traffic variables received online in a route such as speed and flow. A knowledge based system is established, which consists of a series of rules (If-Then) to identify the critical traffic conditions when the traffic variables in a route decrease or increase as compared with the previous means, significantly. Statistical control charts are used to identify significant deviations of traffic variables from their means, which are usually caused by events such as accidents. The data for traffic variables, namely flow and speed in 60 hours was collected from one of the main highways of Tehran (Iran’s Capital) in peak hours (17 and 18). 35 observations were used to design control limits for two traffic variables, namely flow and speed and the remaining 25 observations were used to monitor traffic conditions in the future (execution of phase 2 of statistical control charts). The results of traffic monitoring in the intended route indicate that the decision support system has a good performance to identify critical traffic conditions.

This paper studies the relationship between quality of life and its eight components with employee performance in general directorate of youth and sport in province of Golestan, Iran. The study uses a questionnaire developed by Walton (1974) [Walton, R. E. (1974). Improving quality of work life. Harvard Business Review, 52(3), 12.] for quality of life and a standard questionnaire named ACHIEVE consists of 25 questions for measuring the performance. Using Spearman correlation test, the study has determined a positive and meaningful relationship between employee performance and eight components of Walton’s model including adequate and fair compensation, safe and healthy working conditions, development of human competencies, growth and security, social integration, constitutionalization and total life space and social reliance.

This paper studies the relationship between working capital management and profitability of accepted corporations in Tehran Stock Exchange over the period 2008-2012. The study selected 66 firms as a statistical sample based on Cochran formula and simple random selection. In this study, variables including the average period of collecting accordance, periods of circulation of inventories, the average period of debt payment, and cycle of cash conversion on the factories operating profits are studied. The research method is applied and collection of data is solidarity, the Pierson and Regression solidarity are used. Results show that variables of capital investment management and profitability were in opposite direction. If the period of collecting accordance, period of debt payment, period of circulation of inventories and the cycle of cash conversion increase, it decreases the period profitability and the manager can decrease the period of debt payment, period of cash conversion to the least amount of positive value for affiliate.

This paper studies the relationship between workplace Spirituality and Organization Citizenship behavior (OCB) in banks located in province of Sari, Iran. The statistical population of research includes the employees of Sari & apos; s Banks including Melli, Ghavamin, Saderat, Keshavarzi, Mellat,Tejarat, Saman, Parsian, Sarmaye, Pasargad and Karafarin. We used a questionnaire with 45 questions as an instrument for collecting research data. The questionnaire was designed based on workplace spirituality (Milliman et al., 2003) [Milliman, J., Czaplewski, A., & Ferguson, J. (2003). Workplace spirituality and employee work attitudes, an exploratory empirical assessment. Journal of Organizational Change Management, 16(4), 426-447.] and organizational citizenship behavior (Podsakoff et al., 1990) [Podsakoff, P., MacKenzie, S., Paine, J., & Bachrach, D. (2000). Organizational citizenship behaviors: A critical review of the theoretical and empirical literature and suggestions for future research. Journal of Management, 26(3), 513–563.]. Findings show that there was a meaningful relationship between workplace Spirituality and Organization Citizenship behavior. The results also indicated that there was a positive relationship between work spirituality and Organization Citizenship behavior in Sari & apos; s Bank.

This paper presents an empirical investigation to study the relationship between emotional intelligence and job performance in railroad industry. The study uses two questionnaires, one for measuring emotional intelligence adopted from Salovey and Mayer (1989) [Salovey, P., & Mayer, J. D. (1989). Emotional intelligence. Imagination, Cognition and Personality, 9(3), 185-211.] and the other one for measuring job performance. The study selects 300 full time employees who work for railroad industry in city of Tehran, Iran, distributes two questionnaires among the employees and managed to collect all filled ones. Using Spearman correlation, the study has determined a positive and meaningful relationship between emotional intelligence and job performance (r = 0.796, Sig. = 0.000). In addition, there were positive and meaningful relationships between four components of emotional intelligence, namely consciousness (r = 0.642, Sig. = 0.000), self-regulation (r = 0.41, Sig. = 0.000), self-awareness ( r = 0.552, Sig. = 0.000) and social skills (r = 0.524, Sig. = 0.000).

One of the primary economic issues is associated with optimum resource allocation in profitable investments with reasonable risk. For this purpose, performance measurement’s criteria are needed some of which emphasize cash flow variables and some others focus on information content of accounting profit. On this basis, this study examines the relationship between earnings before tax and interest and operational cash flows with stockholders’ return in Tehran Stock Exchange (TSE). In this regard, information asymmetry was also examined. To test hypotheses, multivariable regression and combined data method were used. The results showed that based on the information of 102 companies in stock market from 2004 to 2009, there was a positive and significant correlation between earnings before interest and tax and stock return in the companies. While, operational cash flow has no significant impact on stock return. Increasing information asymmetry, earnings before interest and tax has a positive and significant correlation with stockholders ’return; but operational cash flow has no significant effect on stockholders’ return. In other words, earnings before interest and tax have higher information content than operational cash flow.