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Listening to patients: improving the outpatient service	[ "Organisational development", "Patient perception", "Quality improvement", "Patient centredness", "Patient expectation" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Over the past few years, patient participation in illness management has been increasingly encouraged (Guadagnoli and Ward, 1998; Ward, 2004a). Several studies show that involving patients in their medical care results in a better outcome and greater satisfaction (Wressle et al., 2002; Brekke et al., 2001). Rheumatological conditions tend to be chronic and patients often suffer from fatigue, pain, impaired function and psychosocial problems. Disease management requires a multidisciplinary approach (Kjeken et al., 2006). Obtaining the patient's rheumatology outpatient service perspective is essential to provide high-quality services (Joint Working Party, Royal College of Physicians, 2004). The patient experience starts from the appointment letter, then consultation and follow-up. An efficient and effective service depends on the whole team (Petersson, 2005; MacKay et al., 2005) including doctors, nurses, pharmacists, therapists, receptionists, secretaries, service facilities and clinical pathways.\nMethods: This was a structured interview schedule based on 38 questions developed following discussion among the authors and their patients. The questions were designed to address rheumatology out-patient consultation structure, process and outcome. We specifically tried to address conceivable aspects related to the service including appointment letter, clinic structure, waiting times, consultation, follow up, compliance with medication and overall satisfaction. Responses were measured either on a Likert scale or a yes/no response. A total of 70 consecutive patients attending the rheumatology clinic on Wednesdays, over a three-month period, were recruited. Patients were interviewed by an independent assessor (SJC) in a separate location immediately after their scheduled clinic appointment. The average time taken for the interview schedule was eight minutes.\nResults: Patient characteristics are shown in Table I. The main findings from the 38-point questionnaire showing outpatient structure, process and outcome perspectives are summarised in Table II.\nDiscussion: Hospital out-patient staff struggled to cope with their workload, given that need and demand are always greater than supply - the main factor creating waiting times. Staff try to cope with the demand by separating new patient and follow-up clinics, to ensure that new patients can access the system. Where clinics are mixed, attempts are made to have a new to-follow-up patient ratio that is appropriate for the specialty. Providers should be continually asking two questions when assessing service provision:\nConclusions: Health service research is important for patients, clinicians and policy makers alike. An easily accessible, user-friendly healthcare delivery is key in a patient-centred care system. Overall, this study indicates that there is a potential for further improvement in the way arthritis care is delivered. A few proposals may need extra resources, but some require few additional means. Obtaining specialist, primary care physician, patient and their advocates' perspectives ensures that services are built around our patients' needs and expectations.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: This paper assesses the patients' healthcare information needs and expectations when they attend a rheumatology outpatient clinic. It proposes that obtaining the patients' perspectives about the services they use is an essential service-development tool. The aim of this paper is to expand the current domains used to evaluate these perspectives.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This paper is an exploratory study, looking at quality assessment and improvement based on Donabedian's quality model in a rheumatology outpatient setting. A structured interview schedule addressing care pathways was used and 70 consecutive patients were recruited.\nFindings: The article provides insights about how relevant change can be brought about when service development is contemplated. It suggests that patients are important stakeholders in the ongoing service development process.\nResearch limitations/implications: Because rheumatological conditions tend to be chronic and require long-term follow-up, the results may lack generalisability. Therefore, researchers are encouraged to test propositions in different clinical settings.\nPractical implications: The article highlights healthcare delivery areas that are not meeting patient expectations. Some recommendations (such as informing waiting patients regularly about any delays) require minimal additional resources for successful implementation. Service providers need to obtain the patients' healthcare perspectives to ensure that services are built around their needs.\nOriginality/value: This article fulfils an identified need to study how patients perceive service quality.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Improving performance in project-based management: synthesizing strategic theories	[ "Project management", "Performance management", "Theory", "Resource management" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Projects have been used to implement change, either of a physical nature or process, for several millennia, yet its management is still considered to be a relatively young discipline which lacks a fully developed theoretical base (Jugdev, 2004). However, it was only in the 1950s when organizations began to systematically apply project management methods to complex defence and construction projects that project management theory began to develop (Packendorff, as cited in Jugdev, 2004).\nWhat is project success?: A key question in project management literature is how to measure project success (Wateridge, as cited in Choi et al., 2011). Pinto and Slevin (as cited in Muller and Jugdev, 2012, p. 758) note \"There are few topics in the field of project management that are so frequently discussed and yet so rarely agreed upon as that of the notion of project success\". Traditionally, project success has been measured based on \"the triple constraints\" or \"the iron triangle\" of time, cost and scope of objectives (with quality often displayed in the centre of the triangle) (Choi et al., 2011; Sebaux et al., 2011). These elements are mutually dependent; therefore, a change in one will have a resultant effect on at least one other element. Over the years, the criterion for measuring project success has evolved to a more quality-based focus with greater awareness of stakeholders' needs, and inclusion of internal-external quality measures (Parker et al., 2013). A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK Guide) (Project Management Institute, 2013, p. 35) states project success \"[...] should be measured in terms of completing the project within the constraints of scope, time, cost, quality, resources, and risk as approved between the project managers and senior management\".\nProject-based productivity management: The traditional approach to project management identifies a sequence of steps to be completed, which can generally be broken down into the following five components: project initiation, planning, execution, monitoring and controlling and close out (Wysocki, 2011). The PMBOK Guide, first developed by The Project Management Institute (PMI) in 1976, is based on this traditional approach. The PMBOK Guide continues to be put forth as the \"generally accepted\" project management practices for project managers and the de facto standard of the discipline (Shenhar and Dvir, 2007). The PMBOK Guide uses a systems approach based on inputs, processes and outputs and emphasizes the triple constraints of time, cost and scope (Jugdev, 2004).\nThe TOC: The TOC was first popularized by Goldratt and Cox (1984) in the book titled The Goal: Excellence in Manufacturing. TOC adopts the common idiom \"a chain is no stronger than its weakest link\" (Tulasi and Rao, 2012); and aims to identify the core problem and develop a breakthrough solution by asking three improvement questions: What to change? What to change to? And how to cause the change? (Rand, 2000).\nThe RBV: The RBV was conceptualized during the 1950s-1970s and is considered one of the most dominant frameworks in strategic management (Jugdev, 2004). The RBV focuses on managing limited resources in order to generate a competitive advantage. Prior (2003, p. 2) provides a more comprehensive definition, stating: \"The RBV focuses on the use and deployment of resources by a firm, the development of resource-based core competencies and the eventual competitive advantage that results from this process\".\nRDT: RDT was introduced in Pfeffer and Salancik's (2003) book titled The External Control of Organizations: A Resource Dependence Perspective. The RDT framework provides an understanding of organization-environment relations and outlines the relationship (and dependencies) between resources, power and organization-environment.\nIncorporating TOC, RBV and RDT with project-based productivity improvement: Constraints exist in all stages of a project-based performance management and include time, cost (budget), scope and quality, as well as other factors such as risks and resource availability. Therefore, the application of the TOC to project management is important, as management of key constraints can result in reduced delays, and therefore increase the likelihood of delivering the project on-time, within budget and to scope and quality specifications.\nConceptual model: Planning, scheduling and mobilizing resources are key components of any project-based performance intervention. However, project managers often face situations in which key resources for the project are partially or completely unavailable. This may be due to a range of factors, including allocation of the resource to other projects or activities, or the resource being temporarily absent from the organization or the organization not possessing the required resource to begin with. If a resource is unavailable a project manager may need to delay the project until available, request additional funding to procure the resource from outside the organization or adjust the project objectives to account for the lack of capability within the project (Rand, 2000). If a scarce resource is planned to be used in the project, then obtaining the resource may require negotiation with its owners - which can significantly impact a project manager's ability to deliver the project on-time, within budget or within scope (Engwall and Jerbrant, 2003).\nInitial testing: application to cases study: Prior to undertaking extensive empirical field research, with the underlying need for development of a range instruments for data collection - for eventual testing of the hypotheses - an exploration of conceptual and theoretical validity has been undertaken through grounding the model with a small case study. Such confirmatory reflection using published cases is an established research method (Sauser et al., 2009). The case study highlight the importance of considering resource scarcity during the initiation and planning processes of a project.\nConclusions, limitations and future research direction: Shenhar and Dvir (2007, p. 10) argue:\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore benefits and issues of integrating the theory of constraints (TOC), resource-based view (RBV) and resource-dependence theory (RDT) with conventional project-based management frameworks.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Extant literature is used to develop a conceptual framework of an integrated model that will be tested for applied robustness. The model has been applied to published projects to identify its strengths and weaknesses.\nFindings: The work shows important implications for improved success of projects from the use of TOC, RBV and RDT.\nResearch limitations/implications: While TOC, RBV and RDT are well established in the context of organization theory, there is limited application in project management. Moreover, the model has yet to be applied in the field. The hypotheses identified in this research are currently being tested using empirical investigation.\nPractical implications: The research falls short in addressing some resources, e.g. innovation, tacit knowledge and decision-making methods in traditional project management context. Therefore, identifying these critical resources in future work and exploiting them as the means of improving project performance would enhance the success of project-based management.\nSocial implications: Project management is an emergent discipline and a project is temporary in nature. Therefore, new ideas and development of theories for project management practices are required. This innovative research, for example, may change the way projects are executed in future.\nOriginality/value: This paper examines the components of a successful project according to the iron triangle, i.e. scope, quality, time and cost. However, through the application of TOC, RBV and RDT into an integrated project-based management framework gives new insights to resources management.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
The relationship between total quality management practices and organizational culture	[ "Total quality management", "Organizational culture", "Australia" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Much has been written on the impact of total quality management (TQM) on organizational performance (Flynn et al., 1994; Samson and Terziovski, 1999). These studies typically conclude that TQM has a positive and significant relationship with organizational performance. However, not all TQM implementation yields the satisfactory results promoted by its advocates (Brown, 1993; Harari, 1993; Tatikonda and Tatikonda, 1996). Literature has noted numerous stories on the problematic issues relating to the implementation process and how they affect its outcomes. Among several factors, which have been attributed as key determinants of its success, organizational culture is often among those listed at the top. A number of studies have been devoted to identify what kinds of factors are suitable for implementing TQM based on a proposition that culture affects the extent to which TQM can be implemented in organizations.Closer examination of literature that explores this relationship between TQM and culture reveals two competing schools of thought (Bright and Cooper, 1993). The first view argues that TQM is associated with a single \"homogeneous\" culture. Underlying this \"unitarist\" argument is a view that promotes TQM as a set of organization-wide practices that unify mindsets and perceptions among members of an organization. Within this group, the arguments typically suggest that TQM is associated with a single culture, especially the one that is flexible and people-oriented (Tata and Prasad, 1998). In short, the underlying principal in this unitarist view is that TQM thrives only in a single, identifiable culture. The \"pluralist\" view, alternatively, supports the ideas of heterogeneity of various cultural dimensions on which TQM should be built. A key difference in this view is the argument that TQM also includes cultural elements, which can promote control and standardization, as opposed to flexibility alone (Watson and Korukonda, 1995). As such, this pluralist view of the TQM/culture relationship is more multi-dimensional, with different cultural characteristics in turn being associated with different elements of TQM. This view appears to contradict the people-centered cultural characteristics that are commonly associated with the unitarist view.Underlying these two opposing arguments is the contrasting view on TQM as a set of organizational practices. The first group (unitarist) views TQM as a unidimensional \"package\" which has to be implemented as a whole and therefore both requires and reflects a specific, single \"homogeneous\" culture of the organization. The opposing pluralist school of thought suggests that TQM practice is multidimensional, and is driven by and reflects various types of practices which are driven and reflect various dimensions of organizational culture.These opposing views present an interesting dilemma for managers and researchers alike, named if TQM is indeed multidimensional with respect to culture, it stands to reason that management would need to consider multiple approaches for encouraging its implementation. Alternatively, if it is unidimensional, then a single culture and set of values might be more appropriate. The purpose of this paper is to empirically examine the validity of these two opposing views as they relate to TQM practice. The paper is structured is follows: it starts with literature review discussing the relationship between TQM practices and organizational culture, especially relating to the opposing issues above, which leads to the articulation of the research questions of this study. Following these are methodology and data collection sections, outlining data analysis using structural equation modelling (SEM). Finally, discussion of the findings is presented, followed by conclusion and several recommendations for future research in the area.\nLiterature review: This literature review starts with a discussion of the distinction between TQM as a set of organizational practices and organizational culture. This is followed by a section presenting the nature of the relationship between TQM practices and organizational culture. It concludes with a discussion of the controversy about the relationship between TQM and organizational culture, leading to the development of the research framework and questions for this study.The distinction between TQM practices and organizational culture\nResearch framework and methodology: The literature review section has addressed several issues on the relationship between TQM practices and organizational culture. First, it articulates the difference between TQM as a set of organizational practices, and culture as an underlying belief system related to the mindsets of people within the organization. Second, it holds the proposition that it is organizational culture, which affects TQM implementation, not the other way around. Third, it highlights the debate on the kinds of organizational culture, which are suitable for implementing TQM practices; highlighting the difference between unitarist and pluralist views. The conflict between these two arguments is then extended to another debate on TQM as either unidimensional or multidimensional. By incorporating these three key findings of the literature review, we developed a research framework examining the relationship between organizational culture and TQM practices that built on previous works in the area. In essence, this study was aimed at comparing the nature of the relationship between organizational culture and TQM practices in the form of two competing structural models based on unitarist and pluralist views.In developing the research framework, we built on several past studies. Our study built on the work of Chang and Wiebe (1996) and Dellana and Hauser (1999), which examine the link between TQM practices based on Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award (MBNQA) model and organizational culture based on the competing values model developed by Denison and Spreitzer (1991). Chang and Wiebe (1996) interviewed a panel of experts from the Conference Board Total Quality Management Centre to describe ideal cultural characteristics that they believe will support TQM philosophy based on the four types of cultures of the competing value model, namely group, developmental, hierarchical, and rational. This finding suggests that these four types of culture characterized the ideal organizational culture embodied by a TQM philosophy, although group and developmental cultures appear to be dominant. As such, it provides empirical support for the pluralist view. Dellana and Hauser (1999) also use the MBNQA criteria to represent TQM practices and the competing values model to represent organizational cultures as their research variables. Using Pearson correlation coefficients, they test the association between each of the six elements of the MBNQA criteria and the four cultural dimensions of the competing values model. Their finding concurs with that by Chang and Wiebe where both group culture and developmental culture are associated with high MBNQA scores. Al-khalifa and Aspinwall (2001) investigate the suitability of the national culture in Qatar and the culture required for implementing TQM. Their conclusion suggests that Qatar companies would find difficulties in implementing TQM since they are dominated by a rational and hierarchical culture, hence, confirming the findings of the first two studies.Our study aims to advance both studies from an analytical point of view by following the work by Zeitz et al. (1997) who employ SEM. This allows us to examine the multiple cultures and multiple TQM elements simultaneously, hence, incorporating the interaction amongst independent and dependent variables. The use of SEM also allows us to make a rigorous analysis in comparing the unitarist and pluralist model of the culture-TQM relationship which would contribute to knowledge in this area. In modelling the structural relationship between TQM and organizational culture, we also follow the work of Zeitz et al. (1997) by considering organizational culture as the independent variable which determines the level of TQM practices as the dependent variable.This study also builds on the work by Chang and Wiebe (1996) and Dellana and Hauser (1999) by examining the relationship between TQM practices and organizational culture. In particular, the objective of this study is to examine the multidimensionality of TQM, which is a reflection of multidimensional organizational culture with the following research questions being addressed:RQ1. Can the multidimensionality of TQM practices be reflected in multidimensional cultures?\nData analysis: Data reduction process\nDiscussion: The findings above provide evidence of the need for managing multidimensional elements within TQM that reflect multidimensional cultures. In particular, although they may be seen as somewhat controversial, the findings do support the existence of the mechanistic-type culture within TQM practices, represented by the TQM3 subgroup. This finding is even more important as a counterbalance of the \"bias\" towards group and developmental culture which has dominated the literature on TQM as noted in the earlier section. Therefore, the findings substantiate the idea of the juxtaposition of different elements of TQM, the control and people-centred elements, and that the coexistence of both elements does not necessarily cause a situation where one can undermine the other. The paradoxical combinations of these cultures concur with the findings of past studies in the area (Buenger et al., 1996; Kalliath et al., 1999; Zammuto and Krakower, 1991). This finding also supports the underlying assumption of the competing values model with regard to the importance of balance. This is because, when organizations overemphasize one culture and ignore the other, they may become dysfunctional and the \"single\" culture may turn out to be weaknesses (Denison and Spreitzer, 1991).The importance of this issue can also be viewed from a strategic point of view in relation to the escalating pressure for organizations to pursue more complex, often inconsistent, aspects of performance. In this regard, Benner and Tushman (2003) highlight the idea of dynamic capabilities that integrate the firm's abilities for both exploitation - which emphasizes control - and exploration - which promotes flexibility. We believe that such integration concurs with the need to appreciate the coexistence of control and people-centred cultures within the organization as identified in this study. Supporting this proposition, Denison and Spreitzer (1991) specifically affirm the need to incorporate and balance all four cultural types that represent the capacity to respond to a wide set of environmental conditions.By and large, the coexistence of the control and people-centred models implies that TQM calls for a synthesis of these antagonistic elements within an organization. As Thompson (1998) affirms, the need for managing the cultural paradox could be one of the primary issues of TQM and the biggest challenge for organizations that implement it. The major implication of this finding is that organizations need to accommodate divergent goals by developing a system and/or structure that allows enough flexibility for adapting different (even contrasting) management styles, hence, swinging comfortably between control and flexibility and between internal and external orientations, which is known as the \"ambidextrous\" approach (Tushman, 1996). We believe that this issue is worthy of examination for research on TQM in the future.\nConclusion: It is our hope that the present study helps to nurture a dialog that explores these and other relationships between TQM and culture. Our results support the pluralist view, yet it still opens further debate in the area, particularly between the organizational versus departmental the level. Intuitively, one may argue that multidimensional cultures are applicable only at the organizational level, but once we look into specific parts of the organization we will find subgroups of culture, which are more homogenous, according to the specific task(s) they face. For example, developmental culture can be found to be more prevalent in the R&D function, whilst rational or hierarchical culture is more alive in the (manufacturing) production function.Further, the implications of this research raise questions regarding the most appropriate combination of cultures for TQM. One might posit that the answer to this question hinges on variables such as industry sector and strategic goals of the organizations. We need to examine further if our findings would be different when such control variables are added. Also, it would be interesting to explore if the configuration of TQM subgroups will vary, in contingent on these factors, as suggested by Sitkin et al. (1994) and Spencer (1994). In this regard, we may find different configurations of TQM based on different levels of the three subgroups, contingent to these external and internal control variables. For example, firms operating in a stable industry would emphasis more the control elements of TQM (i.e. TQM2 and TQM3) compared to those operating in a dynamic environment.Another important issue is related to the effectiveness of these cultures in determining organizational performance. For example, the studies by Powell (1995) and Samson and Terziovski (1999) suggest that the \"soft\" factors of TQM - associated with TQM1 in this study - were found to be the strongest predictors of organizational performance. On the other hand, the \"hard\" factors - associated with the TQM3 subgroup in this study - did not show any significant relationship with organizational performance. Does this lead to a conclusion that the cultures supporting these practices (i.e. group and developmental cultures) are the best and therefore should be nurtured, and at the same time, hierarchical factors - which underlie TQM3 - should be suppressed? If so, under what conditions?Finally, this study considers organizational culture as the antecedent of TQM practices. However, as mentioned in the literature review section, there are many arguments that promote TQM as a vehicle for organizational change, including the cultural element. We believe that the recursive effect between TQM and organizational culture would be an interesting topic to examine although it can only be done using a longitudinal study.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - This empirical study explores the relationship between total quality management (TQM) practices and organizational culture with the purpose of identifying the particular cultures that determine the successful implementation of TQM practices. Specifically, it tests two competing views on the relationship; the unitarist and pluralist views.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The empirical data was drawn from 194 organizations in Australia. The research model employs the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award criteria as TQM framework and builds on the competing values model to frame organizational culture. The data was analysed using structural equation modelling technique.\nFindings: - The findings support the pluralist view, wherein different subsets of TQM practices are determined by different types of cultures. Interestingly, hierarchical culture was found to have a significant relationship with certain practices of TQM. Additionally, the findings indicate that although the cultural factors underpinning different elements of TQM are dissimilar, even antagonistic, organizations can implement them in harmony.\nPractical implications: - The major implication of this study is that organizations need to accommodate divergent goals by developing a system and/or structure that allows enough flexibility for adapting different (even contrasting) management styles, between control and flexibility and between internal and external orientations, so that they may gain benefits from the multiple dimensions of TQM.\nOriginality/value: - This paper provides empirical evidence on the multidimensionality of TQM practices along with their association with different types of culture.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Promoting safety: Longer-term responses of three health professional groups to a safety improvement programme	[ "Safety", "Team working", "Attitudes", "Questionnaires" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Tackling patient safety\nAims: We investigated the acceptance and adoption of the NSW health system's SIP using large, professionally mixed groups of senior clinicians who had been trained in safety improvement techniques during the previous three years. A follow-up questionnaire survey compared doctors', nurses' and allied health professionals' SIP training appraisal of skills learned from the course and applied in the workplace. Groups' attitudes regarding the benefits of implementing SIP and RCAs were investigated. Professionals' experiences when conducting RCAs were explored in terms of likelihood of being part of or leading an RCA team, barriers encountered when conducting RCAs and implementing the investigative teams' recommendations. Research findings discussed above led to four hypotheses. While all groups of senior health professionals favoured safety improvement and hence the SIP (H1), doctors would hold less positive attitudes toward the course content and structure, its application to their work, and the benefits of the SIP than would the other professions, particularly nursing (H2). There were opposing predictions regarding the groups' experiences when conducting RCAs. The relatively higher power of the doctors suggested they would experience fewer barriers when conducting RCAs (H3a). The greater endorsement of teamwork by the other professions particularly nursing suggested they would experience fewer barriers when conducting RCAs (H3b).\nMethod: Questionnaire\nResults: Attitudes toward the SIP training course\nDiscussion: Overall, our survey results indicate that, as predicted, SIP has been well accepted by senior members from the major health professions (H1). On the questionnaire Likert scales, the groups' mean scores were always favourable, but with three exceptions. Doctors were dissatisfied with the course's lack of evidence-base and they disagreed with the notion of having consumers as RCA team members. Additionally, all groups gave negative answers to one item, reporting lack of time as a frequent problem when conducting RCAs. Our results add to Leape and Berwick's (2000) assertions that health practitioners from all professions are eager to improve safety. The SIP appears to have effectively tapped this reservoir of concern for safer healthcare. However, as predicted, the professions differed in the degree to which they favoured SIP. Doctors were less positive than the other professions in their attitudes regarding the first three domains (H2). Nurses almost always gave the most favourable response to items, even when these did not differ significantly from the other groups' replies. Allied health almost always held attitudes intermediate to those of doctors and nurses, though their attitudes tended to resemble nurses' more frequently than the doctors' particularly regarding course and SIP benefits.Doctors' less favourable course views were reflected in the decreased likelihood of them saying they would recommend it to colleagues. Yet they were as likely as other groups to say that not enough people in their organisation had been SIP trained. Doctors particularly disliked the lack of an evidence-base for the topics covered in the course. As predicted, doctors were more critical of the teaching content and style than other groups. Attending the course with members of other professions and being taught by a mixed faculty, some of whom were not doctors, possibly contributed to their less positive course evaluation and their perception of its applicability to their work. In the skills domain, the items to which doctors were less likely to agree, compared with the other groups, concerned the application of skills promulgated in the SIP course. Nurses applied these skills more than the other professions but were no more likely to say they learnt more (items 9, 19), only that they changed their safety practices more.For nurses and allied heath, the team approach to inter-professional education and involvement in interactive tasks, proved more appealing. A course benefit for nurses was their perception that participation in the programme added to the status of their profession. Compared to others, doctors seemed less optimistic about the immediate and long-term benefits from the programme. Further evidence of doctors' greater reluctance to endorse SIP comes from follow-up interviews with the course faculty (Long, 2005). Some faculty members expressed disappointment with doctors' low participation rate. It was felt that doctors, to some degree, were avoiding taking part in the course. While the number of doctors in the sample approximated those in the health workforce, doctors' participation was seen by faculty as particularly important.There are few differences between the professional groups' experiences of doing RCAs either in terms of their involvement in RCAs, the problems encountered with members of teams, implementation rates of recommendations and desire for follow-up training. We hypothesised (H3a) that doctors' higher status and power might decrease the barriers they encounter when investigating incidents. However, the difference observed in this domain was not in the direction predicted; doctors reported more problems from unsupportive managers when conducting RCAs. The contradictory hypothesis (H3b) was that other health professionals, particularly nurses, would encounter fewer barriers owing to their teamwork endorsement. Neither of the opposing hypotheses was supported. It may be that the professional groups' differing characteristics and skills assisted them in different ways when conducting RCAs. The benefits of their different advantages cancelled each other out so that all groups had similar outcomes. Doctors' preference for not having consumers on RCA teams, and the trend for them to prefer having colleagues and not outsiders is in line with other evidence about their lower levels of support for teamwork. More investigation, including ethnographic observation, is needed before this discussion of H3 can be considered more than speculation (Iedema et al., 2006). The fact that similar and high proportions (84 per cent) of all professional groups who had been involved in RCAs would like follow-up sessions indicates a commitment to the RCA process. Furthermore, all groups' preferences are for face-to face follow-up, which might have been expected to appeal more to nurses and allied health. It may be that the process of working together on an RCA team results in doctors becoming more favourably disposed toward multidisciplinary teamwork.The professions' ratings of the barriers encountered when conducting RCAs indicate that these occur relatively frequently, particularly lack of time. These problems need to be addressed if staff enthusiasm for the RCA process and the quality of RCA outputs, is to be maintained and fostered. That a quarter of those involved in RCAs were uncertain whether their recommendations were implemented hardly provides positive reinforcement for the work that went into reaching recommendations. The desire for greater dissemination of anonymous RCA findings and resulting changes were spontaneously mentioned in some text comments. Such dissemination would provide evidence to health professionals that the SIP initiative is continuing and changes are being put in place.\nConclusion: Our study provides evidence that health professional groups attending SIP courses for safety improvement strongly support the programme, while highlighting differences between the professions in their enthusiasm for the programme and its benefits. Attitudes toward safety improvement, safety skills and the benefits central to improving patient safety in a systematic and comprehensive way seem on the evidence to be changing as a result of the SIP initiative. Many factors probably contributed to doctors' less positive attitudes. Means of counteracting these raise dilemmas as doctors, more than other professional groups, dislike some of the knowledge content and multidisciplinary teaching environment considered optimal for imparting the skills needed to conduct RCAs. Long-term effects of this safety improvement initiative are predicted to reduce levels of harm to patients and improve outcomes though as many participants in all professional groups asserted, culture change is necessary in the health system if such benefits are to be sustained. Although such variables are hard to measure, ongoing research is needed. It represents the next stage in the journey of providing safer healthcare systems for patients.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - Patient safety has been addressed since 2002 in the health system of New South Wales, Australia via a Safety Improvement Programme (SIP), which took a system-wide approach. The programme involved two-day courses to educate healthcare professionals to monitor and report incidents and analyse adverse events by conducting root cause analysis (RCA). This paper aims to predict that all professions would favour SIP but that their work and educational histories would result in doctors holding the least and nurses the most positive attitudes. Alternative hypotheses were that doctors' relative power and other professions' team-working skills would advantage the respective groups when conducting RCAs.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Responses to a 2005 follow-up questionnaire survey of doctors (n=53), nurses (209) and allied health staff (59), who had participated in SIP courses, were analysed to compare: their attitudes toward the course; safety skills acquired and applied; perceived benefits of SIP and RCAs; and their experiences conducting RCAs.\nFindings: - Significant differences existed between professions' responses with nurses being the most and doctors the least affirming. Allied health responses resembled those of nurses more than those of doctors. The professions' experiences conducting RCAs (number conducted, leadership, barriers encountered, findings implemented) were similar.\nResearch limitations/implications: - Observational studies are needed to determine possible professional differences in the conduct of RCAs and any ensuing culture change that this may be eliciting.\nPractical implications: - There is strong professional support for SIPs but less endorsement from doctors, who tend not to prefer the knowledge content and multidisciplinary teaching environment considered optimal for safety improvement education. This is a dilemma that needs to be addressed.\nOriginality/value: - Few longer-term SIPs' assessments have been realised and the differences between professional groups have not been well quantified. As a result of this paper, benefits of and barriers to conducting RCAs are now more clearly understood.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Storage allocation framework for designing lean buffers in forward-reserve model: a test case	[ "Dynamic storage allocation", "Forward-reserve model", "Lean buffer design", "Lean warehousing", "Retail-distribution center" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: \"Lean\" is a systemic management approach applied in utmost industries along with manufacturing, which was initiated by Toyota. Initially its objective was to improve customer value, eliminate wastes and facilitate cost reduction (Womack et al., 1990). The warehousing has a function of \"buffering\" which aims to optimize storage and facilitate efficient material handling (Frazelle, 2002). Ackerman (2007) explored warehouse operations from lean perspective and highlighted that effective storage utilization and efficient material handling lead toward lean warehousing. It is considered as non-value added (NVA) activity to the supply chain (Tompkins et al., 2003) and cannot be eliminated completely; however, it can be reduce in some special situations such as lean manufacturing, virtual inventory and cross-docking (De Koster et al., 2007). After successful adoption of lean manufacturing, now practitioners are thinking about lean practices to improve distribution services, where massive warehouse inventories are piled up as wastes (Manzini, 2012). Furthermore, unwanted waiting and movement of workers (Ackerman, 2007), excessive material or handling devices (Kilic and Durmusoglu, 2013), employee underutilization (Vinodh and Kumar, 2012) and honeycombing due to improper storage are considered as NVAs and need reduction (Bartholdi and Hackman, 2014). The lean warehousing practices are still at their nascent stage as scarce studies were found exploring their state of the art (Myerson, 2012).\n2. Literature review: The storage-level design decisions pertaining to sizing, dimensioning and assignment affect the performance of forward buffer. Sizing is defined as an ability to accommodate the received goods, and dimensioning is defined as to allocate or distribute space among SKUs. Studies found allocating practical number of storage locations is strategic decision, and we can only approximate it (Hung and Fisk, 1984). Many authors have carried out noteworthy research on storage allocations in forward-reserve storages of warehouse: Pliskin and Dori (1982), Azadivar (1989), Hackman and Rosenblatt (1990), Heragu et al. (2005), Sanei et al. (2011), Accorsi et al. (2012), Bonder and Lysgaard (2014). Gu (2005) addresses forward-reserve dimensioning problem in distribution warehouse using robust mathematical solution based on branch-and-bound (BNB) algorithm. The modeling and assessment of capacity requirements and efficient storage considering seasonal demand is required as future work. Bartholdi and Hackman (2014) identified the need of a study improving storage efficiency, as a dedicated policy in forward area is not storage efficient. Either a separate storage area in reserve storage with dedicated policy or faster buffer area, isolated from forward area, was suggested as an effective solution. Also, intelligent allocations can save labor time, which requires testing and validation (Van den berg et al., 1998). Recently, Pan et al. (2015) presented a genetic algorithm-based heuristics for pick-and-pass system to balance manual workload among pickers and recognized the need of a model exploiting relationship between storage assignment and layout design issues. Kota et al. (2015) show how storage efficiency and retrieval time can be improved using strategic storage system. Inefficient warehousing practices diminish response time and customer satisfaction, which need to be addressed.\n3. Methodology: This section demonstrates testing of simple knapsack model highlighting the need of lean management in storage allocation policies and validates results in LINGO. It also explains existing case and problem discussion followed by revised formulations incorporating issues found during testing.\n4. Proposed framework and heuristics: The proposed framework facilitates guidelines to design lean buffers and provides a self-adaptive dynamic storage allocation policy for reducing wastes. The objective of it is to design lean, i.e., \"just-right\" number of storage allocations through \"just-right\" sizing and restocking, ensuring no stock-outs, smooth material flow and least SW in forward buffer. Allied decisions affecting this goal of study are to identify initial number of storage locations for each SKU, compare performance of static vs dynamic allocation strategies and assess the impact of varying buffer size on system performance. Unique performance measures affecting leanness in forward buffer like storage efficiency and effectiveness, wastage and material flow are defined along with design framework. Heuristics is proposed for all storage allocations and dimensioning problems as they are identified as NP hard problems, for which optimal solution in reasonable polynomial time is not possible (Gajjar and Adil, 2011). Proposed heuristic has been tested with randomly generated data for average and worst demand variations with uniform and exponential distribution. The results are analyzed along with further possible developments.\n5. Findings: Many strategic decisions and its impacts are investigated in order to take decisions concerning lean buffer design. Different data sets are generated and tested for proposed algorithm answering the following questions: what should be the initial allocations (minimum, maximum or average) for SKU allocation in forward buffer? Which allocation policy (static or dynamic) performs better? What is the impact of varying buffer capacity on performance measures behavior for uniform and exponentially distributed data? What is the lean buffer level for a given scenario? The results and performance analysis along with distributions and buffer sizes are discussed below. The uniform and exponential distributed data are generated using the following functions available in LINGO.\n6. Conclusions and future scope: The presented model illustrates thinking of lean adoption in designing storage allocation strategy while reducing wasted space in the forward buffer. Proposed heuristics utilizes space through dynamically efficient and self-adaptive algorithm over planning horizon, which was identified as an obligatory research need (Bonder and Lysgaard, 2014), as space is costly and scares in the forward area. It also fulfills the need of isolated and efficient storage buffers in forward-reserve model (Bartholdi and Hackman, 2008). Along with pick frequency and movements, it also monitors pallets, delivered out of allocated and demanded, improving effective storage utilization and throughput, which was not addressed in earlier studies. It facilitates the design of lean buffer, which may be of great help to the researchers who would like to explore the emerging field of lean adoption in forward-reserve model. Efficient forward buffers help distributors deliver required products to retailers responsively. To retain customers, companies frequently offer promotional schemes, wherein offered package of products can be stored together in isolated designed forward buffers. Although this model is applied for single forward buffer, the same framework can be applicable to design such multiple forward buffers as well. All previous studies found emphasizing issues at strategic level only, whereas the presented model condenses the gap between retail marketing strategies and operational performance of warehouse together. Also, in the present model, major research studies were validated and implemented with empirical methods, while this paper presents framework designing strategic policies, and the model also helps testing its implications at the operational performance level.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The retail revolution swing from traditional distribution to e-tailing services and unprecedented increase in internet adoption insist practitioners to diversely plan warehousing strategies. More than practically required storage space has been identified as wastes, and also it does not improve performance. An organized framework integrating storage design policies, operational performance and customer value improvement for retail-distribution management is lacking. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to develop broad guidelines to design the \"just-right\" amount of forward area, i.e., \"lean buffer\" answering the following questions: \"What should be lean buffer size? How effective the forward area is? As per demand variations, which storage waste (SKU) should be allocated with how much storage space? What is the amount of storage waste (SW)? How smooth the material flow is in between reserve-forward area?\" for storage allocation in cosmetics distribution centers.\nDesign/methodology/approach: After forecasting static storage allocation between two planning horizons, if a particular SKU is less or non-moving, then it will cause SW, as the occupied location can be utilized by other competing SKUs, and also it impedes material flow for an instance. A dynamically efficient and self-adaptive, knapsack instance based heuristics is developed in order to make effective storage utilization.\nFindings: The existing state-of-the-art under study is supported with a distribution center case, and the study investigates the need of a model adopting lean management approach in storage allocation policies along with test results in LINGO. The sensitivity analysis describes the impact of varying demand and buffer size on performance. The results are compared with uniform and exponential distributed demands, and findings reveal that the proposed heuristics improves efficiency and reduce SWs in forward-reserve area.\nOriginality/value: The presented model demonstrates a novel thinking of lean adoption in designing storage allocation strategy and its performance measures while reducing wastes and improving customer value. Future research issues are highlighted, which may be of great help to the researchers who would like to explore the emerging field of lean adoption for sustainable retail and distribution operations.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Electroacoustic music: updating the library collection	[ "Academic libraries", "Collections management", "Music", "Public libraries" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Although there is still some contention among music theorists and composers about the subject, today the term electroacoustic music survives as a description of tools and processes used in its creation much like piano music or harp music and not a reference to the various composition idioms.\nOrganizations and societies for electroacoustic music: What follows is a list of societies and organizations around the world instrumental in promoting and championing electroacoustic music. They are invaluable resources to collection development librarians because of the wealth of information they offer. Most of them sponsor conferences and journals and include biographical and bibliographical information about their members who are some of the most prominent figures in the world of electroacoustic music. The list includes only the largest and more prestigious organizations as they have web sites with a large variety of useful resources for librarians, composers, music historians and students interested in electroacoustic music.Electronic Music Foundation (EMF)\nJournals, magazines and newsletters: The following list is composed of currently published journals and newsletters devoted to various aspects of electroacoustic music. Some deal with contemporary music in general, but include articles and resources for electroacoustic music. Most are available in both print and electronic formats, and some are available free of charge. The list is not comprehensive but includes the more commonly known periodicals suitable for academic library collections.Amazing Sounds\nCD/DVD vendors: Because of the recent trend toward self-publishing, electroacoustic music recordings have been increasingly difficult to locate. Established electroacoustic music composers with works on popular labels can sometimes be found through large commercial sites such as Amazon and Barnes & Noble. The following list includes smaller, specialized company web sites selling, in most cases, only electroacoustic music recordings.* www.electrocd.com* www.forcedexposure.com* www.ab-cd.com* www.frogpeak.org* www.cdemusic.org* www.sargasso.com* www.newalbion.com* www.digital-music-archives.com\nOnline streaming services: DRAM\nScore vendors: Although techniques and procedures used in electroacoustic music traditionally do not lend themselves to notation, interplays of textures and gestures rather than harmony, rhythm and pitch play a significant role in its creation. The scores and more importantly performance notes do exist for some of the music. The scores are more common for pieces which make use of sometimes modified traditional instruments in addition to their electronic counterparts.Just as there are few composers who limit themselves to composing solely in electroacoustic medium, there tends to be no publishers specializing in publication of this music. One of the ways to locate these materials is through large national presses. Ricordi in Italy for works of Luigi Nono and Samfundet in Denmark for works of Ejnar Kanding are great examples. Some composers such as Pamela J. Marshall and Larry Polansky choose to self publish them. In most cases the best approach is to start with the individual composers and locate their publishers.\nRecent books: There is an excellent bibliography of seminal works about electroacoustic music from 1950s to late 1990s in the Grove Dictionary. The following list is composed of significant works published in the past eight years suitable for academic library collections. Particular emphasis is placed on works dealing with electroacoustic music analysis, individual composers, sub genres, software and hardware, and historic overviews.Analysis and theory\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to present a variety of current resources associated with electroacoustic music suitable for updating academic and large public library collections.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The approach taken in the paper is to identify resources meant to provide guidance in locating appropriate resources and to identify specific resources regarding electroacoustic collections that are grouped in several categories for ease of reading.\nFindings: - The complexity of definition of electroacoustic music and its interdisciplinary nature has had a negative impact on availability of collection development guides for electroacoustic music. Furthermore, resource formats associated with this type of music are heavily dependent on technology and change with great frequency which makes them challenging to keep up with.\nOriginality/value: - The paper offers practical advice about updating electroacoustic music collections.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Authentic leadership and job satisfaction among long-term care nurses	[ "Authentic leadership", "Areas of worklife", "Emotional exhaustion", "Job satisfaction", "Long-term care nurses" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Improving the work environments of long-term care nurses is a valuable endeavour as it may allow for the provision of better resident care. For instance, nursing work climate has been found to be influential on nurses' affective commitment and, in turn, organizational outcomes (including measures of quality such as pressure ulcer rates) (Woznyj et al., 2019). Examining job satisfaction is important as higher job satisfaction has been associated with lower job turnover intentions among long-term care nurses (Kuo et al., 2014). Job turnover is negatively influential not only on the sustainability of the nursing workforce but also on the financial health of organizations (Duffield et al., 2014).\nTheoretical framework: The theoretical framework that underpinned this study is Avolio et al.'s (2004) authentic leadership theory which asserts that authentic leaders are able to influence the work attitudes (e.g. commitment and job satisfaction) and behaviours (e.g. job performance and extra effort) of their followers in a beneficial way. Moreover, authentic leaders aspire to foster authenticity among followers and establish more positive work climates (Gardner et al., 2005). The four main tenets of authentic leadership are:\nLiterature review: Authentic leadership\nMethods: Design and sample\nResults: Descriptive results\nDiscussion: Overall, results supported the hypothesized model linking authentic leadership to long-term care nurses' perceptions of person-job match in the AWLs, emotional exhaustion and job satisfaction. All hypothesized paths in the model were supported except for the relationship between authentic leadership and emotional exhaustion. Authentic leadership not only had a direct association with job satisfaction, but it also had an indirect relationship with job satisfaction through AWLs and emotional exhaustion. Results indicated that nurses who rated their managers highly on authentic leadership reported higher person-job match in the AWLs, lower emotional exhaustion and higher job satisfaction.\nConclusion: Study findings suggest support for the application of authentic leadership theory to nurses who work in long-term care settings as well as further validation of the theoretical and research links among authentic leadership, the six AWLs, emotional exhaustion and job satisfaction. When nurses work with managers who exhibit openness and honesty, fair and objective decision-making, self-awareness and strong ethics, they may experience increased overall person-job match in the six AWLs, lower emotional exhaustion and, subsequently, higher job satisfaction. Health-care organizations are encouraged to explore the development of leadership programs that focus on the authentic leadership of managers and, thereby, facilitate positive working conditions that contribute to increased job satisfaction of nurses.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this study is to examine the effects of managers' authentic leadership, person-job match in the six areas of worklife (AWLs) and emotional exhaustion on long-term care registered nurses' job satisfaction.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A secondary analysis of baseline data from a national survey of 1,410 Canadian registered nurses from various work settings was used in this study, which yielded a subsample of 78 nurses working in direct care roles in long-term care settings. Hayes' PROCESS macro for mediation analysis in SPSS was used to test the hypothesized model.\nFindings: Findings showed that authentic leadership significantly predicted job satisfaction directly and indirectly through AWLs and emotional exhaustion.\nPractical implications: Authentic leadership may provide guidance to long-term care managers about promoting nurses' job satisfaction, which is essential to recruiting and retaining nurses to meet the care needs of an aging population.\nOriginality/value: As demand for care of the aged is increasing and creating challenges to ensuring a sufficient and sustainable nursing workforce, it is important to understand factors that promote long-term care nurses' job satisfaction. Findings contribute to knowledge of long-term care nurses by suggesting that managers' authentic leadership can positively affect nurses' job satisfaction directly and indirectly through positive perceptions of AWLs and lower emotional exhaustion.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Dynamic supplier selection through optimal ranking under two-echelon system	[ "AHP and TOPSIS", "Dynamic supplier selection", "Mixed-integer linear programming", "Taguchi method of parameter design", "Two-echelon system" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Nomenclature\n1. Introduction: Suppliers are considered to be important stakeholders of any supply chain (SC) network, as they play a significant role in managing operational costs, its profitability, quality of finished products, competitiveness, and level of satisfaction of the customers (Ayhan and Kilic, 2015). Thus, selection and evaluation of potential suppliers forms an important decision-making area for any original equipment manufacturer (OEM). A two-echelon system (TES) is a supplying network for an OEM within which a sequential improvement of product is carried out through coordination mechanism of two distinct levels or echelons of suppliers. Practically, various examples that support TES in the manufacturing sector, such as an automotive company, receive gearboxes from a manufacturer, which, in turn, receive raw items such as bearings and material for gears, pinions, input and output shaft from the recognized suppliers. Another example is related to a refrigeration company that has first-tier manufacturers of compressors and condensers, which, in turn, have another tier of suppliers of raw items such as tubes, fins, materials, etc. In real case, an OEM often faces difficulties when it comes into the market individually due to limitations in the availability of good quality raw items, skilled operators, costly engineering design, and high value machineries (Ahmad and Mondal, 2016). In these situations, TES can be adopted so that OEM can gain a competitive edge among others from the predecessor group of suppliers and manufacturers who have been sustaining into the market since a long time. It provides edge to the OEM as OEM receives components from reputed set of manufacturers at a reasonable cost; those group of suppliers and manufacturers find OEM as the regular customer; and OEM regulates the entire chain as integrated way to maintain the desired parameters level such as quality level, cost, lead time, etc.\n2. Literature review: In order to deal with the SS problem for its practical applicability and contribution within the SC area, numerous mathematical models have been presented. However, the models and their implications for SS have been solving lots of problems through distinct frames, as revealed by the review papers of Ho et al. (2010), Ware et al. (2012), Chai et al. (2013), and Wetzstein et al. (2016). Moreover, various papers have been proposed on SS under multi-product and multi-source in the past, but a very few papers adopted multi-echelon and dynamicity in the SS problem simultaneously. All the contributed studies put the differences mainly in the context of area of applications, adopted methodologies, situation-specific criteria, and distinct approaches toward the problem. Hence, the literature on the SS model is briefly overviewed, and it is shown in Table I.\n3. Problem description: A company (or OEM) manufactures the product for customer, and demand of the product depends upon their branding and reputation. This arises from the expertness and competencies of the skilled workers, quality of raw material, availability of the good machinery, and their effective co-ordination with potential suppliers. Moreover, it is almost difficult for OEM to find by its own the skilled manpower, costly engineering design, and quality of raw material at appropriate cost. Besides, it is probably problematic for the OEM to cross the manufacturers or suppliers who have been sustaining in the market since a long time. For overcoming these difficulties, an OEM adopts TES in which the manufacturers (at first tier) receive different types of raw components from the suppliers (at second tier) for conversion into semi-finished product through machining and fabrication process of assembly at first-tier manufacturers, and then they are supplied to OEM (as shown in Figure 1). In this problem, manufacturers at the first tier receive the multiple types of raw items/parts and further, they are delivered to OEM as semi-finished products. At each echelon of OEM, a set of suppliers is to be considered for supplying the parts or components through integrated monitoring of OEM in order to get the product as per demand. Finally, an assessment is required for deciding the effective set of suppliers at each echelon of TES for maintaining the continuous supply of material and semi-finished products to the OEM.\n4. Methodology proposed: An OEM needs to cluster the suppliers and manufacturers from the market, for which a set of suppliers and manufacturers at each echelon is assessed through an integrated methodology of AHP and TOPSIS. This study mainly works in two stages. In the first stage, the relative closeness (RC) values of suppliers of each echelon for each type of item are obtained through AHP and TOPSIS method. In the second stage, these RC values are used as inputs in the MILP model to determine the quantities to be allocated. The following steps are adopted for the proposed study.\n5. Application to the proposed methodology: The proposed methodology can be implemented in the manufacturing sector that produces end product through adopted supplying network like TES. In this paper, a case is considered that supports a real-world application under TES. Practically, a chain conveyor company such as OEM is described for the application point of view; it is associated with a set of manufacturers and suppliers at first- and second-tier, respectively, in order to make the requisite product. The chain conveyor company (OEM) needs the gearbox from first-tier manufacturers, which, in turn, require main raw items for assembly such as gears, splined shafts, and bearings from second-tier suppliers.\n6. Result and discussion: The criteria having less contributions are pooled into error in order to test the significant level. As can be seen from Table XII, the criteria other than C22 at the second tier and C11 and C21 at the first tier are pooled into error due to lesser contribution into the outcome. As per the limiting value to the criteria such as (F0)0.05,2,6=5.14 for the second tier and (F0)0.05,2,4=6.94 for the first tier, C22, C31, and C41 are significant, which provides much impact on the outcome, leading to more robustness in the ranking. Besides, S/N response graph (Figure 4) suggests an optimal level and its variability of criteria at each echelon of OEM. With Figure 4, optimal level of each criterion is obtained by selecting higher position as compared to three levels as shown in Table XV. In this analysis, OEM finds critical criteria and also their optimal weights. This analysis also suggests both tiers of suppliers to improve the criteria's weight toward optimality so that they could be entered into the TES. The case presented above has some managerial analysis, which will be presented hereafter.\n7. Practical implications of proposed study: This adaptive proposed model deals with the real-world problem of SS. As managers often wish to know the critical criteria and their optimal weights in each timeframe so that they could identify the robustness in TES. It provides the usefulness for not only the case company or OEM but also for the suppliers and manufacturers involved. This study suggests to include the number of potential suppliers and manufacturers at each echelon through proposed methodology in order to obtain the solution in a very short running time. Practically, it is valuable to measure the strength and weakness of the suppliers and manufacturers involved under positive and negative-ideal approach with the comparison of initial and optimal level, which suggests the performing and non-performing suppliers at each echelon of OEM. Practitioner always wishes to tackle the demand fluctuation in the proposed TES. If in the current periods, more demands come at the OEM, then managers may include the other potential suppliers from the obtained optimal rank to mitigate the excess demand. Hence, the number of suppliers can be included at each echelon to tackle the demand fluctuation of the market. This critical analysis of the criteria even suggests the OEM to provide the more economical objective value (total cost of procurement) under TES in order to gain the competitive advantages over others' work in the market.\n8. Conclusion: In this study, a DSSPis evaluated in the context of TES within which multiple raw items are manufactured through machining process into single semi-finished products in the defined multi-periods scenario. An integrated methodology of AHP and TOPSIS is implemented to shortlist the group of suppliers and manufacturers at each echelon of OEM, and subsequently, a mathematical model based on MILP is proposed to provide the optimal allocation at the first tier as well as the second tier of OEM simultaneously. To check the robustness of the TES and criticality in the criteria involved, SA has been performed on the basis of TMPD. By this approach, most critical criteria and their percentage contribution into the objective of the model are obtained from ANOVA table and response graph. This analysis suggests the significant level of involved criteria and optimal ranking of suppliers and manufacturers in order to achieve the robustness or robust group of suppliers and manufacturers at each echelon of OEM. This model is solved through optimization software of LINGO17.0 with realistic data for the chain conveyor company.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: With the increasing competition among the industries, they remain under pressure as how to select the best set of suppliers for the competitive edge. Often, it has been challenging to develop an effective set of suppliers due to varied and asymmetric mode of criteria. The purpose of this paper is to develop a responsive chain under original equipment manufacturer (OEM).\nDesign/methodology/approach: This study proposes a responsive chain under a two-echelon system (TES) of OEM, which needs to collaborate with a set of suppliers at each echelon through an integrated methodology of AHP and TOPSIS. According to the OEM's criteria, demands and suppliers' capacity vary with time, therefore they are not static for a longer period. Hence, supplier selection (SS) problem possesses dynamicity in real practice. For this, MILP is used for finding optimal order quantities based on the optimal ranking at each echelon in the multi-period scenario. Subsequently, sensitivity analysis (SA) is conducted through Taguchi method of parameter design (TMPD) to achieve an optimal ranking in the TES.\nFindings: This study suggests optimal criteria's weight, percentage contribution, and flexibility for the suppliers and manufacturers involving through maximum demand strategy at each echelon of OEM. It also provides robust group of suppliers and manufacturers in the TES through optimal ranking and simultaneously in the order allocations. Furthermore, it restricts the number of suppliers and manufactures at each echelon through proposed methodology to obtain the solution in a very short running time.\nOriginality/value: To validate this model, a real data set for the case of chain conveyor company is used. This adopted methodology can suggest the organization that how the approach should be implemented.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Shaping service ecosystems: exploring the dark side of agency	[ "Opportunism", "Service ecosystem", "Conflict", "Ambiguity", "Dark side" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: A definition of a service ecosystem as a \"relatively self-contained, self-adjusting system of resource-integrating actors connected by shared institutional arrangements and mutual value creation through service exchange\" (Vargo and Lusch, 2016, pp. 10-11) puts the focus on actors and networks, whose actions bring about systemic and synergistic, rather than linear, effects (Lusch et al., 2010). As a foundational resource, actors have agency and can act liberally and purposefully by performing \"multiple roles, such as facilitators, modifiers, or disruptors in the service ecosystem as part of their value co-creation efforts\" (Tronvoll, 2017, p. 10). Understanding the actor, thus, is crucial to clarifying service ecosystems dynamics and their shaping (Kleinaltenkamp et al., 2012; Tronvoll, 2017). In particular, actors integrate resources and co-create value according to their perceptions and interactions with other actors, operating at the cross-roads of various societal and individual ambits that affect the actor, but also are affected by that actor through a recursive, reciprocal structuration process (Giddens, 1984).\nResearch process: The research process for this study is based on abductive reasoning (Tavory and Timmermans, 2014), which is a nonlinear, non-sequential, iterative process of systematic and constant movement between literature and empirical data, through which literature-based results can be reoriented, as directed by the empirical findings (Dubois and Gadde, 2002; Nenonen et al., 2017). Abduction is a suitable approach to lay a foundation for further inquiry, beginning with an unmet expectation (e.g. lack of investigation of agency's dark-side facets that might hinder A2A relationships and resource integration in shaping the service ecosystem), then inferring a plausible explanation (Nenonen et al., 2017; van Maanen et al., 2007). The choice to use abduction reflects two main research motives. First, though several articles discuss dark sides, no coherent theory of the dark side of social phenomena exists, nor does extant service ecosystem literature address the dark side of actors' deliberate attempts to influence service ecosystems. Second, the abductive inquiry is particularly effects for case studies in business network research (Dubois and Gadde, 2002; Easton, 2010), and service ecosystems have a strong network character (Vargo and Lusch, 2011).\nThe role of agency in S-D Logic: This review aims to develop a better understanding of the role of agency according to the S-D logic. Agency builds on central S-D logic concepts: A2A relationships, service ecosystems, resource integration and institutional arrangements.\nExploring the dark side: Extant dark-side research emphasises the detrimental implications of an action or occurrence (Abosag et al., 2016; Numerato and Baglioni, 2012; Perlman and Carcedo, 2010; Vaughan, 1999; Victor and Stephens, 1994). The various behaviours, conditions or occurrences that are experienced as difficult or problematic (Tahtinen and Halinen, 2002) can include mistakes, misconduct (Andreoli and Lefkowitz, 2009; MacLean and Behnam, 2010) or actions that violate formal rules and laws (Vaughan, 1999). Another focus is on negative outcomes (Vaughan, 1999) that result from deliberate action (Molinsky and Margolis, 2005; Numerato and Baglioni, 2012), an unintended consequence of a practice (Victor and Stephens, 1994) or a secondary outcome that diverges from an original objective (Vaughan, 1999). Several studies also analyse negative elements that can affect a business interaction, such as, opportunism (Nunlee, 2005; Wathne and Heide, 2000, Williamson, 1975), conflict (Duarte and Davies, 2003; Mele, 2011), ambiguity (Chowdhury et al., 2016), imbalanced power conditions (Ritter et al., 2004), asymmetry (Caniels and Gelderman, 2007) or institutionalized creativity (Halinen, 1997).\nEmpirical findings and discussion: This section illustrates the empirical findings related to how the three facets of agency adversely affect A2A relationships and resource integration in efforts to shape a service ecosystem. In line with the abductive approach, this section refers to the literature that informed the analysis. Furthermore, this section exemplifies the use of a service ecosystems approach (Akaka et al., 2013; Vargo and Akaka, 2012) to analyse various aspects of A2A interactions and resource integration. From this perspective, actors and their agency act as part of a service ecosystem, governed by distinct institutional logics (Vargo and Lusch, 2016). The findings are summarised in Table II.\nConclusions: This research addresses the dark side of agency related to value co-creation in service ecosystems by studying how ambiguity, conflict and opportunism adversely affect A2A relationships and resource integration among actors who seek to shape a service ecosystem. The service-for-service exchange takes place not solely in contexts of mutual value creation; actors also behave differently in shaping service ecosystems. This study is relevant for the further development of the S-D logic, particularly for increasing understanding of service ecosystem dynamics. It reveals the difference between actors' experiences and system-level implications, such that actors' a priori position and their reach or scope, are relevant for shaping service ecosystems.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The extant service ecosystem literature rarely addresses the dark side of actors' agency, which hinders further development of the service-dominant (S-D) logic, particularly with regard to understanding service ecosystem dynamics. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to delineate the dark-side facets of actors' agency that adversely affect actor-to-actor relationships and resource integration, in the context of shaping service ecosystems.\nDesign/methodology/approach: With abductive reasoning, this study seeks to reorient results from prior literature in accordance with empirical findings. The empirical data pertain to 21 firms in Finland, New Zealand, Singapore and Sweden, representing various industries, sizes, international reach, technologies, ownership forms and histories.\nFindings: The dark side of agency emerges as an actor's deliberate attempts to influence a service ecosystem to achieve self-interested benefits, despite understanding that these actions inhibit other actors from providing service and can be detrimental to other actors and the ecosystem. The findings also reveal three facets of the dark side: conflict, ambiguity and opportunism. The process of shaping service ecosystems is prone to systematic conflict, ambiguous and opportunistic behaviours occurring between the focal actors' ecosystem and other ecosystems vying for the same set of resources.\nResearch limitations/implications: This study advances the S-D logic by addressing the crucial role of agency in a dialectical relationship with institutions and structures. Service-for-service exchanges can take place in asymmetric, ambiguous, opportunistic situations driven by self-interested motives.\nPractical implications: Processes aimed at shaping service ecosystems can demonstrate the dark sides of actors' agency, related to conflict, ambiguity or opportunism. Managers interested in shaping strategies should be prepared for this outcome.\nSocial implications: A service ecosystem perspective requires policy makers and regulators to reconsider their role in shaping processes. No \"invisible hand\" guides markets to equilibrium, so they should be more proactive in shaping ecosystems, rather than merely fixing market failures.\nOriginality/value: This research offers the first S-D logic-based investigation into the dark side of actors' agency in shaping service ecosystems.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
How do firms tackle strategic change? A theoretical model of the choice between dynamic capability-based and ad hoc problem-solving approaches	[ "Dynamic capability", "Strategic change", "Dynamic environments", "Environmental dynamism", "Ad hoc problem solving", "Organizational attributes" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The study of how firms handle strategic change - the change in decisions about products and markets in response to dramatic environmental shifts (Boeker, 1997) - has been an important subject of interest (Li and Liu, 2014). The conventional wisdom is that, in a rapidly changing environment, the development of capabilities for strategic change can create value and lead to competitive advantage (Eisenhardt and Martin, 2000; Helfat et al., 2007; Kelly and Amburgey, 1991). The most important theoretical advancement in this regard has been the development of a dynamic capability approach toward strategy (Teece, 2007). However, some research has questioned whether dynamic capabilities are necessary for strategic change (Arend and Bromiley, 2009; Chakrabarti, 2015; D'Aveni et al., 2010; Helfat and Peteraf, 2003). In particular, Winter (2003) distinguishes between two different ways to handle strategic change - ad hoc problem solving and the exercise of dynamic capabilities - and argues that firms can accomplish change without relying on dynamic capabilities. Under certain circumstances, taking an ad hoc problem-solving approach toward change could be a more efficient option, as it involves nonrepetitive behavior and its costs largely disappear if there is no similar problem to solve in the future (Winter, 2003). Winter, however, did not identify the circumstances under which firms should choose either an ad hoc problem-solving approach or a dynamic capability-based approach other than pointing out that a cost-benefit analysis of these approaches requires an understanding of how idiosyncratic attributes of individual firms affect such a choice in a particular competitive context (Winter, 2003).\n2. Literature review: 2.1 Research on strategic change\n3. How do firms tackle strategic change in highly dynamic and low-dynamic environments?: Dynamism of environmental forces has different classifications in the management literature (Dess and Beard, 1984; Mintzberg, 1983; Tan and Litschert, 1994; Girod and Whittington, 2017). We use the classification developed by Bourgeois and Eisenhardt (1988), who focus on the two dimensions of unpredictability and velocity, where the term unpredictability means uncertainty and the term velocity concerns the rate or pace of change in a firm's environment. The classification is most relevant to the present study because a number of important past studies related to dynamic capabilities and organizational change use these two dimensions to distinguish between highly dynamic, moderately dynamic, and stable environments (D'aveni et al., 2010; Eisenhardt and Martin, 2000; Schilke, 2014). However, their focus was on examining the contingent value of dynamic capabilities for competitive advantage in different environments. Our purpose is to investigate how environments with varying degree of dynamism might serve the antecedents to the organizational choice between dynamic capabilities and ad hoc problem solving for handling change.\n4. How do firms tackle strategic change in moderately dynamic environments?: 4.1 Handling strategic change in a moderately dynamic environment\n5. Contributions and future research: 5.1 Contributions to research and practice\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to provide a theoretical account of how firms make choices between dynamic capability-based and ad hoc problem-solving approaches toward strategic change.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A model has been developed to answer the questions of how and under what conditions firms develop appropriate approaches to handle strategic change.\nFindings: Drawing upon structural inertia theory (SIT) and the resource-based view (RBV), the model predicts that firms, regardless of their age and size, are more likely to adopt an ad hoc problem-solving approach to handle change in both highly dynamic and low-dynamic environments. However, in moderately dynamic environments, a dynamic capability-based approach may be more appropriate, depending on which theoretical logic (SIT or RBV) the decision is made.\nOriginality/value: The paper builds on the useful distinction made by Winter (2003) in terms of the ways to handle organizational change and extends the recent research on temporary vs sustainable competitive advantages to investigate how firms tackle strategic change within the contexts of both environmental dynamism and organizational attributes.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Follow my leader? Understanding followers' impact on leaders	[ "Transformational leadership", "Followership", "Conflict behaviors" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nReview: Given that the study of management can trace its modern roots all the way back to the establishment of the first business school by Henry Wharton in Pennsylvania in 1881, there are some aspects of it that can frustrate and concern professionals in equal measure. One example of this that will be common to anyone who has spent time in the classroom is around leadership, and how much time and effort is taken up by case studies, psychological profiles, and theory about people who are in the minority in most businesses. What about the people who actually do the jobs that earn the revenues?\nFollowing the followers: It is therefore gratifying to see some serious research being undertaken by academics directed toward followers and the wider impact on their own behaviors. In their article \"The impact of followers' conflict behaviors on teams' transformational leadership, team member exchange and membership (2017)\", authors Aw and Ayoko (2017) look at how the behaviors of leaders themselves are a result of how followers go about their business, with specific reference to managing conflicts.\nPersonal conflict, team conflict: To judge these activities, conflict and how it is managed is the prism through which things are viewed. This conflict can be expressed in a number of different ways, which are important to track when it comes to assessing followers and leaders. Interpersonal conflict generally happens when two or more people realize that others' and their own aspirations cannot be satisfied simultaneously, and it is of course prevalent in the workplace. To boil it down, the authors look at how people respond to such conflict through the following behaviors:\nProblems, problems: First, when the study in Singapore was completed, what the two authors found was that in terms of problem-solving, while followers who exhibited problem-solving behaviors had a positive impact on TL, there was no such link with TMX or engagement. This is thus seen to support the argument that some make that leaders tend to adapt and change their style of leadership depending on the characteristics of their followers in their teams. The reason there was no link for confrontational behaviors may be down to Singaporean culture and a desire to save face, while no-confrontational behavior may be similarly explained by a desire to tackle issues in a cohesive unit, where individuals are not exposed.\nComment: The article \"The impact of followers' conflict behaviors on teams' transformational leadership, team member exchange and membership\" by Aw and Ayoko (2017) is a very welcome contribution to the debate on leadership, in that it does not focus on leadership at all but on the effect on leadership that followers' behavior has.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: This paper aims to review the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoint practical implications from cutting-edge research and case studies.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This briefing is prepared by an independent writer who adds their own impartial comments and places the articles in context.\nFindings: Given that the study of management can trace its modern roots all the way back to the establishment of the first business school by Henry Wharton in Pennsylvania in 1881, there are some aspects of it that can frustrate and concern professionals in equal measure. One example of this that will be common to anyone who has spent time in the classroom is around leadership, and how much time and effort is taken up by case studies, psychological profiles, and theory about people who are in the minority in most businesses. What about the people who actually do the jobs that earn the revenues?\nPractical implications: The paper provides strategic insights and practical thinking that have influenced some of the world's leading organizations.\nOriginality/value: The briefing saves busy executives and researchers hours of reading time by selecting only the very best, most pertinent information and presenting it in a condensed and easy-to-digest format.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Towards a disaster risk assessment methodology for communities underlain by dolomite	[ "Risk reduction", "Vulnerability", "Urban planning", "Disaster risk", "Dolomite", "Risk assessment methodology" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: South Africa's urban landscape has been shaped by decades of improper urban planning. The legacy of skewed urban development left by apartheid era policies and subsequent rapid post-1994 urbanisation have meant that large parts of South Africa's most vulnerable populations find themselves living in marginal areas that are exposed to hazards such as floods, fires and also areas underlaid by dolomite, with the subsequent threat of sinkhole forming (Parnell, 1997, p. 896; Williams, 2000, p. 168; Mabin and Smith, 1997, p. 193; Pharoah, 2009, p. 105). Whilst concrete strategies exist to assess the possible risk of flooding and fires, no clear methods yet exist to assess the risk of sinkhole formation that could affect communities. In the absences of such a methodology many of South Africa's most vulnerable populations run the risk of losing their lives, property and livelihoods due to the formation of sinkholes. Therefore, there is an urgent need for a method to evaluate the risk of sinkhole formation within marginalised and developed areas.\nVulnerability context in South African cities: People's vulnerability is determined by a complex array of physical issues, socio-economic factors such as class, ethnicity, community structure, community decision-making processes and political aspects (Yodmani, 2001, p. 4; White et al., 2004, pp. 11-15). Vulnerability can be defined as the characteristics of a person or group and their situation that influence their capacity to anticipate, prevent, cope with, resist and recover from the impact of a natural hazard event (Wisner et al., 2004, p. 11). Several physical and socio-economic factors can be identified in South African urban areas that contribute to the overall vulnerability of communities, especially those situated in areas with underlying dolomite rock formations. The following sections will focus on two crucial drivers of urban vulnerability, which are the legacy of apartheid, and mostly uncheck post-apartheid urbanisation.\nScope of dolomite in urban South Africa: A study undertaken in 2003 by the National Department of Public Works, identifies 47 municipalities (out of a total of 279) in South Africa which were completely or partially situated on dolomite rock formations (South African Department of Public Works, 2003, pp. 163-167). These dolomite formations have been found to be present in almost all types of urban settings, be it in large metropolitan cities like Pretoria or Johannesburg, or smaller municipalities such as Tlokwe (Potchefstroom) and Merafong (Carletonville) Local Municipalities. Buttrick and Van Schalkwyk (1998, pp. 170-178) specifically highlight that as much as 20 per cent of the densely populated Pretoria-Witwatersrand-Vereeniging area of the Gauteng Province is underlain by dolomite and most of the gold mining areas in the far West Rand (i.e. Merafong Local Municipality) and North-West Province (Tlokwe Local Municipality) are also on dolomite land (De Bruyn et al., 2000, pp. 2-3; Buttrick et al., 2001, p. 27) (see Figure 1). These areas are home to the majority of South Africa's residential, commercial and industrial developments (and also the heartbeat of most African economic activities), some of which have been affected by the formation of sinkholes (Buttrick et al., 2001, p. 27).\nMethodology development: Requirements of the methodology was that is must be scientifically sound, yet uncomplicated. A scoping study on municipal disaster management capacity conducted by Botha et al. (2010, p. 41) found that there is a severe lack of general disaster risk management skills and competencies in municipalities in South Africa. This lack of skills becomes even more chronic when it comes to more specialised skills such as geological surveys and the understanding of geological processes (Botha et al., 2010, p. 41). Thus the reason for the development of this basic methodology was to provide disaster risk management officials at local government level with an understandable tool which can be used to incorporate a sinkhole risk assessment into the disaster risk management and integrated development plans of municipalities underlain by dolomite. The methodology had to include variables which is fairly easily obtainable within all municipalities and be uncomplicated in its implementation.\nSinkhole risk assessment: To conduct an effective disaster risk assessment of sinkhole hazards in urban areas, a basic understanding of the inherent risk classification of dolomite rock formations is needed. These formations are classified on a risk scale of 1-8. The formation categorised in risk category 1 are considered low risk whilst those categorised as category 8 are considered extremely high-risk (Kirsten et al., 2009, p. 27; Buttrick et al., 2001; Trolip, 2006, pp. 32-33).\nPrioritisation: According to the National Disaster Management Framework (2005, p. 40), not all risk can be addressed at the same time due to limited budgets and resources. Considering these deficiencies, it is thus necessary to prioritise disaster risks in an area to ensure that adequate budgets and resources are allocated to address priority risk in a timely fashion. In the case of sinkhole disaster risks, prioritisation should be conducted by adding the hazard and vulnerability scores (as discussed above) of a specific area with underlying dolomite together (see Table III). If these scores are between the range of 5 and 6, the area should be considered a high priority area for intervention through risk reduction initiatives. When an area has a risk score of 3 to 4, that area should be considered a medium priority area and when the score is between 1 and 2 the area should be considered as a low priority intervention area.\nConclusion: The paper aimed to bridge the lack of a clear, robust sinkhole risk assessment methodology by combining existing knowledge on inherent dolomite risk classes with disaster risk management theory and legislation. The result was a method whereby hazard component (dolomite risk classes) could be aligned to issues of physical vulnerability (in this case ageing water infrastructure). Subsequent to the development of the methodology, an opportunity arose to test the validity of the method as a tool for sinkhole risk assessment in urban areas. Through the application of the method in a real life scenario it was established that it provided not only an accurate but simple method to assess the sinkhole disaster risk in municipal areas. The results from the sinkhole risk assessment has already proved to be robust and useful, and the municipality involved has already taken step to integrate the results into their urban planning and integrated development planning process.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of the paper is to provide a robust and simple methodology for disaster risk management officials to assess the total disaster risk posed by dolomite in urban areas of South Africa.\nDesign/methodology/approach: In order to develop the methodology the basic principles of disaster risk assessment, incapsulated in the notation R=HxV, was applied to provide a vehicle to quantify hazard and vulnerability aspects related to dolomite risk. Specifically existing knowledge on inherent dolomite risk classes (hazard component) was aligned to issues of vulnerability (in this case ageing water infrastructure) to attain a total dolomite disaster risk score for a specific area.\nFindings: The results from the practical application of the method indicated that the proposed dolomite risk assessment methodology is not only robust but easy to comprehend and to apply. The simplicity of the method also allows for easy integration into existing urban planning and integrated development planning process.\nOriginality/value: The creation of the method not only provides a much-needed tool for assessing the total disaster risk posed by dolomite in urban areas but also adds value to the entire urban and community development process.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
What drives users' intentions to purchase a GPS Navigation app: The moderating role of perceived availability of free substitutes	[ "Global positioning system (GPS) navigation app", "Innovation diffusion theory (IDT)", "Mobile applications (apps)", "Perceived availability of free substitutes (PAFS)", "Value-based adoption model (VAM)" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The mobile industry has quickly matured and user demand for mobile services continues to grow strongly. A report released by comScore (2015) shows that the number of global mobile users surpassed desktop users in 2014. It is estimated that in 2017, worldwide mobile application revenue will grow to $82.2 billion, and by 2021 it is anticipated to be more than $139.1 billion (App Annie, 2017). According to Yahoo's Flurry Analytics report (2015b), approximately 90 percent of consumers' online time was spent using mobile applications with the remainder split between calling, e-mailing, and texting (Gupta, 2013; Flurry Analytics, 2015b). Mobile applications (hereafter referred to as apps) are software programs designed to run on smartphones, tablet computers, and other mobile devices. A huge surge in user demand and the widespread availability of developer tools (Hsu and Lin, 2015) has led to the rapid development of apps that cover a wide variety of product and service categories, such as hedonic apps (games, music, media, and entertainment) and utilitarian apps (personalization, news, magazines, utilities, productivity, navigation). With the number of app downloads expected to grow in the future, app marketplaces (e.g. Google Play, Apple App Store, and Windows Phone Store) must meet consumer demand for the number, quality, range, and types of apps available. For instance, in 2015, utilitarian app usage grew 50 percent year-on-year (Flurry Analytics, 2015a), which reflects utilitarian apps' ability to engage and satisfy consumers better than hedonic apps (Gupta, 2013).\n2. Theoretical foundations: 2.1 Mobile applications\n3. Hypotheses development and research model: The research model, shown in Figure 1, predicts how consumers' perceptions of benefits (i.e. compatibility, relative advantage, and perceived enjoyment) and sacrifices (i.e. complexity and perceived cost) influence their value perceptions and purchase intentions. In addition, it identifies the moderating effect of PAFS on the relationship between perceived value and purchase intentions. The following sections develop the theoretical backing of the proposed hypotheses.\n4. Methods: 4.1 Measures of the constructs\n5. Results: Data were analyzed using partial least squares (PLS), which has several advantages over regression and covariance-based structural equation modeling (CBSEM). First of all, PLS is a powerful technique that is appropriate for complex research models that include direct variables (i.e. compatibility, relative advantage, perceived enjoyment, complexity, and perceived costs), an indirect variable (i.e. perceived value) and a moderating variable (i.e. PAFS). Further, PLS has an advantage over regression in that it can easily analyze the entire model as a unit, rather than dividing it into several pieces (Goodhue et al., 2012). In addition, the sample size of 219 was relatively small. For smaller sample sizes, CBSEM may not converge, while PLS has the smallest occurrence of false positives. Finally, since this research adopted IDT and VAM as conceptual constructs, PLS was highly suited to this initial exploratory study.\n6. Discussion: Understanding the key influences on consumers' decision making for purchases of mobile products or services is crucially important for mobile internet marketers. Unlike previous studies that focused on perceived usefulness/perceived quality or perceived ease of use/technicality as components of perceived benefits and sacrifices (Kim et al., 2007; Tseng and Lo, 2011; Wang et al., 2013; Seol et al., 2016; Yang et al., 2016), the current study considered a broader range of factors associated with IDT and VAM that influence consumers' purchase intentions. Moreover, this research examined the interaction effect between PAFS and perceived value, which may have a different impact on purchase intentions.\n7. Implications: 7.1 Theoretical implications\n8. Limitations and future research: While this study was conducted with methodological rigor, there are some limitations. First, the use of a nonrandom sample of volunteers in this study may have introduced sampling bias, which might limit the generalizability of the results because of the potential lack of representativeness with other populations and regions. To reduce sampling bias risk, future researchers should collect and use a randomized sample that includes other nationalities and geographical areas. Continued research is needed to generalize the findings of this study and extend the discussion to include additional user groups. Another limitation of this study is that the model does not incorporate all potential determinants of users' behavioral intention to purchase paid GPS navigation apps. Future research could enhance the explanatory power of the proposed model by integrating additional determinants, such as app store ratings and rankings, habit, and demographic characteristics (age, gender, educational level, and income).\n9. Conclusions: This research investigated the impact of compatibility, relative advantage, perceived enjoyment, complexity, perceived cost, perceived value, and PAFS on purchase intentions. The proposed model and empirical findings contribute a more thorough understanding of users' behavioral intentions to purchase a GPS navigation app. Specifically, this study makes three important contributions to the theoretical development of app purchase behaviors. First, the authors modified and extended VAM to explain users' behavioral intention to purchase a paid GPS navigation app. This has rarely been explored in the existing literature. Thus, this study points app purchase behavior research to a new direction. Second, findings are evidence that compatibility, relative advantage, perceived enjoyment, complexity, and perceived cost significantly influence purchase intentions through the mediation of perceived value. Importantly, perceived cost was found to be significantly and positively related to perceived value. Third, the empirical results indicate that PAFS weakens the positive relationship between perceived value and purchase intentions. This is a new finding that helps fill the knowledge gap related to the moderating effect of PAFS on purchase intention in previous research.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Grounded on the value-based adoption model and innovation diffusion theory, this study examined consumer purchase decisions of mobile Global Positioning System (GPS) navigation apps. In addition, this study also investigated the moderating role that perceived availability of free substitutes (PAFS) plays in the relationship between perceived value and purchase intention. The paper aims to discuss these issues.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Data collected from 219 mobile users were analyzed against the research model using the partial least squares approach.\nFindings: The results showed that compatibility, relative advantage, perceived enjoyment, perceived cost (positively), and complexity (negatively) influenced these users' value perceptions and purchase decisions. Furthermore, PAFS significantly weakened the positive relationship between perceived value and purchase intentions.\nPractical implications: Based on these findings, the authors provide practical suggestions for mobile app developers to increase mobile app sales. This study also helps advance knowledge of mobile internet marketing.\nOriginality/value: This study is a pioneering effort in explaining consumer purchase intentions in the context of mobile GPS navigation app.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
When location and content matter: effects of mobile messages on intention to redeem	[ "Location-based services", "Contextual marketing", "Intention to redeem coupons", "Mobile messages", "Mobile targeting" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Brick-and-mortar businesses need to come up with much more compelling reasons for consumers to get off the couch and actually show up to the store(eMarketer, 2014).\nLiterature review and hypotheses: Our theoretical background is based on contextual marketing theory (Kenny and Marshall, 2000), which states that a marketer's effort is always context dependent. When influencing the consumer's purchasing decision, new technologies enable marketers \"to reach customers whenever and wherever they are ready to buy\" (Kenny and Marshall, 2000, p. 119). Precisely planning the timing and location of these marketing messages can lead to a more efficient outcome (Luo et al., 2014). This is also referred to as geographical targeting, where the timing of the message is most relevant. But in contrast to contextual marketing theory, which states that context matters most (Kenny and Marshall, 2000), content is also seen as a relevant factor. It makes a difference if consumers get a promotional message with an additional cash discount or bonus points rather than text messages with purely promotional appeal. The main contribution of this study is demonstrating that successful mobile targeting depends on the content and location at which the message is received. This can be summarized into the following hypothesis:\nContext and overview of studies: Two studies were set up to test the hypotheses. The first was implemented with fictional scenarios to evaluate hypotheses without any special discount app experience. The second study was based on a real beacon bonus point app, enabling one to differentiate between different user experience types and to analyze the influence of retail sectors.\nDiscussion and conclusions: This research aimed to demonstrate that mobile targeting is influenced by the content of the mobile message and the customer's location upon receiving the message. When analyzing the effects of content and location of mobile messages in greater detail, one can answer RQ1. The first study showed that interaction effects between location and content exist for both the intention to redeem the mobile message and purchase intention. The second study, using a real app, could confirm most of these results and also explain some unexpected results in greater detail. What is surprising, however, is that in front of the shop, the discount coupons lead to a lower intention to redeem than they do at greater distances; customers of the first study did not want to redeem the coupon when they received it in front of the shop. While no relevant differences between the coupon types (points or percent discount) were revealed, there is indeed evidence of a difference between coupons and promotional texts. The second study discloses the need to differentiate among user groups of discount apps: current users, those who have experience with or know discount apps, and those who do not have any experience with them. Only those familiar with such an app but who refuse to use it seem to be attracted by promotional messages. In contrast to that, the current app's users show increased intention to redeem mobile messages when in proximity to the shop.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of mobile messages on intention to redeem a coupon or promotional offer, depending on location and content. Location (home, city, shop) and content (coupon, promotional message) were used as independent factors.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Participants in two online surveys (using 3x3 and 3x2 between-subjects factorial designs) received both simulated and real application smartphone messages and they got the location where the smartphone shopping message scenario is located. The surveys produced 528 responses for analysis in the first study and 146 answers for the second study.\nFindings: The results indicate that mobile messages can be highly effective for users of discount apps when the consumer is near the shop. However, the high perceived risk associated with such a message could deter potential customers from using mobile coupons.\nResearch limitations/implications: The main limitation of this study is that few consumers used the discount mobile applications examined. Future research should implement field experiments with real and potential users to investigate this low usage rate.\nPractical implications: Brick-and-mortar retailers can compete with digitization by using mobile messages, as users' intention to redeem is quite high. However, they should be aware of the privacy concerns preventing some customers from using these apps.\nOriginality/value: Current research highlights the importance of digitization in retailing by using new technologies for brick-and-mortars, e.g., mobile messages as part of mobile targeting. This study provides evidence of the potential risks and benefits of sending mobile messages to customers in a different context.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Succeeding with organizational change: A step-by-step approach	[ "Organizational change", "Empowerment", "Change management", "Vision" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nThe change challenge: Rapid developments in technology and the increase in global competition combine to ensure that the business environment is subject to frequent change. Organizations must evolve in order to succeed and grow. Those which fail to do so are effectively reserving their place among the also-rans.\nLaying the foundations: vision and communication: At the outset, it is important to create a strong belief that change is urgently needed. A strong case must be presented and can be achieved by:\nSuccess as a platform: Nothing breeds success more than success. Early gains can work wonders. This is especially true with change, where the focus is largely on the longer term. Even small successes are inspirational and prove that everything is progressing as intended. During this step of the change process, rewarding these initial successes furthers the positive impact on morale. In addition to this, the coalition is able to garner invaluable evidence of how the vision is performing in the real business world.\nComment: The review is based on: \"Back to the future: revisiting Kotter's 1996 change model\" by Appelbaum et al. (2012). In this piece, the authors re-evaluate the significance of a renowned framework for change. Each stage is detailed and comment offered on its relevance to today's business climate. Potential limitations of the model are also noted in what is an instructive article for practitioners.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: This paper aims to review the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoint practical implications from cutting-edge research and case studies.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This briefing is prepared by an independent writer who adds their own impartial comments and places the articles in context.\nFindings: Rapid developments in technology and the increase in global competition combine to ensure that the business environment is subject to frequent change. Organizations must evolve to succeed and grow. Those which fail to do so are effectively reserving their place among the also-rans. These tough challenges facing companies aren't going away in a hurry. Being equipped with the ability to adapt is therefore crucial. Indeed, effective performance in both the short and longer term depends on it. The failure rate of change initiatives remains staggeringly high. To say that change management needs to be taken seriously is therefore stating the obvious.\nPractical implications: The paper provides strategic insights and practical thinking that have influenced some of the world's leading organizations.\nOriginality/value: The briefing saves busy executives and researchers hours of reading time by selecting only the very best, most pertinent information and presenting it in a condensed and easy-to-digest format.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
A brief retrospective and introspective on value	[ "Value analysis", "Marketing", "Consumer behaviour" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: The marketing discipline has struggled to develop an accepted general theory and even more specific theories recounting relevant phenomena within marketing are relatively few. This comment is offered not as criticism, but as a simple recognition of the reality that marketing is a very young discipline. As such, scholars have and will disagree over precisely what is the core concept of marketing. Is it exchange, attitude, satisfaction, trust, quality, or another concept that, like these, often remains defined without consensus or clarity?\nHow has value been defined?: Definitions from literature\nValue in a service era: Theoretically\nA value framework: Consumers and producers co-create value. This means that consumers take advantage of value propositions or offerings from the marketer and use resources of their own device to varying degrees to produce worth. The firm, in return, can realize value captured from consumer resources received in return. Here, we examine a simple way of understanding value as a direct function of \"get\" and \"give\" components (Babin and Harris, 2009). While enumerating all the components is a practical impossibility, Figure 1 shows a basic framework for understanding the process.As service takes place, \"get\" and \"give\" components are exchanged. Typical \"get\" components of value include function, quality, and convenience. That is, how the offering performs in terms of accomplishing its purpose, the level of competence in doing so, and doing so in a way that is least taxing on the consumer, produces value. Additionally, emotions, including feelings of prestige, excitement, nostalgia, or others, along with perceptions of scarcity and the ability to realize social benefits, can all be \"get\" components that contribute to value. The \"give\" components are in a way investments in the co-creation process. Obviously, marketing activities involve financial resources and the consumer gives up financial resources, most often in the form of money in realizing value. With minimum involvement from the consumer, only money and perhaps a small amount of time and energy are invested in realizing value.However, consumers are often much more engaged in the value creation process. In these cases, significant investments of energy, know-how, and sometimes creativity are used to enhance basic offerings of marketers and make them more worthy. High levels of involvement mean that emotions are also invested into the process and at times, the consumer even puts his or her reputation on the line. \"Give\" aspects like these best illustrate the service-dominant logic view of co-creation.In fact, the firm's opportunity role in facilitating value is enhanced from the amount of engagement exhibited by a consumer (Gronroos, 2008). For instance, an unengaged consumer will expend little energy or effort in getting something out of the value proposition offered. The marketing firm carries the burden in value creation in this case, and the service process becomes relatively simple. Consumers fitting this profile realize value when they supply few types of resources in capturing value. A customer lacking knowledge is more prone to need the firm's operant resources to complete a task or enjoy an experience (Vargo and Lusch, 2004). The customer will expend a low amount of effort while the firm will capture resources from the customer as it provides resources to the customer.However, as the consumer becomes more engaged, the \"give\" and \"get\" components become even more blurred. The co-creation that takes place with an engaged consumer and an engaged service provider evidences the interactional nature of value (Vargo and Lusch, 2008a). Consider the example of an engaged consumer who chooses to customize his or her own automobile. He or she invests a large variety and a large amount of resources into the task. The engagement, or high involvement in the process, has potential to directly produce \"get\" components in the terms of favorable emotions and the pride of producing something from one's own work. These emotions feed into hedonic value in addition to utilitarian value realized as the consumer successfully accomplishes the task of fixing up the car. More engagement can lead to more value and possibly more risk for both the firm and the consumer. When a customer is very involved, does it alter the implications of a bad result? Could the potential negative value exaggerate any subsequent ill effects for the firm? These topics are interesting and deserve attention in future research.\nValue axioms: This note highlights some key theoretical and practical aspects of value with an emphasis on the enhanced role of value that is made clear by the recent emphasis on service. In closing, some key points about value are illustrated in an attempt to aid in understanding what value is and what it is not, as well as to clarify some ambiguity and better direct future research. Some of these points are simply explicitly or implicitly derived from service-dominant logic or from the theoretical nature of value. Some may be provocative, but hopefully all are thought provoking:* Value is a subjective assessment of the worth of some service taking into account all one gets and all one gives (Babin et al., 1994; Vargo and Lusch, 2008a). Value is derived by the activities that comprise service.* Value results as an interaction of the firm and consumer and is derived by both the firm and the consumer (Babin and Harris, 2009; Vargo and Lusch, 2008b).* Value also has implications for society at large. As exchanges produce more value, ultimately societies are better off than if the exchanges had not taken place (Gronroos, 2008). The consumers' lives are enriched and firms use the resources exchanged to grow, leading to job creation and an increased standard of living within that society.* As a result of the above, value is not a zero-sum game. In other words, value can be obtained from all parties involved in a service exchange. The fact that a consumer receives high value is in no way an indication that the firm is receiving proportionately less value.* Value occurs only after the purchase. The evaluation of worth can only occur after the fact. Research that operationalizes value in studying an impending purchase decision is more accurately focusing on value expectations or the anticipation of value.* Value can be negative (Gronroos, 2008). When the service does not at least restore homeostasis, the value received can be negative. The \"give\" has exceeded the \"get\" components.* Utilitarian value and hedonic value are not mutually exclusive. These dimensions are not opposites, and while a firm can provide expertise in providing consumers with \"get\" components that lead to one or another, utilitarian value does not exclude hedonic value and vice versa. In fact, successful firms who build strong brand names often do so by providing relatively high amounts of utilitarian and hedonic value.* Value is not entirely distinct from one's personal values (Rokeach, 1972). These personal values represent relatively desirable end states (terminal values) or ways to obtain the desirable end states (instrumental values). Thus, they illustrate the ends toward which service should be directed. A consumer's ranking of the importance of these personal values is likely linked to the types of \"get\" components that are most sought after and the types of \"give\" components (resources) that he or she is most willing to let go.* Consumption is the process that creates value from service.* Ultimately, all meaningful marketing activity is directed at value creation. This makes value an imperative, and perhaps the imperative, concept to building marketing descriptions and prescriptions.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - Value as a research topic within marketing is not new. The purpose of this research note is to examine how value fits within marketing in the twenty-first century. Specifically, the emergence of service-dominant logic has brought the concept of co-creation of value to the forefront. This paper comments on previous definitions of research and offers insight to stimulate future theoretical developments and serve as an aid in future research.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The paper represents a conceptual overview of previous research and offers some logical derivatives of value from the previous work and from the emergence of a service-dominant logic in marketing.\nFindings: - Since the paradigm shift toward service-dominant logic, few researchers have examined value as it specifically relates to marketing theory and practice. Value as a key outcome variable is typically overshadowed by other constructs such as satisfaction, word-of-mouth, and loyalty.\nOriginality/value: - Key value axioms are derived from both theory and past research as a guide for future research. These value axioms predict how consumers' derive value, how society and value are intertwined, and how previously studied aspects of value, such as utilitarian and hedonic value, fit into the value equation. Further, a framework for the future study of value is presented which encompasses the key \"get\" components as well as the key \"give\" components. The material hopefully clarifies some aspects about value and directs future research.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Exploring the world of knowledge management: agreements and disagreements in the academic/practitioner community	[ "Knowledge management", "Organizational theory", "Competitive advantage" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: There is growing recognition in the business community about the importance of knowledge as a critical resource for organizations (Foucault, 1980; Winter, 1987; Leonard, 1999). The new, knowledge-based economy places great importance on the diffusion and use of information and knowledge, as well as on its creation. In this new economy, individuals and companies are obliged to focus on maintaining and enhancing their knowledge capital in order to innovate. Their ability to learn, adapt and change, becomes a core competency for survival.Knowledge management (KM) has gained a great deal of attention from both the academic and practitioners' point of view (Wiig, 1993; Bhatt, 2001; Metaxiotis et al., 2002). The famous statement \"If only we knew what we know ... \" has prompted the idea of capturing, sharing and applying knowledge all over the organization. Although there is recognition that knowledge is a key business asset, organizations are still in the early stages of understanding the implications of KM. KM is slowly becoming an integral business function for them. Current research (Davenport and Prusak, 1998; Liebowitz, 2000; Wild et al., 2002; Liebowitz and Beckman, 1998) has shown that a knowledge-based company possesses information and knowledge that confer a special advantage, allowing it to maneuver with intelligence, creativity, and occasionally, cunning. It is well prepared to sustain its growth and develop in a dynamic environment. By marshalling the skills and expertise of its members, it is able to engage in continuous learning and innovation.A myriad researchers and practitioners have presented KM methodologies, frameworks, and technologies and have discussed various KM theoretical and practical issues. Some 15 years after its introduction, KM is now a keyword in bibliographic databases and forms the conceptual nucleus of a developing literature (Chauvel and Despres, 2002; Moffett et al., 2003). The aim of this paper is to explore the world of KM in a different way, by reviewing the current status quo and analyzing the main agreements and disagreements among researchers and practitioners in order to highlight the key issues, which need to be further researched. Since it is not feasible to cover all the literature, our main purpose is not so much to summarize but to recognize the KM issues on which researchers/practitioners agree or disagree. This will result to some conclusions about directions for future research, avoiding KM fields that have already been over-researched (researchers have come to specific agreements and conclusions). This study seeks to contribute to the deeper understanding of KM complexity and orientations.We begin with background discussion about the management of knowledge, followed by a brief presentation of important KM aspects. Next, a critical examination of main agreements and disagreements in the research community is presented. Finally, conclusions and suggestions of future directions for further research are provided.\nA journey to KM history: Knowledge management has its origins in a number of related business improvement areas, such as total quality management (TQM), business process re-engineering (BPR), information systems (IS) and human resource management (HR). It emerged on the maps of strategy consultants and conference organizers in the beginning of 1990s, although the knowledge debate had started much earlier (Hayek, 1945; Bell, 1978). In 1965 Marshall (1965) argued that capital consists, in the greater part, of knowledge. He argued also that knowledge is the most powerful engine of production and thus, organizations increasingly focused on its management. Kuhn (1970) stressed that the knowledge embraced by a field of endeavor is \"... intrinsically the common property of a group or else nothing at all\". In 1972 Habermas (1972) argued that knowledge does not exist as some abstract entity, but is the product of intentional and, sometimes, unconscious human activity.Historically, we can distinguish three generations of knowledge management. The period 1990-1995 can be called as the first generation of KM. During this generation of KM, many initiatives focused on defining knowledge management, investigating the potential benefits of KM for businesses, and designing specific KM projects (Senge, 1990; Nonaka, 1994; Quinn, 1992; Wiig, 1993). Also, progress on artificial intelligence influenced research on KM, mainly in the direction of knowledge representation and storing (Mui and McCarthy, 1987; Levine and Pomerol, 1989; Ignizio, 1991). The second generation of KM started to emerge around 1996 with many corporations setting up new jobs for KM specialists and \"chief knowledge officers\". The different sources of KM became combined and also quickly absorbed to everyday organizational discourse. During this generation, KM research touched knowledge definitional issues (Figure 1), business philosophies (Grant, 1997; Thierauf, 1999; McAdam and Reid, 2001), systems (Alavi and Leidner, 1999; Hasan and Gould, 2003; Lan Sia and Al-Hawamdeh, 2003), frameworks (Holsapple and Joshi, 1997; Rubenstein-Montano et al., 2001a; Chua, 2003; Maier and Remus, 2003), operations and practices (Rajan et al., 1999; Pervan and Ellison, 2003), advanced technologies (Carneiro, 2001; Nemati et al., 2002; Liao, 2003; Metaxiotis et al., 2003).On a more practical level, second-generation KM emphasized that KM is about systemic organizational change where management practices, measurement systems, tools and content management needed to be co-developed. Resulting from new insights and practices, a new, third generation of KM is now emerging with new methods and results. According to Wiig (2002), \"one difference from the earlier KM generations is the degree to which the third generation is integrated with the enterprise's philosophy, strategy, goals, practices, systems and procedures and how it becomes part of each employee's daily work-life and motivation ... \". The third generation seems to emphasize the link between knowing and action (Paraponaris, 2003). All knowledge is inherently social and cultural, and organizational knowledge can only be realized through change in organizational activity and practice. Table I presents some of the most important research contributions to the field of KM, which are considered today as reference points for further research.In the next sections, this paper presents a critical examination of main agreements and disagreements in the KM research community, as they are reported in the literature.\nMain agreements: Definition of KM\nMain disagreements: KM frameworks\nConclusions and recommended directions for research: Globalization has placed businesses everywhere in new and different competitive situations where knowledgeable and effective behavior has come to provide the competitive edge. Nowadays, many organizations try to improve their competitive position through better use of knowledge, looking for new ways to harness and enhance the expertise and intellectual capital they possess, while aiming to continuously leverage them into new applied knowledge.This paper explores the world of KM in a different way, by reviewing the current status quo and analyzing the main agreements and disagreements among researchers and practitioners in order to highlight the key issues, which need to be further researched. As it became clear, the KM debate emerged from an individual-knowledge focus in the 1970s and 1980s to a group-knowledge focus in the 1990s and 2000s. Based on the key agreements among researchers and practitioners and having in mind the remaining disagreements, the third KM generation should proceed to further investigation of several KM issues and to further research. Recommended directions for further action research are the following:* Development of criteria for evaluating KM frameworks and KM methodologies and approaches.* Development of systems for measuring the valuable knowledge, intellectual capital and other \"intangible\" assets of a corporation.* Inclusion of double-loop learning as part of a KM framework.* Study and analysis of investments and costs of IT supported KM systems in today's companies, and especially in SMEs.* Use of modern technologies as tools for transfer of explicit knowledge across cross-functional boundaries or silos of knowledge in organizations.* The application of KM concept to other areas of our social life (health, public administration, higher education, etc.).Finally, we should stress the fact that this literature review highlights the need to better clarify what we mean when we are using concepts such as \"knowledge\" and \"KM\" and to illustrate the differences between \"competitive intelligence\", \"intellectual capital\" and \"KM\".\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - During the last 15 years, knowledge management (KM) has changed from one generation to the next through constant improvements and new perspectives. A myriad researchers have presented methodologies, frameworks, technologies and have discussed various KM theoretical and practical issues. However, KM still needs extensive development - it is in its infancy. This paper aims to explore the world of KM in a different way; to review the current status quo and analyze the main agreements and disagreements among researchers and practitioners in order to highlight the key issues which need to be further researched.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The authors attempt to review and analyze in a coherent way the main agreements and disagreements among researchers and practitioners - in the field of KM - based on a wide range of published works, including papers, books, reports and web sites.\nFindings: - Based on the key agreements among researchers and practitioners and having in mind the remaining disagreements, the third KM generation should proceed to further investigation of several KM issues and to further research.\nResearch limitations/implications: - The key issues highlighted here need to be researched further. Following on from the individual-knowledge focus of the 1970s/1980s and the group-knowledge focus of the 1990s/2000s, the third KM generation should: develop criteria for evaluating frameworks, methodologies and approaches, and systems for measuring knowledge, intellectual capital and other assets; include double-loop learning; analyse investments and costs of KM Systems; use modern technologies for transfer of explicit knowledge; and apply KM to other areas of social life. There is also a need to clarify the meanings of differences between the various concepts discussed here.\nOriginality/value: - The distinguishing feature of this study is that it emphasizes placing KM in a broader context of researchers/practitioners' discussions so that the key issues can be better recognized and understood.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Exploring determinants of job involvement: an empirical test among senior executives	[ "Job commitment", "Employee involvement", "Senior managers", "Israel" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Job involvement is of ongoing research interest. It is defined as \"a belief descriptive of the present job and tends to be a function of how much the job can satisfy one's present needs\" (Kanungo, 1982, p. 342). The ongoing research interest in this subject has led to empirical and theoretical attentions among researchers in the area of organizational behavior. Yet, it seems that we are still far from understanding what exactly fosters organization members' job involvement. For example, Brown (1996) argued that we are in need of further research to clarify how job involvement is related to other job attitudes.\nTheoretical background and the research model: It has been argued that the degree to which employees are involved in their job can be influenced by situational-related (i.e. experiences and psychological reactions to the work) factors (Vroom, 1962). A favorable organizational image fosters the identification of an employee with her/his organization (Dutton and Dukerich, 1991; Dutton et al., 1994; Smidts et al., 2001). An employee is likely to be satisfied and develop a strong attachment to an organization that possesses a certain level of prestige (a favorable reputation) as part of his/her connection with glory (Cialdini et al., 1976). Strong identification with one's organization may translate into a high degree of job involvement.On the other hand, researchers argue that job involvement is a personal characteristic. Therefore, it is less likely to be influenced by organizational factors and more likely to be influenced by personal characteristics (Dubin, 1956; Rabinowitz and Hall, 1977). The protestant work ethic is conceptually related to job involvement as it represents the \"moral character of work and a sense of personal responsibility\" (Rabinowitz and Hall, 1977, p. 267). Although it has received less attention, normative commitment, which represents a high moral right to stay with one's organization regardless of one's degree of personal satisfaction (Marsh and Manari, 1977, p. 59), can also be seen as another personal characteristic that is conceptually related to job involvement.Job involvement as a function of individual characteristics\nMethod: Respondents and data collection\nResults: To control for differences among the participants, at both the organizational and individual levels, with respect to the degree of their involvement in the job, hierarchical regression was conducted. The control variables were entered in the first step and the independent variables were entered in the next one. The results indicate no significant differences.To test whether perceived external prestige consists of two sub-measures, confirmatory factor analysis, using AMOS 4.01 (Arbuckle and Wothke, 1999; Byrne, 2001) was conducted. The results support one factor measure (kh2=17.11, df=14, kh2/df=1.22; RMSEA=0.05; RFI=0.98; NFI=0.99; CFI=0.99).The means, standard deviations, reliabilities and the correlations among the research variables are presented in Table I. The correlation coefficients among the research variables were reasonable and did not exceed the value of 0.60.Structural equation modeling (Bollen, 1989) was performed to assess the overall research model presented in Figure 1, using AMOS 4.01 (Arbuckle and Wothke, 1999; Byrne, 2001). In order to assess the fit of the research model in Figure 1, multiple goodness-of-fit indices were examined, since no single indicator has been demonstrated as superior in the structural equation modeling (Medsker et al., 1994). Following Bentler and Bonnet (1980) and Kline (1998), the indices upon which we relied included the chi-square statistic divided by the degree of freedom (kh2/df) (recommended to be less than three). Joreskog and Sorbom (1993) pointed out that even if all the assumptions underlying the use of the chi-square test hold, it might not be realistic to assume that the model is really valid exactly in the population. Thus, it is also useful to consider other, less sensitive, tests. These include the root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) (its value is recommended to be up to 0.05, and is acceptable up to 0.08), the relative fit index (RFI), the normed fit index (NFI), and the Tucker-Lewis index (TLI) (which is recommended to be higher than 0.90 and close to a value of 1.00).As shown in Figure 1 protestant work ethic affects both normative commitment and job involvement. Normative commitment is positively related to job involvement. Perceived external prestige affects both job satisfaction and affective commitment. Affective commitment mediates the relationship between perceived external prestige and job satisfaction, and job involvement. All paths that derived from the research hypotheses are presented in this diagram.The results of the research model suggest that the overall fit of the model with the data is good (kh2=84.98, df=52, kh2/df=1.63; RMSEA=0.08; RFI=0.97; NFI=0.98; TLI=0.99). The findings indicate that job involvement is affected by both individual characteristics and situation-related factors. Only the path from protestant work ethic to job involvement was not significant.H1 suggested that protestant work ethic would be positively associated with both normative commitment and job involvement. The results provide support only for the relationship between protestant work ethic and normative commitment. As expected, normative commitment was positively related to job involvement. The findings indicate that normative commitment mediates the relationship between protestant work ethic and job involvement. Thus, H1and H2 were partially and fully supported, respectively.H3 predicted a positive relationship between perceived external prestige and both affective commitment and job satisfaction, but the magnitude was in favor of affective commitment. As expected, CFOs who believe their organization is viewed by outsiders as one that possesses a favorable level of prestige with respect to a set of criteria show strong attachment to their organization (b=0.39, p<0.01) and a high level of satisfaction (b=0.39, p<0.01). Interestingly, however, the magnitude for these relationships was the same. These findings provide support for only the first part of H3.H4 stated that job satisfaction would be positively related to affective commitment. As expected, the path between these constructs was significant (0.55) and thus H4 was supported. H5 proposed that affective commitment would mediate the relationship between perceived external prestige and job satisfaction, and job involvement. The findings supported this hypothesis. The path between affective commitment and job involvement was significant (0.35), and the overall fit indices indicate in favor of a mediation model (kh2=84.98, df=52, kh2/df=1.63; RMSEA=0.08; RFI=0.97; NFI=0.98; TLI=0.99) for the following reasons: First, the paths from job satisfaction and perceived external prestige to job involvement were not significant. Second, although the model fit the data the overall indices indicate in favor of a mediation model (kh2=84.44, df=50, kh2/df=1.69; RMSEA=0.084; RFI=0.96; NFI=0.98; TLI=0.98).Because the study involved CFOs from 98 organizations, it was essential to control for differences at both the individual and organizational levels. The results of multiple regressions, in which all the control variables were entered, indicate that income was the only variable positively related to job involvement (b=0.225, t=2.07, p<0.05). However, the effect of income on job involvement was omitted when we entered the independent variables (b=0.153, t=1.56, p=n.s.).\nDiscussion: The major goal of this study was to develop and test a model, which explores the degree of involvement of top executives (CFOs) in their jobs. The study unearthed some interesting findings. It specified the importance of two main effects - personal-related attitudes and situational-related factors. In particular, it revealed the complexity of the process, in which top executives become highly involved in their jobs.The findings of this study provide support for the notion that organizational image (perceived external prestige) augments one's satisfaction and attachment to one's organization. This may be very interesting when exploring the extent to which organizational image is important for top executives. The results indicate that top executives consider their organizational image to be an important factor in determining the degree with which they identify and are satisfied with their organization. These findings are consistent with recent studies (Bergami and Bagozzi, 2000; Smidts et al., 2001) and extend the validation of the relationship between organizational image and employees' identification with their organizations.However, organizational image is not related to job involvement in a direct way, but rather through affective commitment. That is, highly involved top executives are those who possess a high level of emotional identification with their organization, which is affected by both the organizational image and their degree of satisfaction. The findings indicate that being involved in a job is a complex process; a favorable image, job satisfaction and a high level of attachment in a combined process augment job involvement. The fact that job satisfaction, which is a less stable attitude, was not significantly related to job involvement supports this argument. If a high degree of job involvement is considered to augment work outcomes, then organizations should devote efforts to creating a favorable image because it fosters organizational identification and satisfaction, and eventually leads to high job involvement.Job involvement is also a function of personal-related attitudes. Surprisingly, the findings of this study did not support a direct relationship between protestant work ethic and job involvement, but did show a connection through normative commitment. Top executives see their work as an essential issue in their life, but the degree to which one develops high involvement in his/her job depends on the level of his/her normative commitment. It is possible that CFOs are more calculative individuals. Thus, their personal traits such as work ethic translate into job involvement only if they also develop a high level of normative commitment, namely when they feel a moral obligation to their organization. Brown (1996) suggested that further research is needed to clarify how job involvement is related to other job attitudes. One contribution of this study is the examination of work commitment attitude and normative commitment, in relation to job involvement.\nLimitations and suggestions for future research: The limitations of this study and directions for future research are simultaneously discussed. The main limitations are the cross sectional design of the study and its self-report measurement. Clearly, it is important to interpret the results with caution, especially with respect to causality. It is also impossible to eliminate a certain degree of common method error. We estimated the potential for common method errors by Harman's one-factor test (Podsakoff et al., 2003; Podsakoff and Organ, 1986). The results from a factor analysis of all items suggest that a single dominant factor did not emerge. Although this result does not entirely rule out the common method errors, the latter may not be severe in this study. It should be mentioned, however, that data were obtained from 98 organizational units, and that validated and usable measures were employed to reduce the possibility of bias in general method variance, and thus reduce the possibility that these procedures contain severe limitations. To overcome these limitations, further research should adopt longitudinal design to establish causal relationships among the research variables tested in this study.Although the present study was carried out in the context of a specific work setting (public sector organizations), caution should be taken in generalizing the results. However, one cannot argue that the variables included in this study are unique to the investigated work setting. Clearly, further research should be conducted in order to validate the findings of this study. In particular, researchers are encouraged to examine what motivates top executives to be involved in their job in the public, not-for-profit and business sectors.Future research may also investigate other relationships. For example, it would be very interesting to examine the interaction of situational-based attitudes and personal-related traits. In addition, this study is the first to relate organizational image to job involvement, and examination of the impact of an organization's image and reputation on job involvement should be interesting. Finally, examining additional related work outcomes (i.e. how job involvement affects work outcomes) is essential to the development of a more complete framework.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - This study proposes and tests a model that attempts to explain the role of situational and personal-related factors relating to why top executives become involved in their jobs.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Building on job involvement, literature, the present study involved senior managers employed in public sector organizations in Israel. Data were collected through structured surveys. A total of 98 usable questionnaires were returned (a response rate of 37.4 percent). Path analysis, using AMOS 4.01 program, was conducted to assess the research model.\nFindings: - The results indicate that both situational and personal-related factors predict job involvement. The findings show that the relationship between perceived external prestige and job involvement is mediated by affective commitment, and that the relationship between protestant work ethic and job involvement is mediated by normative commitment.\nResearch limitations/implications: - This research is one effort to unraveled situational and personal-related factors that affect the degree to which senior managers become highly involved in their job. The findings shed light on the process that job involvement is developed among senior executives. Future research, however, should apply a longitudinal design to fully understand the dynamic process of becoming involved in a job among people who are being promoted to senior managerial positions.\nPractical implications: - Being involved in a job may produce both positive and negative consequences at both the individual and organization level. Thus, efforts should be directed to fit and balance expectations, needs and interests of both sides.\nOriginality/value: - This study provides useful information on the determinants of job involvement among top executives\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Using netnography for the study of role-playing in female online games: Interpretation of situational context model	[ "Netnography", "Online games", "Role-playing", "Situational context" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: In 2016, the global gaming market will reach $86.1 billion, with a total number of up to 1.55 billion users. In 2017, the output of the global gaming industry will reach $100 billion, providing huge business opportunities (IEK, 2015a). Specifically, from 2011 to 2015, the rapid increase in mobile games grew from $10.5 to $152 billion; online games grew from $18.6 billion to $25.5 billion; and console games grew from $34.1 billion to $41.4 billion (IEK, 2015b). With its annual increase in consumption capacity, China is the world's largest gaming market, with an online game population of 120 million and a mobile game population of 160 million. The USA has an online game population of approximately 52 million and a mobile game population of approximately 100 million. Taiwan has an online game population of approximately six million and a mobile game population of approximately nine million (Consortium Corporation Information Industry Strategic Association, 2015).\n2. Literature review: 2.1 Online role-playing games\n3. Research design: 3.1 Research methodology\n4. Text analysis and context induction: Text analysis is a netnography data analysis method (Kozinets, 1997, 1998). This type of analysis adopts an \"emerging design orientation\", guided by so-called speaking for themselves in qualitative studies, capturing true data and real understanding (Lincoln and Guba, 1985). Through constant comparisons among the interview contents from the various respondents, concepts and titles for presenting the characteristics of the interview content were developed. Through this systematic data collection and analysis process, theories were excavated and formed. The study was based on interview materials (interviews, observations from field participation, meeting notes, files, and other phenomena) with a preset perspective but without a predetermined conclusion (Demuth and Mey, 2015), further establishing a strategy framework prototype.\n5. Findings: This study emphasized the theory that emerged from the meaning of the text. Theories also came from a meaning sharing system based on symbolic interaction (Kozinets, 1997, 2002). The theories were systematically applied according to the rules of netnography and conducted based on context induction (Hine, 2000). The findings of the study can be classified into a three-stage situational context approach, which is presented in the form of propositions. Finally, the insight of the situational context model was developed, as shown in Figure 1.\n6. Conclusions: 6.1 Discussion\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore in depth the special context and unique life experience of the online role-playing game and to provide insights regarding an interpretation of the situational context model.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This study uses netnography, online interviews, and the physical travel of researchers to the field for field participation and observations. The combination of netnography and online interviews combines online and offline studies to achieve more consistency in the data collection, analysis, and other processes. In-person participation in observations makes the research more realistic. The combination of these qualitative methods is helpful in achieving a more comprehensive and accurate research process.\nFindings: The findings of the study can be classified into a three-stage situational context approach, which is presented in the form of propositions. Finally, the insight of the situational context model was developed.\nResearch limitations/implications: This study only focussed on office workers and students in online role-playing game. Therefore, the samples should be extended to other massively multiplayer online games, including different nationalities and professions for comparative analysis and related studies. Through the expansion of the sample size, a representative and stable cyber model can be established.\nOriginality/value: The theoretical contribution of this study is to establish an interpretation of the situational context model and eight related propositions. The study revealed the mystery of female online role-playing games.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
An empirical study of purchase behaviour on social platforms: The role of risk, beliefs and characteristics	[ "Gender", "Risk", "Privacy", "Information sharing", "Security", "Social network analysis" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: While originally created as a peer-to-peer communication medium, social networks have become a platform for realising commercial opportunities (Im et al., 2008; Miller et al., 2009; Zheng et al., 2015). This has created a variety of implications for information systems research, including how e-commerce and social networks are converging. Social commerce can be regarded as a new dimension of e-commerce in which consumers use social networking sites (SNS) to engage in purchase behaviour (Hajli, 2015).\n2. Literature review: 2.1 The transactional SNS paradox\n3. Conceptual framework: Further to the exploration of purchase intention in e-commerce settings by Chang et al. (2016), there is a strong rationale to explore purchase intentions on SNS through the lens of cognitive appraisal perspectives. Cognitive factors reflect that SNS users' purchase intentions are influenced by judgements about the vendor. We bring in user beliefs and attitudes affecting purchase intention, which are the factors describing user beliefs affect intentions and therefore behaviour. The hypotheses formation is presented in the section which follows.\n4. Method and data collection: 4.1 Sampling and design\n5. Findings: 5.1 Regression results\n6. Implications: 6.1 Implications for research\n7. Limitations: Despite every effort taken by the researchers to achieve objectivity, our study is not without its limitations. The target population of this study is online social media users. For the sample size, literature recommends approximately 400 participants for a population of over 100,000 (Krejcie and Morgan, 1970; Isaac and Michael, 1995). There is still a dearth of literature on effective sampling frames in social platforms. According to Duffy (2002), unrestricted internet samples, or self-selection may not be reliable. Nevertheless, research finding shows that self-selected samples are clearer and more complete than targeted samples (Gosling et al., 2004). We acknowledge that the data used in this research are self-reported. Also, it is conceivable that a different set of results may emerge using a different sampling technique. We therefore offer our proposed model for further empirical testing by researchers. One potential avenue would be to test the model's ability to explain purchase behaviour as opposed to intention. A second avenue would be to explore if the findings hold for other regions of the world.\n8. Conclusions: With the proliferation of social media applications across personal and commercial activities, the transactional potential of social platforms is yet to be realised. Through a review of literature, we explored why social media environments are somewhat different than e-commerce and warrant specific attention towards social media users' attitude, cognitive appraisal and their purchase intentions. We proposed a theoretical model which explains the relationships between perceived control over information, risk and trust which have an impact on the purchase intentions on social media and found that these relationships differ depending on the age and gender of the social media user. Specifically, we find that for women, perceived control, trust and risk propensity predict purchase intention. These relationships are moderated by age - for younger women risk propensity is significant; for older women perceived control and trust are significant. For men, age is the only significant predictor; younger men are more likely to buy via an SNS than older men are. The implications for practice of the research findings are threefold. We identified that while the role of the individual user in understanding risks is important, it cannot be the only protective measure for safe activity on social networks. The results of this study help enhance the theoretical understanding of the effects of user behaviour on social technologies.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Social media users' purchasing behaviour is yet to be fully understood by research. The purpose of this paper is to investigate how purchase intention is affected by social media user traits, cognitive factors (such as perceived control and trust) and individual beliefs, such as risk propensity and trustworthiness.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The authors propose and empirically test a model of purchase intention on social platforms. The study of over 500 active social media users finds the links between risk propensity, trust, technical efficacy and perceived control and explores the moderating effect of age and gender.\nFindings: Purchase intention on social platforms is influenced by demographic factors, cognitive factors and beliefs. Both age and gender moderate the effects of beliefs and cognitive factors: age is a determinant of purchase intention for men, while beliefs are significant for younger women and cognitive factors are significant for older women.\nResearch limitations/implications: This study involved a cross-sectional design via online survey of social networking users. Gender differences in purchase intentions are found which are, in turn, influenced by age. Further empirical testing of social purchase intention could include less experienced users or non-users.\nPractical implications: The results of this study provide guidance for SNS providers and technology developers in social networking commerce in terms of the different drivers of purchase intention.\nOriginality/value: Social media users' purchasing behaviour is yet to be fully understood. The study shows that purchase intention antecedents vary between genders and age groups of users. The identified connection between users' perceptions of social networking sites (SNS) usage of personal information and purchase behaviour has an impact on the likelihood of user engagement in social transactions.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Supplier management in a manufacturing environment: A strategically focussed performance scorecard	[ "Discrete choice analysis", "Total cost of ownership", "Supplier performance scorecard", "Supplier classification", "Supply base consolidation", "Strategic sourcing" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: During the 1980s and 1990s, companies realized that their productivity could be significantly increased by managing relationships, information, and material flow across enterprise borders (Cherry, 2006). As supply chains increase in complexity and continue to become more global, the management of these relationships can drastically affect the profitability and sustainability of manufacturing companies. It is also important to note that as manufacturing companies continue to become leaner, there is more emphasis on total costs associated with purchasing raw materials. These costs include, but are not limited to the price paid for the item, order placement, research and qualification of suppliers, transportation, receiving, inspection, rejection, replacement, rework, downtime caused by failure, and disposal costs (Ellram, 1996). Whereas, in the past, many manufacturing companies based their purchasing decisions primarily on price alone or price and vague qualitative data. The culmination of all of these factors has led many manufacturing companies to focus their efforts on creating long-term, more meaningful relationships with suppliers that benefit their firms' strategy. This close co-operation with suppliers has brought about lower unit costs and greater quality (Goffin et al., 1997).\nDCA: DCA can be used to assess the relative weights for price, quality, delivery, flexibility, as well as many other value-added features deemed important by departmental management (Rhee et al., 2009). Intensive work must be completed to determine the important variables and their relative alignment within each business unit and also within the company. For example, a medical device manufacturer, like St Jude, might place more relative importance on purchasing goods of a higher quality than purchasing medium quality goods for better purchased prices. Conversely, a diversified manufacturer like 3M might pursue a more balanced purchasing approach on price, quality, and on-time delivery. Once the analysis is completed, the important variables must be weighted in relevance to importance, ultimately totaling up to 100 percent. A basic example can be seen in Table I.\nTCO analysis: The TCO model uses the weighted analysis gained from the DCA model to assess both current and future suppliers. TCO model analysis is not an exact science, and many different companies throughout the world use different versions of the TCO model to evaluate, benchmark, and select suppliers. While many versions exist, Ellram (1996) supports developing a standardized company version of the model that can be applied and used readily across suppliers. When issues of concern are the same across buys, there is a desire for a relatively easy model, or there is a desire to computerize the system. In contrast, Ellram suggests using a unique TCO model when buys between suppliers and materials vary greatly, no one set of factors captures critical issues across buys, or there is a strong desire for flexibility in cost modeling.\nStrategy in action: Company overview\nStudy limitations: Supplier management is an ongoing process that necessitates constant attention, not just when problems arise. Despite making a conscious effort to recognize the supplier base, various limitations do exist within supplier management. From a macro viewpoint, both DCA and TCO can be very difficult to assess, and therefore become quite subjective to manufacturer and supplier alike. It is for this reason that transparency among manufacturers and suppliers is so important. Without transparency, areas for improvement will go unnoticed and unrecognized.\nManagerial implications: When considering supplier management initiatives, there are various effects that management must be aware of. The first is that processes associated with supplier management must be both continual and up-to-date. Data must be specific and timely in order to be effective. If it is not, it loses credibility and relevance. Management must be willing to spend the time and money required to maintain supplier management systems so that they contain the best information available.\nRecommendations for future work: Within the business issue of supplier management, whether being maintenance or consolidation, there exist the capability for further work and examination. The first recommendation for future work would be for estimating the possible ROI of implementing a supplier management system. Obviously, the costs and amount of time are extremely demanding, and a total analysis of the return and how long it might take would be extremely useful to a company of any size. Another recommendation for future work could be determining what internal capabilities and external capabilities a manufacturer needs to be able to carry out a massive and time-consuming supplier management system. This recommendation would be extremely helpful in deciding whether a firm needs to look into hiring an external consultant for support. Lastly, a final recommendation might include a final concluding analysis ten years after implementation. How effective was the supplier management system and what, if any, changes should have been made along the way?\nConclusions: Developing long-term relationships with suppliers starts with identifying the needs of the company through their strategy and long-term goals. A DCA is good tool to utilize to determine the required emphasis that the company needs to put on various features in their supplier relationship. The vast majority of a company's suppliers will not be able to meet all the needs of a company. For this reason it is important to consider trade-offs when choosing suppliers to determine the best value-added features.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Managing a supplier base can be both challenging and rewarding. Instances abound where the lack of attention to supplier management has caused once successful businesses great losses or even failures. Assessing a supply base using the combined approach of discrete choice analysis (DCA) and total cost of ownership (TCO) can help a company determine the necessary features required to alleviate the strain caused by doing business with poorly managed companies. The paper aims to discuss these issues.\nDesign/methodology/approach: By combining a company's DCA with their TCO, manufacturing companies can create a strategically focussed scorecard that aligns their supplier requirements with high-performing companies. During the analysis, the paper chose to analyze an appliance manufacturer.\nFindings: As a result of the analysis, it was determined that a specific supplier that was labeled as strategic, should actually be considered for elimination. While this analysis can be extremely effective, three main limitations within the research do exist. First, the lack of alignment of DCA with the strategic business initiatives within each unit of a company can adversely affect its financial success. Second, implications for management which include all data used in the analysis through all three stages - identify and classify, consolidate, and maintain supplier base - must be up-to-date. Finally, trade-offs must be accepted as a means of doing business with a supplier.\nOriginality/value: After reading this study, sourcing managers should realize the potential for aligning and managing their supplier base with the strategy of the company to assure a profitable future.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
The university and transformation towards sustainability: The strategy used at Chalmers University of Technology	[ "Sweden", "Universities", "Curricula", "Change management", "Sustainable development", "Curriculum greening", "Education for sustainable development", "Change", "Transformation" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1 Introduction: Many universities struggle with change processes (Ferrer-Balas et al., 2004; Hopkinson, 2010; Jansen et al., 2005; Kamp, 2006). There are many good ambitions and goals that seem to be hard to implement, e.g. equality, integration of the different aspects of the knowledge triangle (education, research and innovation) or implementation of education for sustainable development (ESD). Transforming higher education contents and practices is a tough challenge, and actual results are still far from the desired image of a higher ESD (The Observatory, 2006; Holmberg and Samuelsson, 2006).Over the years, Chalmers University of Technology (Chalmers) has developed a strategy for this kind of more complex change processes. It has been used for promoting the inclusion of sustainable development in university activities on a broader scale and more specifically to accelerate the implementation of ESD. The strategy has also been used to enhance collaboration across disciplines and with the surrounding world through eight newly introduced \"Areas of Advance\". The aim of this paper is to describe the strategy that has been used, describe how it relates to preceding and on-going processes as well as future ambitions, describe achievements and lessons learned in this process and discuss barriers and drivers, in order to provide input to other universities that struggle with change processes. In this paper, we will illustrate the strategy by describing a specific three-year reform project, which started in 2006, with the goal to accelerate the implementation of ESD at Chalmers.The ESD project is part of a long series of processes related to SD and ESD at Chalmers. Already in 1985, a policy was introduced stating that educational programmes should contain a course load corresponding to five weeks of full-time studies on environment and SD (E&SD). Since 2003, this has been a compulsory requirement. In 1989, Chalmers started a process, which lead to the formation of The Gothenburg Centre for Environment and Sustainability (GMV). The centre is now an open and cross-disciplinary network for researchers at Chalmers and Gothenburg University and has been an important driver for development of education and research on SD at Chalmers. It has carried the history in this area across shifts in university management. In 2006, Chalmers received a UNESCO chair in ESD, and the university management approved funding of the connected ESD project. Strongly related to this process is also the series of international conferences organized by Chalmers and Gothenburg University, starting with a workshop on ESD within the EU summit in 2001.The aim of the ESD project was to develop an organization that can manage the implementation of ESD at Chalmers, resulting in a suggestion that:* guarantees and continuously enhances the quality of the compulsory courses on E&SD;* guarantees and continuously enhances the quality of SD content in other courses;* effectively gives support to those who order SD courses;* effectively gives support to students when choosing SD courses;* effectively promotes internal and external information exchange on ESD;* effectively promotes cooperation with internal and external stakeholders within ESD;* provides a forum for meetings for students and for teachers with interest in the area;* provides support to further education within the SD area for non-teaching personnel; and* provides support to the development of a campus reflecting Chalmers initiative for SD.There are approximately 12,000 students at Chalmers. Most of the students study for a Master of Science in Engineering degree, which are five-year long programmes in different disciplines, such as chemical, mechanical, electrical, computer engineering, etc. Chalmers also admit students to the last two years of these programmes for a Master degree. There are also Architect and Teacher degrees (five-year long programmes) and Bachelor of Science in Engineering programmes (three-year long).The analysis of the change process in relation to the strategy that is described in the next section is made in the subsequent section along three different lines for the ESD project: the work on the compulsory courses, the efforts for integrating ESD into educational programmes, and the work to collect and spread information on good teaching practices within ESD. More information on the project can be found in the literature (Holmberg and Arehag, 2007; Holmberg et al., 2008) and on www.chalmers.se/gmv/EN/projects/esd_chalmers. Other change processes than the ESD project in which the same method has been used will also be briefly discussed.\n2 Method: Chalmers' strategy for change: To implement new ideas and achieve change at universities, with their high degree of autonomy and strong traditions, is often a difficult mission, especially if the mission is as complex as to achieve a higher degree of embedding of ESD at the university. A task like this often turns into something that is in everybody's interest but is nobody's responsibility. One way to get around this dilemma is to use a top-down demand and control strategy, more often used in business organisations. Kotter (1995), suggests that a successful change process in a business organization goes through a series of eight distinct stages: establishing a sense of urgency; forming a powerful guiding coalition; creating a vision; communicating the vision; empowering others to act on the vision; planning for and creating short-term wins; consolidating improvements and producing still more change; and institutionalizing new approaches. Our experience is that these kinds of sequenced processes can work well for hierarchal organisations (like an enterprise), but meet obstacles when introduced on a broader scale at a university, since it requires very effective incentives in order to profoundly affect every-day university practices. Such incentives are difficult to construct for complex issues, as for instance the embedding of ESD. Another way to go about is that a certain department is given the task or takes on the mission on its own. This might work to a certain degree, but often leads to lock-in effects in the long run. This lock-in can consist in that persons in the rest of the organization do not make an effort since they can leave the concern to the responsible department. The responsible department might also feel that they want to be in control and therefore does not welcome initiatives from other departments or individuals. When funding comes with the responsibility, the risk that this happens is even greater. At a university, the power structure is more complex than in an enterprise. The top management has power but so has also, and in many cases to a larger extent, all the teachers and scientists at the university. In such structures, it is essential to be able to create engagement and involvement among the staff in order to succeed with broad-scale transformation. It is our experience that the facilitation of the change process by a neutral arena/organization is also crucial.Hopkinson (2010) used a sequenced process developed for the Harvard campus greening initiative for transforming the University of Bradford in a process named Ecoversity. In a campus greening project, the hierarchal structure can be quite clear also at a university, but when Hopkinson applied the method on a broader scale at the university, it met some obstacles. It was perceived as being mainly a top-down estates-driven programme, involving a number of small \"bitty\" projects. Based on these findings it was decided that a new approach would focus on the decision-making processes, cross institutional action-based task groups and the engagement and involvement of students and staff.Scott (2003), in a paper focusing mainly on the need for universities to change their pedagogical methods in light of new opportunities and shifting needs, presents some ideas on how to achieve change. These ideas are generic enough to be applicable also to other change processes at university. He reports on key insights from his own practice and from screening the scientific literature. He argues that \"Change is learning and learning is change\" - and that motivation is what fuels both individuals and organisations to learn and thereby change. Furthermore, he emphasizes the very strong connection between individual learning and organizational learning - change in both university mission, systems and infrastructure and the motivation and capabilities of individuals must therefore be addressed simultaneously and be mutually supportive. He also states that team-efforts that are action-research based and cyclical rather than linear are the most successful.At Chalmers, a method for achieving change has been identified that is clearly supported by the work by others reported in literature. The strategy has now been tested on different scales and for many years and seems to be successful. Three important building blocks can be identified in Chalmers' strategy for achieving change:1. Create a neutral arena/organization. Some kind of neutral arena that can facilitate the change process is needed. It must have an overview of the whole organization and must be working across research groups to avoid lock-in effects. It must function as a platform for cooperation and information exchange and be of long-term character. An arena like this is essential for making this kind of complex change successful and for it to have long-lasting effects. Such an organization can function as a driver for the issues that otherwise often become everyone's interest but no-one's responsibility. Important features of this arena/organization are that it is: open and inviting, service-oriented (not building its own empires), building trust and lowering barriers, keeping the memory of the change process, and giving feed-back to relevant stakeholders and thereby keeping up the momentum of change.2. Build on individual engagement and involvement (bottom-up). Universities, with their core values of scepticism, curiosity and freedom of speech, have a high degree of autonomy, which must be respected in a change process. Teachers hate to be taught! The change process must therefore build on the engagement and involvement of individuals. The features of the neutral arena/organization and the methods used to bring about change must use this as a core principle.3. Communicate a clear commitment from the management team. The change process must be in line with the overall strategy of the university. Ideally it should be an essential part of the vision of the university. It must not be counteracted by different structures in the organizational system. It is important that the university clearly motivates the change process - systematically creates incentives and other structures that correlate with and pushes for the change process.\n3 Transformation processes in relation to Chalmers' strategy for change: In this section, three transformation processes related to the ESD project will be discussed in relation to the three building blocks of Chalmers' strategy for change. These examples target different elements of the overall vision to enhance the quality and embedding of ESD at the university and to create a permanent platform for further work on ESD. The basic course requirement for SD and the integration of ESD into educational programmes were addressed with the purpose of increasing quality, engagement and competences, whereas the collecting of good teaching practices was seen as important in providing support to the first two elements. Some other transformation processes, in which Chalmers' strategy for change has been used, will be discussed at the end of the section. The aim is to illustrate how the strategy has been put into practice.3.1 The compulsory courses on E&SD\n4 Concluding remarks: The strategy used for achieving change at Chalmers University of Technology has been presented and illustrated using a project on ESD and other change projects.The three important building blocks of the strategy are:1. Create a neutral arena/organization. The ESD project functioned as a neutral arena since it was not placed at any specific department but rather engaged participants from many departments. This neutral arena has been important, e.g. to increase the willingness of teachers to share their good teaching examples.2. Build on individual engagement and involvement (bottom-up). The ESD project was successful in creating a shared responsibility and for starting learning processes in many individuals by the involvement of a broad range of educational actors at Chalmers.3. Communicate a clear commitment from the management team. The strong and clear commitment from the management team has been used as a driving force in the ESD project.The paper can provide valuable input to universities that struggle with change processes.It is difficult to measure the benefits of the strategy but it seems to have provided good results, e.g. by reducing lock-in effects that would otherwise have slowed down or halted development, and for building trust and lowering barriers in the organization. The aim of this paper has mainly been to inform about the strategy and illustrate its elements by describing processes in which it has been applied. Future studies should compare the strategy with other strategies having the same goals and try to provide a more thorough analysis of its characteristics and benefits and shortcomings.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to present the strategy used for achieving change towards sustainability at Chalmers University of Technology (Chalmers). Examples of how this strategy has been used are described and discussed, and exemplified with different lines of activities in a project on Education for Sustainable Development, the ESD project.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The strategy consists of three important building blocks: Create a neutral arena; Build on individual engagement and involvement; and Communicate a clear commitment from the management team. The analysis is made along three different lines of activities in the ESD project: The work to improve the quality of the compulsory courses on sustainable development; The efforts to integrate ESD into educational programmes; and The work to collect and spread information on good teaching practices within ESD. Some other related examples where the strategy has been applied are also presented.\nFindings: - The ESD project functioned as a neutral arena since it was not placed at any specific department but rather engaged participants from many departments. This neutral arena has been important, for example, to increase the willingness of teachers to share their good teaching examples. The process was successful in creating a shared responsibility and for starting learning processes in many individuals by the involvement of a broad range of educational actors at Chalmers. The strong and clear commitment from the management team has worked as a driving force.\nOriginality/value: - This paper can provide valuable input to universities that struggle with change processes.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Chinese immigrants' occupational well-being in Finland: the role of paternalistic leadership	[ "Finland", "Paternalistic leadership", "Chinese immigrant", "Leadership behaviour", "Occupational well-being" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The Chinese have migrated internationally for centuries (Ma, 2003). In Finland, where the present study was set, the ethnic Chinese presence has increased from 300 in 1990 to 8,900 in 2013 to become the country's fourth largest immigrant group (Official Statistics Finland, 2014). However, because of some obvious cultural differences between Chinese immigrants and local Finns (House et al., 2004), social integration has proved challenging for leaders in organisations. Integration depends crucially on managers' leadership skills and strategies in helping ethnic Chinese employees to cope with the local cultural environment.\nThe three-dimensional model of paternalistic leadership: Paternalistic leadership has attracted increasing interest in the Eastern management and leadership literature (Chen et al., 2011). Traditional Chinese thinking views fathers as authoritative in dictating all of their children's significant life decisions. In paternalistic relationships (as with the father figure in a family), organisational superiors are commonly presumed to have the right to exercise authority over their subordinates and to command unquestioning personal respect and deference (Jackman, 1994; Aycan et al., 1999; Aycan, 2006).\nThe three dimensions of employee well-being: Most of the existing research on paternalistic leadership has focussed on outcomes related to employees' work attitudes and behaviours at organisational and management levels (Pellegrini et al., 2007; Chen et al., 2011; Wu et al., 2012). We extend the scope of this research by focussing in particular on the outcomes of paternalistic leadership for employee well-being at the individual level. In management research, employee well-being is important not only in terms of ensuring that workers are happy and productive (Wright and Staw, 1999; Robertson and Cooper, 2011; Oswald et al., 2015) but also because low levels of well-being may result in negative psychological outcomes such as depression and physical problems such as cardiovascular disease (Siu et al., 2007).\nMethod: Participants and procedure\nResults: Descriptive analysis\nDiscussion: As hypothesised, relationships were found between all three dimensions of paternalistic leadership and the well-being of immigrant Chinese knowledge workers. Specifically, we found that in a Finnish organisational context, benevolence has significant effects on these workers' satisfaction and on the quality of their relationships with supervisors in terms of LMX and private guanxi while reducing their stress at the work context. Morality in paternalistic leadership was shown to be associated with Chinese LMX relationships, indicating that a superior's morality in terms of integrity and concern for the collective good are highly valued by Chinese employees, with positive implications for high-quality LMX relationships. Authoritarianism was found to be slightly related to Chinese workers' stress, which was increased by more authoritarian leadership.\nConclusion: Rooted in Chinese Confucian values, paternalistic leadership has been shown to have significant positive effects in many Asian countries. However, misunderstanding of this form of leadership behaviour in Western societies may impede its further development. The present study enhances the understanding of paternalism in a Finnish organisational context by illuminating the effect of such leadership on the occupational well-being of immigrant Chinese knowledge workers. The findings indicate that some aspects of paternalism may have beneficial outcomes for these employees. Specifically, we showed that benevolence as a form of paternalistic leadership has a positive effect on the occupational well-being of Chinese immigrants in a knowledge-intensive organisational context in Finland. We contend that it may be appropriate for Finnish managers to consider benevolence as a leadership strategy to advance occupational well-being and to address challenges in this regard among immigrant Chinese employees.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to enhance the understanding of paternalistic leadership behaviour in the Finnish organisational context by investigating its relationship with Chinese immigrant employees' occupational well-being.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This research was based on a survey of 117 Chinese immigrants working in Finland. The snowball sampling method was adopted in the present research.\nFindings: The findings show that the dimensions of paternalistic leadership, specifically benevolent leadership behaviour, can be influential in Chinese immigrant knowledge workers' occupational well-being in the Finnish organisational context.\nResearch limitations/implications: Paternalistic leadership style can also make sense in a Western organisational context, especially when dealing with well-being among immigrant employees from China or other Asian countries.\nOriginality/value: Some misunderstanding of paternalistic leadership behaviour in Western societies may impede the theory's further development. The study enhanced the understanding of paternalism in the Finnish organisational context by illuminating the effect of paternalistic leadership on Chinese immigrant employees' occupational well-being.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
ERP use and value: Portuguese and Spanish SMEs	[ "Portugal", "Spain", "Resource management", "Small to medium‐sized enterprises", "Enterprise resource planning", "Diffusion of innovation", "Resource‐based view", "Post‐adoption", "Use", "Value" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1 Introduction: As suggested in the literature, innovation is identified more and more as the transformative force that creates and shapes new economies in today's digital world. Firms often adopt information systems (IS) to upgrade or improve their business performance and be more competitive (Ho and Tai, 2004). Davenport (1998) qualified enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems as the most important development in enterprises' use of information technology (IT). ERP's main purpose is to integrate functions of financial management, supply chain management, and customer relationship management to the greatest extent possible. Such systems manage both information and resources by supporting execution of operational transactions and advanced planning, alongside real-time data access (Klaus et al., 2000).As with many other technological innovations, ERP systems were initially implemented mostly in large organizations, and this has probably been the main reason for research to focus on large enterprises. Although small and medium enterprises (SMEs) have been adopting ERP systems for many years, the literature reveals that little attention has been given to research on ERP in SMEs, and less on cross-national studies. Moreover, according to the European Commission (2011), 99 per cent of all European firms have fewer than 250 employees, and both Portugal and Spain adhere to this profile, and with the same percentage. Because SMEs are the backbone of the economy, important for increasing productivity and gaining competitive advantage, as well as being important drivers of innovation and transformation, it is valuable to study ERP at the SME level across countries (Hitt et al., 2002; Raymond and Uwizeyemungu, 2007; Chuang et al., 2009; Maguire et al., 2010).As the impact of IT systems on a firm's performance is mostly long term and indirect, measures of the value to business are linked primarily to system usage (Devaraj and Kohli, 2003; Zhu and Kraemer, 2005). The current investigation explores an alternative way to understand and measure IT value by studying ERP in its post-adoption phases; use and value. We develop and test a model based on the diffusion of innovation (DOI) model and resource-based view (RBV) theory.The theoretical perspectives and research model proposed to explain use and value are outlined in next two sections. The appropriateness of the model is then tested using a sample of 558 firms. Tests for differences based on Portugal and Spain are also conducted. Finally, we discuss our results and offer implications and conclusions.\n2 Theoretical perspectives: 2.1 ERP use and DOI\n3 Research model and hypotheses: The post-adoption model shown in Figure 1 outlines our proposal that the DOI model explains \"ERP use\" and RBV theory explains \"ERP value\". The left-hand side shows the extent of \"ERP use\", influenced by six factors embedded in the DOI context: compatibility, complexity, efficiency, best-practices, training, and competitive pressure. On the right-hand we postulate that \"ERP value\" is explained by: \"ERP use\", collaboration, and analytics.3.1 Hypotheses to explain use\n4 Research methodology and data: A survey methodology is proposed for data collection to validate the research model and test its nine hypotheses. Each survey item-question was reviewed for content validity by ERP experts; three academics and two consultants. The initial questionnaires were pilot tested on ten firms, and some items were revised for clarity. The finalized questionnaire was designed to be answered in 15 minutes (Malhotra and Birks, 2007). With the assistance of International Data Corporation (IDC) we conducted a web-survey during September and October 2011. To ensure the generalization of the survey results, the sampling was stratified by country (Portugal and Spain), by firm size (fewer than 250 employees), and by industry (finance, distribution, manufacturing, and professional services). Questionnaires were translated into the two languages and sent only to firms that use ERP in conducting their business. In total, 1,400 (1,000 Spanish and 400 Portuguese) firms received the email survey, and 558 valid responses were returned (424 Spanish and 134 Portuguese). Table I shows the sample characteristics; approximately 70 per cent of Portuguese firms responded that they had been using ERP for less than five years, while Spanish firms expressed 40 per cent. The wide range of the respondent and industry types, suggests the good quality of the data source.The constructs were operationalized on the basis of a literature review (the Appendix). Constructs were measured using a survey instrument and multiple indicator items to strengthen validity. Whereas the \"ERP use\" construct was measured by items calling for responses in percentages, all other constructs were measured by item responses on a five-point Likert scale ranging from 1 - low to 5 - high. The control variables used were country, size, and industry type.\n5 Data analysis and results: A structural equation model was conducted to empirically assess the constructs theorized above. Because our purpose is to exam the validity of the constructs and does not require normal distribution for the variables, we used the partial least squares (PLS) as implemented in the software SmartPLS. We performed the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test and confirmed that none of the items measured are distributed normally (p<0.001). In accordance with Chin (1998), factor loadings should be at least 0.6 and preferably greater than 0.7. For this reason CB3, CX1, TN1, CP2, and ERPU1 question-items of Appendix were excluded from our research model following the PLS model estimation due to low loadings. We retain the items presented in Table II, except for BP2 (0.691), all other items have loadings above 0.7 and are significant at p<0.001. Furthermore, Table II shows that composite reliability (CR) and average variance extracted (AVE) for each construct are above the cut-off of 0.7 and 0.5, respectively, (Hair et al., 1998).In short, our measurement model satisfies convergent validity criteria. Consequently, the constructs developed can be used to test the conceptual model and its hypotheses.We tested the conceptual model by using both the full sample and the sample split between Portugal and Spain. Figure 2 shows the path coefficients and t-statistics (in parentheses) derived from bootstrapping (300 resamples), as well as the R2 values for dependent constructs.The analysis of hypotheses for the full sample was based on the examination of the standardized paths shown in Figure 2(a). For \"ERP use\", all six DOI determinants; compatibility, complexity, efficiency, best-practices, training, and competitive pressure, have positive and statistically significant paths leading to the dependent construct. Although the path associated with complexity is statistically significant, it does not have the negative sign that we expected. Therefore, all hypotheses (except H2) dealing with \"ERP use\" are supported. In addition, the model shows a significantly positive link from use to value (0.058), thus supporting H7. Collaboration and analytics are also shown to have significantly positive associations with \"ERP value\"; hence, H8 and H9 are supported. To assess model fit, we present R2 values in Figure 2(a), which indicates how well the antecedents explain the dependent construct. An examination of the R2 values shows that all six DOI determinants explains the variability of \"ERP use\" in 35.9 per cent, and \"ERP use\", collaboration and analytics determinants explain the variability of \"ERP value\" in 55.2 per cent, suggesting a good fit for the model.The analysis of hypotheses on the Portuguese and Spanish subsamples was also based on the examination of the standardized paths shown in Figure 2(b) and (c), respectively. In the Portuguese subsample, for \"ERP use\", although complexity has a negative path while the other five factors have positive paths, all six DOI determinants are statistically significant. Thus, H1-H6 regarding \"ERP use\" are supported. In addition, the model indicates a strong link from \"ERP use\" to \"ERP value\" (H7). Although collaboration (H8) has a stronger relationship (0.518) with \"ERP value\" than analytics (H9), both H8 and H9 are supported. Regarding the Portuguese subsample, based on this model 52.9 per cent of the \"ERP use\" variability was explained by six determinants, and 58.2 per cent of the \"ERP value\" variability was explained by three determinants.In the Spanish subsample, for \"ERP use\", although all six DOI determinants are positive, only four are found to be significant; compatibility and efficiency are insignificant. Complexity was expected to be negative and therefore, H4-H6 for \"ERP use\" are supported. The model shows a not significant link between \"ERP use\" and \"ERP value\", hence H7 is not confirmed. As in the Portuguese subsample, the Spanish shows a significantly positive association of collaboration and analytics with \"ERP value\". Hence, H8 and H9 are supported. For Spain, best-practices, training, and competitive pressure explain the variability of \"ERP use\" in 33.3 per cent and, \"ERP use\", collaboration, and analytics explain the variability of \"ERP value\" in 56.4 per cent.In a deeper analysis, we tested the differences between the path coefficients across the Portugal and Spain subsamples. Table III shows that regarding \"ERP use\"; training has no statistically significant differences (p>0.10) between countries, being equally important for both Portuguese and Spanish firms. Whereas best-practices, compatibility, and efficiency are more important factors to Portuguese firms, competitive pressure is more important to Spanish firms. Moreover, complexity is found to be an important inhibitor for Portuguese firms and a facilitator for Spanish. Regarding \"ERP value\"; whereas \"ERP use\" and collaboration are more important for Portuguese firms, analytics is more important to Spanish firms.Overall, the above results provide support for the cross-country differences in the determinants shaping ERP use and value in which firms adopt IT, thereby supporting H10.\n6 Discussion: The purpose of this paper is to identify the determinants that explain ERP post-adoption with regard to usage and value and to determine the magnitude of variations across Portugal and Spain. Empirical results support our theoretical model, and all hypotheses have been tested on full sample and subsamples. Both academic and managerial implications are discussed below.Full sample\n7 Conclusion: Consistent with DOI and RBV, we developed and empirically evaluated a research model for assessing ERP use and value at the firm level. While these are usually studied separately, our study proposes that use and value are closely associated for the post-adoption stages. Besides being the first model applied to Iberian SMEs, our study contributes to the literature by moving beyond dichotomous \"adoption versus non-adoption\" linking actual usage to value creation, and adds transactional efficiency and collaboration as important determinants for Portuguese firms, as well as business analytics, but more important for Spanish firms. For \"ERP\" use, our study has examined six DOI determinants; whereas competitive pressure, training and best-practices are important to both Portuguese and Spanish firms, cross-country analysis also shows complexity to be an important inhibitor for \"ERP use\" among Portuguese firms, but a facilitator for Spanish. In addition, while for Portuguese, compatibility and efficiency are significant, they are not for Spanish. For \"ERP value\" (and consistent with RBV), our study demonstrates that the degree of \"ERP use\" and IT-enhanced capabilities such as collaboration and analytics, contribute to value creation from ERP. Moreover, our study reveals that for Portuguese firms \"ERP value\" is mainly explained by \"ERP use\", collaboration, and analytics, whereas for Spanish firms \"ERP value\" is mainly explained by collaboration and analytics capabilities. Finally, our study exposes that both countries' SMEs are not using ERPs as a transaction processing system alone, but also as a front-end application.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - Consistent with the diffusion of innovation (DOI) model and resource-based view (RBV) theory, the purpose of this paper is to develop a research model for measuring enterprise resource planning (ERP) post-adoption and its consequence on small and medium enterprise (SME) performance.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The model links six determinants based on DOI to explain \"ERP use\" and three on RBV to explain the \"ERP value\", on which nine hypotheses are postulated. Testing was conducted through structural equation modelling, utilizing data from 558 web-surveyed firms in Portugal and Spain.\nFindings: - Full sample analysis finds that competitive pressure, training, best-practices, compatibility, and efficiency are important antecedents of \"ERP use\". Together with usage, collaboration and analytics capabilities contribute to \"ERP value\". Cross-country analysis reveals that complexity is an important inhibitor for \"ERP use\" in Portuguese firms whereas it is a facilitator for Spanish firms. In addition, while for Portuguese firms, compatibility and efficiency are significant, they are not for Spanish firms. For \"ERP value\", while use and collaboration are more important for Portuguese firms, analytics is more important for Spanish.\nResearch limitations/implications: - The paper provides insight into how SMEs use and value ERP; however, the authors cannot speak empirically on the issue of whether value is sustained, or on maturity stages, or on the impact of different industries.\nOriginality/value: - The paper describes the first empirical research study on Iberian SMEs, thus adding a cross-country dimension to the innovation diffusion literature. Unlike the typical focus on ERP adoption found in the literature, this paper focuses on post-adoption stages, linking usage with value.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
The effect of partner buffering on the risk of unemployment in Finland	[ "Unemployment", "Household", "Dual earner model", "Partner effect" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The Nordic welfare state and economic strategy is built on the high labour market participation of men and women over their life course, and the dual-earner model is a cornerstone of this policy. From a theoretical point of view, prevailing research offers mostly favourable assessments of the dual-earner employment model compared to the breadwinner and single-earner models. There are sound reasons for such a positive interpretation, but there are some well-argued reservations as well.\n2. Theory and hypotheses: In the Nordic countries and elsewhere in Europe - in both the former communist states and the industrially advanced nations - dual-earner employment became the norm because of the symmetric engagement of mothers and fathers in the labour market. This model was seen as the most efficient way to increase the employment rate, improve the economic and social equity of men and women, increase the level of welfare and productivity, and transfer care responsibilities from the mother to the father and from the family to society (Leira, 1992, 2002; Ellingsaeter, 1998; Ellingsaeter and Leira, 2006).\n3. Research design: 3.1 Data and sample\n4. Empirical results: 4.1 Results of the first-step analysis: micro-level determinants of unemployment risks\n5. Discussion and conclusion: Even in hard times, the Finnish economy has had a comparative advantage in adapting to external economic shocks, but we did not know how the dual-earner model, when compared with other household models, works in times of economic cycles or the major restructuring and retrenching of the welfare state. In this paper, we studied how households buffer unemployment risks under the changing macro-economic conditions of labour markets. Based on European LFS microdata for Finland for the period from 2005 to 2013, we found empirical evidence in support of the argument that the partner effect (dual-earner household) turns out to be an important regulator of unemployment risk.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to outline the study to determine whether the dual earner model better offsets the actual risk of unemployment compared to other household models.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The authors linked the partner effect (household type) with macroeconomic institutional settings, such as employment protection, the active labour market policy, economic growth rate and globalisation, to study how these micro- and macro-level factors influence the unemployment risk of individuals.\nFindings: Using European Labour Force Survey (EU-LFS) microdata for Finland from 2005 to 2013 and a multilevel modelling technique, the authors found that the partner effect is an important regulator of unemployment risks, but the effect is modified by institutional factors. Dual earners and breadwinners experience a less significant effect from employment protection legislation regulation and other external factors on the increase or decrease in unemployment risk compared to singles. The authors also found that unemployed singles are more exposed and vulnerable to fluctuations caused by economic events.\nOriginality/value: In this way, this paper contributes to the sociological theory of labour markets and a better understanding of how different household types buffer and mediate the risks of unemployment. The authors used the EU-LFS and novel multilevel analysis statistical solutions to determine the impact of macro- and micro-level factors. The case of Finland may also be of broader interest to researchers and policy-makers because of the long and strong tradition of the dual earner employment pattern and strong macro-economic fluctuations.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
The advocacy-growth nexus: the case of the Egyptian banking sector	[ "Developing Countries", "Emerging markets", "Alliances", "Economic growth", "Private sector" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The 18-day nationwide sit-ins at the main squares of Egyptian cities at the dawn of 2011 caught the world off guard. Never had political experts expected such a determined uprising by what was perceived to be a politically dormant nation. Economic analysts were surprised at the fury of a people whose economy was able to sustain an average annual growth rate of 5 per cent since the 1990s. But what could have caused the rage and torment that were equally displayed by the underprivileged Egyptian masses and the affluent intelligentsia?\nPrivate sector advocacy in the banking sector: The Schumpeterian elite theory of democratic leadership displays private sector advocates and political entrepreneurs as elites who influence public opinion and mould policies (Schumpeter, 1942). As entrepreneurial activity flourished in the USA in the wake of Second World War, the theory of elite pluralism was developed by Schattschneider (1960), positing that members of the affluent elite and policy-planning networks collectively acquire access to some levers of policymaking and resource allocation. Concurrently, social corporatism cropped up to resolve class struggles, hence protecting private ownership in exchange for granting labour unions political recognition and decision-making roles (Katzenstein, 1984). Neo-corporatism evolved from this model, stipulating that such relationships would breed cronyism as large businesses assume the dual roles of producers and politicians (Wood and Harcourt, 2000).\nThe two-stage empirical model: There are a number of factors that render advocacy evaluation a difficult task. First, many of the goals of private sector advocacy do not materialise immediately. Advocates also continuously adapt their strategies. Since there are usually multiple actors campaigning simultaneously, it is difficult to establish and evaluate the contributions of each actor. To avoid bias, it is advisable to use a statistical concept that measures the degree of contribution of advocacy efforts. In this paper, a two-stage model is constructed. The first stage attempts to measure advocacy using confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), which is considered a highly efficient statistical procedure for testing hypothesised factor structures (Byrne, 2001). In the second stage, a parsimonious model measures the relationship between advocacy and macroeconomic performance.\nConclusion and policy implications: Concurrent with the crony relationships in the Egyptian banking sector, two factors have resulted in the rise of growth alliances and good private sector advocacy practices since the turn of the century. First, the level of cronyism that peaked since the appointment of the so-called \"2005-Businessmen Cabinet\" led to the emergence of counter-groups undertaking a broad range of initiatives to foster fair competition and entrepreneurial activity. A counter-corruption movement also evolved after the Bank Reform Plan of 2004, wherein some ministries and central bankers invited the business community to reshape some procedures, national strategies and policies.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The Egyptian banking sector has acted as an arena for multiple alliances, some of which bred crony capitalism and others acted as growth alliances. The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of private sector advocacy in the Egyptian banking sector on macroeconomic performance, with the prime aim of designing an Egyptian-centric roadmap outlining precepts of good advocacy between bankers, policymakers and businesses.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The study uses a two-stage model. In the first stage an advocacy construct is developed using confirmatory factor analysis. In the second stage the relationship between advocacy and macroeconomic growth is measured by running a set of parsimonious regressions.\nFindings: The empirical results show a strong relationship between advocacy and growth, albeit not on inflation rates, suggesting that an innovative set of public policy instruments is needed to promote private advocacy efforts and to institutionalise private-public partnerships. This is an innately pressing mission for the new government to mitigate the impact of the double-digit inflation that has prevailed since the Triple-F - food, fuel and finance - Crisis of 2006.\nPractical implications: The ousted Egyptian government failed to protect its citizens from crony alliances and corruption, be it abuse of public resources or unfair access to bank credit. Hence, the prime aim is to design a future roadmap for the endorsement of effective growth alliances between businesses, bankers and policymakers. The recommendations proposed by this study would prove helpful to future public policymakers in the fulfilment of the macroeconomic aspirations of the Egyptian society as well as to other emerging and developing nations that share similar problems.\nSocial implications: The research addresses how reforms can be designed in an egalitarian fashion to direct credit to growth enhancing and job-generating sectors since a prompt treatment of these problems at their roots is apt to minimise the probabilities of future social turmoil. This is apt to assist the Egyptian people to transition to a truly democratic society and to convert street rebellions into inclusive institutional activism.\nOriginality/value: This paper adds to the literature a measurable construct gauging the relationship between advocacy in the banking sector and growth. Another contribution is the set of policies proposed to institutionalise rightful advocacy efforts.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Just talking about my generation: Why old and young employees need each other	[ "Mentoring", "Organizational development", "Ageing workers", "Intergenerational learning", "Knowledge building", "Organizational generations" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: You cannot teach an old dog new tricks. Or so they say, but if the \"old dogs\" reference is a euphemism for the older working person, the saying had better not be true. The older workers - particularly the baby boomer generation born between 1946 and 1964 - are likely to be part of the workforce for a while longer than might have been expected as falling birth rates after the post-war \"boom\" and later retirement ages caused by the economic needs of the person concerned and the economy as a whole, combine to create a higher average age of the workforce.\nGrandparents - and grandchildren - demonstrate interactive process: Negative perceptions about older workers' unwillingness to participate in training and development influence management decisions. Low participation is problematic for any organization that relies heavily on human capital as a means of production, because training and development of workers has a direct influence on sustained competitive advantage. According to the European Commission, 40 percent of employees between the ages of 25-34 in European work organizations took part in some form of education and training, while for the 55-64 year age group - considered here to be \"older workers\" - participation was less than 12 percent.\nGenerational diversity as an explicit factor: It seems that IGL is an effective way that people from different ages, learning styles, values and motivations learn together. In this sense, IGL seems like a promising a chance for organizations to capitalize on an ageing worker population. However, there is currently little knowledge of what IGL in an organization looks like, how effective it is as a way to organize learning in the workplace, what organizational problems it might help solve, or how it might be organized.\nSocial capital an especially important outcome for organizations: Organizational IGL leads to outcomes similar to those found in sociology and education, namely a reduction in negative stereotypes, expansion of networks, feelings of inclusion, and knowledge and skills development. However, in an organizational setting other outcomes are also possible and even desired (learning at work is usually meant to benefit the greater organization). From this standpoint, benefits for the individual are eclipsed by the organization's goals and thus are actually of secondary concern. In contrast to IGL in sociology or education, where individual learning is the focus, IGL in organizations is focused on improving organizational capacity, either by raising the knowledge and skill levels of employees, stimulating new knowledge-building, or by improving organizational processes.\nComment: This review is based on \"Intergenerational learning in organizations\" by Donald Ropes which gives managers ideas about organizing intergenerational learning as a strategy for dealing with an ageing worker population. Understanding different generations in an organization is important because each one can be considered as a sub-group that exhibits similar tendencies related to work and learning. This means that generations need to be approached in different ways when considering any organizational learning program.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: This paper aims to review the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoint practical implications from cutting-edge research and case studies.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This briefing is prepared by an independent writer who adds their own impartial comments and places the articles in context.\nFindings: You cannot teach an old dog new tricks. Or so they say, but if the \"old dogs\" reference is a euphemism for the older working person, the saying had better not be true. The older workers - particularly the baby boomer generation born between 1946 and 1964 - are likely to be part of the workforce for a while longer than might have been expected as falling birth rates after the post-war \"boom\" and later retirement ages caused by the economic needs of the person concerned and the economy as a whole, combine to create a higher average age of the workforce.\nPractical implications: The paper provides strategic insights and practical thinking that have influenced some of the world's leading organizations.\nOriginality/value: The briefing saves busy executives and researchers hours of reading time by selecting only the very best, most pertinent information and presenting it in a condensed and easy-to digest format.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Demographic differences in using knowledge creation tools among faculty members	[ "Knowledge", "Knowledge creation", "Knowledge management", "Knowledge driven organizations", "Knowledge creation tools", "Academic institutions", "Universities", "Faculty members", "UAE" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Knowledge management (KM) is the appropriate application and implementation of knowledge development process. It is about making sure that an organization has an ability to provide all it needs for creating, preserving, disseminating and using knowledge as needed. Peter Drucker concisely defined KM as \"the coordination and exploitation of organizations knowledge resources, in order to create benefit and competitive advantage\" (Drucker, 1999, p. 157). Bukowitz and Williams (1999) connect KM to tactical and strategic requirements of any organization. According to them, the focus of KM is on the use and enhancement of knowledge-based assets to allow an organization to respond to these issues. Wellman (2009) confines the scope of KM to problems solved and the techniques used in solving those problems. He argues that knowledge creation is often perceived as a separate discipline and generally falls under innovation management.\nThe review of related studies: In respect to the concept of knowledge creation, many organizations and institutions are increasingly concerned with the provision and the use of effective tools for knowledge creation (Zlotin and Zusman, 2005). As a result, knowledge-intensive organizations are spending a lot of money on knowledge creation tools (Roth, 2003). The tools allow academic institutions to connect faculty members, facilitate knowledge exchange, learning, and knowledge retention (Upadhyaya and Pillai, 2016). This implies that the use of knowledge creation tools is a cornerstone for investigating knowledge cation. Such investigation is vital to the improvement of KM within an organization. A study by Tian et al. (2009) reported that many faculty members at the Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology were not familiar with or have not understood the function and advantage of knowledge creation tools in the process of managing knowledge.\nStudy framework: A tool is an instrument or a device used for producing or getting something. Technology tools can be used for capturing, creating, sharing, acquisition and application of knowledge. Therefore, it is important to categorize different types of knowledge management tools. According to Rudy Ruggles cited by Dalkir (2011), knowledge management technologies are tools that intervene in knowledge processing to enhance and enable knowledge generation, codification and transfer. Rollett (2003) categorized KM technologies into nine categories:\nNew and emerging KM technologies: Technology is rapidly changing. Likewise, knowledge management tools are continuously growing and changing; therefore, from time to time we can see new and emerging tools. Dalkir (2011) listed Folksonomies and Metadata as emerging KM technologies. Since then, three new tools have been considered as major new and emerging KM tools (Dave et al., 2012; Pande et al., 2013). The tools are Enterprise 2, Semantic Web (Web 3), and Ubiquitous Technologies.\nResearch hypotheses: The main aim of this study is to investigate demographic differences in using knowledge creation tools. It also attempts to identify the most knowledge creation tool used among faculty members. In this context, the researchers test, verify and validate the following hypotheses:\nResearch methods: The target populations for this study are faculty members affiliated with accredited universities and colleges in UAE. This population is chosen because academic institutions are considered knowledge management organizations which play a vital role in creating and transmitting scientific knowledge (Tian et al., 2009). Prior to the sample selection, the researchers identified and selected 26 out 78 accredited academic institutions in UAE (Table II). This selection was based on the type of programs offered by each institution. Institutions offering at least a bachelor degree programs of any specializations or disciplines are included in the study. Likewise, institutions offering less than a bachelor degree program are excluded from this study,\nFindings: The participants\nDiscussions and conclusion: The current study has investigated demographic differences in using knowledge creation tools among faculty members. The study found that PKM is the most used knowledge creation tool by the respondents, followed by authoring tools and templates. The results support the previous research that found the use of PKM popular among faculty members (Stroud et al., 2005). In fact, the study of Cheong and Tsui (2010) found that the use of PKM improves individual and organizational competencies. Therefore, academic institutions should encourage and support the use of PKM tools among faculty members. This can be achieved through the provision of sufficient and up-to-date PKM tools and devices, and also through relevant training, workshops, etc.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this study is to investigate and analyze demographic differences in using knowledge creation tools among faculty members. It also attempts to identify the most knowledge creation tool used by the participants. The tools comprised of 13 items including data mining, metadata, classifications, expert profiling, Mashup and blogs.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Data were collected through an online survey questionnaire. A total of 300 faculty members from 26 universities and colleges accredited by the UAE Ministry of High Education participated in the study. The t-test and analysis of variance (ANOVA) test are used to validate the stated hypotheses.\nFindings: The study found personal knowledge management to be the most used knowledge creation tool among the faculty members, followed by authoring tools and templates. Findings of the study indicate statistically no significant difference in using knowledge creation tools with respect to gender, qualification, academic rank, teaching experience and institutional affiliation. These findings support the stated null hypotheses (H1, H3, H4, H6 and H8) and suggest that the use of knowledge creation tools is independent from these variables. However, the results showed statistically a significant age group difference, academic specialization and research experience in using knowledge creation tools. The findings reject the assumed hypotheses (H2, H5 and H7) and suggest the impact of these variables on the use of knowledge creation tools.\nResearch limitations/implications: The paper is based on the data collected through a survey questionnaire. Future studies may combine quantitative and qualitative data collection methods for the purpose of comparison and in-depth analysis.\nPractical implications: Findings could be an important reference for knowledge management officers and knowledge intensive organizations and institutions to develop knowledge creation tools and promote usage among knowledge workers.\nOriginality/value: The paper represents one of the very few empirical studies conducted on the use of knowledge creation tools. Findings of the study may contribute to the process of knowledge creation among faculty members and also to the improvement of knowledge management in the academic environment and other knowledge organizations.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Pricing objectives and pricing methods in the services sector	[ "Service industries", "Pricing policy", "Greece" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: An executive summary for managers and executive readers can be found at the end of this article.\nIntroduction: A number of different authors have underlined the importance of pricing decisions for every company's profitability and long-term survival. For instance, Nagle and Holden (1995, p. 1) point out:[...] if effective product development, promotion and distribution sow the seeds of business success, effective pricing is the harvest. Although effective pricing can never compensate for poor execution of the first three elements, ineffective pricing can surely prevent those efforts form resulting in financial success.Moreover, Marn and Rosiello (1992), Simon (1992), Lovelock (1996), and Shipley and Jobber (2001) have suggested that pricing is the only element of the marketing mix that produces revenues for the firm, while all the others are related to expenses. Diamantopoulos (1991) has also argued that price is the most flexible element of marketing strategy in that pricing decisions can be implemented relatively quickly in comparison with the other elements of marketing strategy.Despite this significance of pricing as an element of the company's marketing strategy, there seems to be a lack of interest among marketing academics on this issue, which has brought Nagle and Holden (1995) to suggest that pricing is the most neglected element of the marketing mix. Within this context, the empirical research that has been conducted on the field of pricing is very limited, while this is even more evident in the case of services. However, the distinctive characteristics of services (intangibility, heterogeneity, perishability and inseparability) necessitate a closer look at the way at which services are priced (Schlissel and Chasin, 1991; Zeithaml and Bitner, 1996; Kurtz and Clow, 1998; Langeard, 2000; Hoffman et al., 2002).Given this lack of empirical research, this paper tries to contribute to this neglected topic by investigating the pricing objectives that service organizations pursue along with the pricing methods that they adopt in order to set their prices. In addition to this, an effort is being made to examine the extent to which the pricing objectives are associated with the pricing methods adopted. A review of the existing literature reveals that these two issues have been examined in isolation (Schlissel, 1977; Zeithaml et al., 1985; Morris and Fuller, 1989; Meidan and Chin, 1995), while, to the best of our knowledge, no previous research has investigated the extent to which the pricing objectives pursued are associated with the pricing methods.Thus, the objectives of the present study are twofold:1. To examine the pricing objectives pursued along with the pricing methods adopted by service organizations.2. To investigate whether the pricing objectives pursued are associated with the pricing methods adopted.The paper is organized as follows: a comprehensive review of the existing literature on pricing objectives and pricing methods is presented along with the research methodology used. Moreover, the data analysis and the discussion of results are reported, while at the end of the paper the conclusions and the implications of the main findings of the study are presented.\nLiterature review: Pricing objectives\nResearch methodology: Sample and data collection\nData analysis and discussion of research results: Pricing objectives\nConclusion: The objectives of this research were to investigate the pricing objectives that service organizations pursue along with the pricing methods that they adopt and the extent to which these objectives and methods are associated. Collecting data from 170 service organizations through personal interviews, it was found that the companies in our sample are fundamentally pursuing qualitative rather than quantitative objectives with a particular emphasis being placed on attracting new customers, maintaining the existing ones and satisfying their needs. Other important objectives were found to be the service quality leadership, the creation of a prestige image of the company and the long-term survival.However, the service organizations in our sample seem to pay very little attention in adopting customer oriented methods perhaps due to the difficulty in determining their customers' demand and needs. They tend to use the traditional cost-plus methods perhaps due to the simplicity associated with these methods. Moreover, the intensive competitive environment that they face tends to force them to price according to the market's average prices.It is also interesting to note the association of pricing objectives and pricing methods as it was identified in our study. In particular, the customer-related objectives along with the competition-related objectives were found to be associated positively with the method of pricing according to the market's average prices, while the service quality-related objectives and the maximization of profits and sales objective were found to be associated negatively with this specific method. Moreover, the financial objectives along with the achievement of satisfactory profits and sales objective were associated positively with the method of target return pricing, while the stability in the market objective was associated negatively with this method. Furthermore, the competition-related objectives were associated positively with the method of pricing according to the dominant price in the market and the method of pricing below competitors, while the market share and capacity-related objectives were also associated positively with the method of pricing below competitors.It is clear from the above that the competition-related objectives are bound to have a bearing on competition-based methods (i.e. pricing according to the dominant price in the market and pricing below competitors), whereas the financial objectives have a bearing on cost-based methods (i.e. target return pricing), as we should expect.\nManagerial implications: This study indicates that the suggestions made by marketing academics regarding the need to incorporate customers' needs and demands into the company's pricing behavior is embedded in the pricing objectives of the companies in our sample. However, regarding their pricing methods they seem to rely on the traditional cost-plus method. This is not surprising given the easiness associated with its implementation along with the difficulty in following customer-based methods. As Cram (1996, p. 38) has suggested \"pricing will always be a challenging area ... Perhaps future answers will come less from thinking of the price as the point of a single transaction and more from seeing pricing as a means of securing customer loyalty\". Certainly, this is not an easy task and necessitates a different mentality towards pricing that will favor formal market research in order to understand customers' attitudes and needs. However, as Nagle and Holden (1995) have suggested, such an approach may improve the quality of pricing decisions. This is intensified by the heavy criticisms surrounding the cost-plus method as placing its emphasis merely on the production cost and disregarding the market conditions. Thus, a clear implication for managers responsible for pricing decisions within their firms is to move away from these simplistic cost-plus formulas and treat pricing from a customer's point of view in all the steps of their pricing process. Within this context, they should always have their customers in mind and to go a step further and endeavor to adapt the cost to their customers' needs.However, such a customer orientation should be integrated within a more general market orientation approach where the pricing practices of competitors are also taken into consideration. This will help the company to reflect more accurately the pricing requirements of its market characteristics and conditions. The fact that the pricing method of pricing according to the market's average price was the second most popular method among the companies in our sample is indicative on this issue. Thus, managers need to continuously pay attention to competitors' pricing behavior as the only \"sure-fire\" way to ensure that they stay in the market. Any attempt to price the offered services above or below the market's average prices should be justified only when a higher quality service is offered to the market.Moreover, the fact that different pricing objectives were found to lead to different pricing methods reflects the need to have a coherent pricing strategy if effective pricing decisions are to be made. Thus, it seems that the selection of a particular pricing method should be guided by the pricing objectives and goals that the company has set a priori and endeavored to achieve these objectives. As Garda (1991) has suggested:... a common mistake for many companies is to treat pricing in a non-systematic way and regard its various components as independent to each other.Managers might have to gain a lot by placing more emphasis on such an integrated pricing approach and implement pricing methods that are in line with the pricing objectives that have been initially set.\nLimitations and future research: Although the present study represents a first attempt to examine empirically the relationship between pricing objectives and methods in the services sector, its findings should be treated with caution by the reader. More specifically, the context of the study (Greece) is an obvious limitation since it limits the ability to generalize the results in other countries. Thus, future research that replicates the current study in other countries could further improve our understanding of the concepts presented here.Moreover, another limitation of the study is related to the increased heterogeneity associated with cross-sectional samples (as in the present study) due to the fact that they induce negative effects on the quality of the findings (Bilkey, 1978; Dubinsky and Ingram, 1982). However, such samples can increase their generalizability and have also been adopted by other studies in the field of pricing (Shipley, 1981; Zeithaml et al., 1985; Tzokas et al., 2000a, b).Future research may investigate the impact of the context of the organization and the impact of environmental variables such as the sector of operation, the market structure etc. on the pricing objectives pursued and the pricing methods adopted. Given the multidimensionality of pricing decisions identified in our work, different characteristics of the market for instance might necessitate the adoption of different pricing objectives and pricing methods. Similarly, the company's sector of operation or size could also influence the aforementioned objectives and methods. The examination of these issues could lead to a better understanding of the concepts presented in this paper.Additionally, another avenue for future research may be the investigation of the impact that different pricing objectives and methods have on the achievement of corporate objectives. Within this context, the most effective pricing objectives and methods may be identified as being those that lead to the achievement of corporate goals.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this research paper is to explore the pricing objectives that service companies pursue along with the pricing methods that they adopt in order to set their prices.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - An extensive review of the literature revealed the complete lack of any previous work aiming to investigate the potential association between these two important elements of a company's pricing strategy. Thus, the value of the paper lies in the fact that it presents the first attempt to examine this issue empirically. In order to achieve the research objectives, data were collected from 170 companies operating in six different services sectors in Greece through personal interviews.\nFindings: - The findings of the study reveal that the objectives, which are pursued, are fundamentally qualitative rather than quantitative in their nature with a particular emphasis given on the companies' customers. However, the pricing methods, which are adopted by the majority of the companies, refer to the traditional cost-plus method and the pricing according to the market's average prices. The study also revealed that the pricing objectives are, as should be expected, associated with the pricing methods.\nPractical implications: - The practical implications of the findings refer to the fact that managers might gain a lot by placing their emphasis on an integrated pricing approach and implement pricing methods that are in line with the pricing objectives that have been initially set. However, the context of the study (Greece) is an obvious limitation to the ability to generalize these findings, suggesting the need for future research that replicates the current study in other countries.\nOriginality/value: - Managers might gain a lot by placing their emphasis on an integrated pricing approach and implement pricing methods that are in line with the pricing objectives that have been initially set.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
The long tail of loyalty: how personalized dialogue and customized rewards will change marketing forever	[ "Customer loyalty", "Consumer marketing", "Customer retention", "Customer relations" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: It is more than the latest marketing catch phrase - through diligent application of dialogue marketing, network-building and relevant rewards, smart companies are opening up new vistas in customer retention and lifetime value.\nHP: long-tail networking: Marketers, academics and theoretical statisticians all have written about the power of networked systems. Palo Alto, California-based computer systems and software manufacturer Hewlett-Packard (HP), meanwhile, has demonstrated the power of networks in the real world. By building a forum by which IT software end-users can connect both with HP and with each other, the company has addressed the long-tail needs of their individual customers to create loyalty to their OpenView management portfolio and OpenCall telco portfolio software products - and to the HP brand.\"HP is known for great customer relationships,\" says Tiffany Tuell, Global Customer Loyalty Manager for HP's software business. \"With the Fortune 500 enterprises and SMB [small to medium] businesses we serve, our new challenge is to build on the tradition of a great customer experience after a sale is made and to reach the real users of our products- the IT users, not only the buying decision-maker.\"In 2003, Tuell and her team were sitting on four years' worth of customer feedback telling them that their customers craved a deeper relationship with the brand. These seasoned IT professionals sought a proactive push of information about how to better leverage their HP software tools. They wanted better product training. They needed information and awareness of HP's related products and services. Customers enjoyed their relationships with HP's sales force, but those conversations largely revolved around transactional details. They wanted more.\"After all, software is about knowledge,\" says Tuell. \"In this space, it is easy to get feature-and-functioned out. The real strength of our brand is the relationship we already have with our customers.\"Given this customer mandate, Tuell set a challenge for her team: manage those IT user relationships. Give them greater knowledge of how to use and apply HP software by building a network where they could collaborate with HP's own product and support staff and share knowledge with each other. Through a customer loyalty initiative, HP would help their technical end-users do their jobs better and deliver a higher return on their business' investment in HP software.Their solution, HP Software's Customer Connection program, puts the long-tail dialogue approach into practice on a global scale. Ostensibly underscored by a web-based loyalty portal for HP's OpenView and OpenCall software end-users, the members-only Customer Connection program allows each of the 5,000 registered program members to connect to all of their HP software needs from a single source, access global HP software experts for advice, and expand their technical and business knowledge with members-only education seminars and feedback sessions. Members also enjoy participation in exclusive contests and incentive programs, focus groups and survey feedback channels tied directly to HP software.\"We take the 'connection' part very seriously in this program,\" says Tuell. \"To date, the interactive member events have been the number one feature of the program. Customers tell us it's why they stay engaged with us. The time constraints of their jobs are the only reason they do not participate more.\"HP's breakthrough came in realizing that, although many of their end-users shared common concerns, each IT manager using HP software had a myriad of needs that lay outside the mainstream. That led Tuell's team to design a customer loyalty program centered around a portal community and built on self-directed access to the latest product information, technical advice and member-populated forums.Additionally, the online workshops and web-based seminars are archived and self-paced, so members do not have to worry if they miss an event. The program also delivers live, local language and regional member events to HP's European, Middle Eastern, African, Asian and Japanese region customers. IT managers are essentially digital firefighters and live a tough, 24-7 existence that precludes conforming to a vendor's schedule. Customer Connection makes it easy for an individual customer to participate in the program's benefits and features on his timetable - the long-tail dialogue approach in action.\"The more you make yourself accessible and available, the greater the member appreciation,\" says Tuell. \"We're also actively working to personalize those benefits. The end-goal is to create an individualized experience for each member in the Customer Connection program.\"The challenge of a dialogue-only loyalty strategy is how to leverage the information you gain, and how to continue justifying the investment. Can HP really help the software division's bottom line without putting some kind of hard benefit on the table to motivate profitable behavior? Exactly what data should they be collecting?HP's approach is to measure customer experience satisfaction - a broader view that can be difficult to obtain. They collect program feedback through news flashes, regional management contacts and e-mails, phone contacts and live event feedback. Site usage statistics, event activity and renewal of support contacts are also important metrics.\"To demonstrate the business impact, we ultimately want to answer three questions,\" says Tuell. \"How many unique opportunities do we create to touch technical customers? How many more opportunities do we create to talk to them? And are we creating more referrals? We find that many members are referring others within their companies after they join - a true test of loyalty. Still, the opportunity is clearly there for us to do a better job measuring the impact of the program.\"With Customer Connection celebrating its second anniversary this summer, and with 50-100 new signups per week still the norm, the long-tail approach to networked dialogue is paying dividends. The challenge now is to continue to find new ways to appeal to individual IT managers and make them HP loyalists for life.\"We're now looking at how we can further connect with our members and reach higher into the selling model - the CIOs and CEOs who control the IT spend,\" says Tuell. \"We hope to expand Customer Connection so that it becomes a true community of users and a place for them to feel like we're their trusted advisor. We want to be there with their morning Starbucks\" (see Figure 2).\nRain Bird: long-tail rewards: On April 16, 1935, Orton Englehart was granted a patent for his novel watering device described as a \"spring-activated horizontal impact arm driven sprinkler.\" The impact sprinkler was durable and distributed water farther, more evenly and much more efficiently than existing sprinklers of that time. Clem and Mary LaFetra, neighbors of the inventor, recognized the potential impact of Orton's device and set up a manufacturing facility in the family barn. That facility evolved into today's Rain Bird Corporation. In 1990, that original manufacturing facility was designated a historic landmark.Today, with over 4,000 product offerings and sales offices in over 20 countries around the globe, Glendora, California-based Rain Bird Corporation is one of the world's leading irrigation manufacturers. The company originally launched the invitation-only Select Contractor program in 1992 to help professional contractors differentiate themselves from competitors, better market themselves and grow their businesses faster. Several years later, competitors began launching copycat programs, a trend which prompted Rain Bird to launch a points-based contractor loyalty program, Rain Bird Rewards, in 2002. Once again, the program had eligibility criteria and limited enrollment - specifically, a $25,000 per-year purchase threshold.Then in early 2004, Rain Bird marketing manager Dave Magner had an epiphany. Irrigation contractors were not carbon copies of one another, he realized; they came in all shapes and sizes, and those who wanted a deeper relationship with the brand could not get it until they met the program's eligibility requirements. By expanding the program's scope, could Marketing get some of those contractors to consolidate more of their spending with Rain Bird? And what effect could an expanded program have on contractor retention?\"We're very cognizant of increasing customer retention and share-of-customer to further strengthen our market share,\" says Magner. \"We were a first mover, but our competition came out with vanilla responses that weren't as selective as ours. Sales and management recognized the need to revitalize the program to keep it relevant and retain our best customers. It was clear we needed to do something.\"Magner's team needed a program that would provide value, fit in with their corporate culture and trump the competition without falling into a rebate race. So in January 2004, Magner re-launched the Rain Bird Rewards program as an umbrella program and opened it to all irrigation contractors. Essentially, Rain Bird expanded their marketing efforts from the 20 percent of irrigation contractors who could meet Select status to include the 80 percent in the Long Tail who perhaps were smaller fish, but who had the potential to consolidate their irrigation spending with Rain Bird.The new program is designed around a three-tiered structure. What tier a contractor falls depends solely on his level of engagement with the brand. The base level, Rewards Contractor, is open to everyone and allows members to earn 60 base points per $100 spent. The Select Contractor tier is open to those contractors who meet the $25,000 per year threshold and use a minimum of 80 percent Rain Bird products in all installations (members must also be nominated by a Rain Bird sales representative); those members earn 80 base points per $100. Finally, those member contractors who install Rain Bird products exclusively, regardless of their annual spend, achieve 100 percent Select status, which increases their earning rate to 100 points per $100 and gives those smaller contractors room to play in the program.In addition, all three tiers can earn growth points at a rate of 200 for every $100 increase in total purchases they make over the preceding calendar year. Because Rain Bird sells exclusively through distributors, members must self-report purchases by fax or mail in orders to earn points credit.The rewards redemption catalog, meanwhile, is a textbook example of the Gemini Effect - rewards that appeal simultaneously to a business owner's rational and emotional sides. Members can spend their points on rewards that help them grow their business, such as graphic design services, Yellow Pages advertising and web site development. They can take courses to hone their design and installation skills and earn office equipment, tools and work apparel. But they can also redeem points for plasma televisions, digital cameras, golf equipment, Weber grills and personal watercraft.The revised program also offers an impressive layer of soft benefits: a members-only web site and toll-free number; a quarterly Rewards newsletter; access to business development services such as advertising and marketing tools and training; annual conferences in such far flung locales as Cancun and Hawaii; a contractor referral program; and even access to business development funds.To protect their brand, Rain Bird requires all Select Contractors to abide by a Code of Professional Responsibility, in which they pledge to meet all licensing requirements, keep their accounts current with distributors and take advantage of professional development opportunities; in exchange for this pledge, Select Contractors enjoy the right to use the Select Contractor logo in their marketing materials. And the results of this new-look rewards program? Magner focused on enrollment as the main objective for 2004 and, although privately held Rain Bird doesn't share numbers publicly, Magner states that \"we easily exceeded our goal.\" His team is now building additional metrics around customer spend and retention. But the most immediate positive impact has come in one of the toughest aspects of the business: distributor relations.\"All irrigation manufacturers sell their products through distributors, and Rain Bird highly values its distributor partners,\" Magner says. \"The challenge is building the end user relationship while also building the distributor relationship. Distributor support is critical to the success of any manufacturer loyalty program, but some saw our original program as threatening. Now, our distributors look at Rain Bird Rewards and say, 'Why do my own program?'\"Flush with a successful program bringing in new contractors by the day, Magner must now turn his attention to looking at the incoming data to identify trends and opportunities, and continuing to refine and expand the program via market research, brainstorming and testing. He relishes both challenges.\"Rain Bird is a strong brand, and we want to continue to strengthen that brand through everything we do,\" says Magner. \"Rain Bird Rewards is a reflection of the brand, and we're committed to having the best frequency program in the industry and being the best business partner we can be to our customers. When embraced and used effectively in the market, a loyalty program can be a winner for manufacturers, contractors and distributors alike\" (see Figure 3).\nThe end of mass marketing?: With the long-tail effect now part of the marketing lexicon, and with new virtual business models such as Amazon, eBay, Google and Yahoo! marketing everything to everybody all the time, the question now becomes whether this paradigm shift portends the end of the mass-market retailer that can only market the hits to a broad and shallow audience fixated solely on price. Chris Anderson thinks that change is in the air.\"For too long,\" Anderson says, \"we've been suffering the tyranny of lowest-common denominator fare ... the Long Tail is the difference between push and pull, between broadcast and personalized taste. Long-tail businesses can treat customers as individuals, offering mass customization as an alternative to mass-market fare.\"Wal-Mart, Anderson argues, is an example of a business model that may eventually need to evolve or perish. Although Wal-Mart's broad selection and rock-bottom prices may seem egalitarian, they are actually the definition of elitist - to cover their overhead and make a profit, they have to sell at least 100,000 copies of a CD. If you are in a Wal-Mart and looking for music beyond Britney Spears and Toby Keith, then you are out of luck.Even so, Anderson is quick to point out that the long-tail effect does not mean the end of mass-marketing per se. In order to guide consumers into the long tail of personalization, you need to give them a point of entry by covering that 20 percent of the market representing mass appeal.What is interesting about applying the long-tail theory to customer relationships is that loyalty marketers have already been thinking this way for years. Loyalty marketing was borne from the recognition that all customers are not created equal, and that some are more valuable than others. Consequently, loyalty program operators specialize in catering to that 20 percent of their customer base that represents the lion's share of their profits, while simultaneously reaching out to the Long Tail with program enrollment, tier mobility, customized rewards and personalized dialogue. HP's Customer Connection uses long-tail dialogue to build a motivated network of loyal IT end users. Rain Bird uses Rain Bird Rewards to capture share of customer from the long tail of irrigation contractors while retaining the cream of their customer base through the select contractor tier.Loyalty and CRM programs are, in fact, ideally suited to exploiting the long-tail effect while retaining best customers. Cerado's Christopher Carfi believes that those companies who do not practice long-tail marketing techniques are destined to fall by the wayside.\"If what you're trying to do is build the exact same, cookie-cutter relationship with every one of your customers, you're about to miss the boat,\" says Carfi. \"If you enjoy life on the treadmill, then keep doing what you're doing. Otherwise, you need the courage to change your game and start building some bridges. And fast.\"\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - This paper is aimed at describing how companies can find new opportunities for customer retention and lifetime value by applying the concepts of dialogue marketing, network-building and relevant rewards.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The paper cites the work of Chris Anderson, Editor-in-Chief of Wired Magazine, and the work of Italian economist Vilfredo Pareto. The paper explains how the works of these two men, and how programs put into place at two companies (Hewlett-Packard and Rain Bird), have opened new vistas in customer retention.\nFindings: - The study found that by applying specific marketing principles, companies can do a better job of retaining all customers, specifically those customers who are not in the top 20 percent of revenue-producers.\nPractical implications: - Most companies believe that 80 percent of their business comes from 20 percent of their customers. However, by applying specific marketing principles, companies can do a better job of retaining all customers, specifically those customers who are not in the top 20 percent of revenue-producers.\nOriginality/value: - The paper takes a new look at an old principle (the 80-20 Pareto Principle).\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Critical success factors for public-private partnership in water supply projects	[ "Public sector", "Critical success factors", "Private sector", "Public-private partnership", "Developing countries", "Water supply" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Since the late 1980s, public-private partnership (PPP) has attracted the attention of governments across the world (Li et al., 2005) as a preferred means to procure public infrastructure assets and services (Menard and Peeroo, 2011). In the water sector of developing countries, PPP is on the one hand due to governments not having sufficient financial resources to undertake the large-scale investments that are required for water supply projects (Rivera, 1996; Haarmeyer and Mody, 1998) and on the other because of the prospects of improved efficiency, cost effectiveness and innovation in water services (Ranasinghe, 1999; Kayaga, 2008). This is in response to growing populations and rapid urbanisation (Iimi, 2005) and the need to halve, by 2015, the proportion of people without sustainable access to drinking water (United Nations, 2007). PPP in the water sector comes in two broad forms (Augenblick et al., 1990; Idelovitch and Klas, 1995), namely, service-based models (utility management) that attract private sector's skills and management expertise to optimise costs and operational efficiency in existing water systems, and financed-based approaches that use private sector's innovative skills and capital to develop new water infrastructure assets with little or no public financial commitments. Between 1990 and 2005, private investment in excess of US$50 billion was committed to over 380 water supply projects in low- and middle-income countries (Marin and Izaguirre, 2006). By 2012, the level of investment reached over US$69 billion in 814 projects in 63 countries[1]. The exact form of PPP for a water supply project is shaped by the host country's water sector characteristics and social, economic and political conditions (Menard and Peeroo, 2011).\n2. Literature review: 2.1 Success criteria defined\n3. Research approach and methods: A sequential mixed research approach that comprised qualitative and quantitative methods was adopted. Qualitative methods were adopted to generate a list of factors thought to influence the success of PPP water projects. A quantitative tool in the form of ranking-type Delphi survey was used to obtain quantitative data for further analysis by factor analysis and fuzzy synthetic evaluation (FSE).\n4. Data analysis and results: Data from the Delphi survey was analysed using the SPSS statistical package 21.0. Statistical tests performed on the ordinal data include mean analysis, reliability analysis, factor analysis and FSE modelling. The mean analysis was used to establish the relative importance of the success factors, reliability analysis was conducted to statistically check whether the 14 factors in the Delphi questionnaire are valid and reliable while factor analysis was used to establish which factors measured the same underlying construct. The output of the factor analysis was used as input variables for the fuzzy predictive tool. FSE analysis was used in identifying the critical latent factors that significantly contribute to project success and to quantify a project's success level.\n5. Establishing a fuzzy predictive tool for evaluating a project success: Assessing the possibility of a project's success involves different CSFGs (five in this case) with varying degree of criticality. For the purpose of comprehensiveness, each CSFG is evaluated in terms of its criticality to a water supply project, from which the overall success level of a candidate project can be quantified. Hence, FSE is adopted to deal with this multi-factor and multi-level problem associated with predicting the success of a project. Because predicting a project's likelihood of success is fuzzy in nature and draws on approximate reasoning by human judgement or perception, fuzzy theory is deemed most appropriate (Xu et al., 2010; Boussabaine, 2014), as demonstrated in this study. Figure 1 presents a step-by-step approach of the predictive tool. For details of the fuzzy approach and its derivations, see Appendix 1. Only relevant equations are referred to in the main text.\n6. Application: Given the above CSFs and CSFGs for PPP water supply projects in developing countries, what is the likelihood that a candidate project would be successful, if these factors are effectively combined and provided a sustained attention? Using data from the Delphi questionnaire survey previously described, the above fuzzy predictive tool is demonstrated.\n7. Discussion: 7.1 Critical success factor group 1: commitment of the partners\n8. Conclusion: The determinants of PPP project success have been the focus of considerable research in construction project and management. Here, an attempt has been made to further our understanding on the key determinants that influence successful implementation of PPP water supply projects in developing countries. The objectives of this study were to identify and evaluate the critical factors that lead to a successful implementation of PPP water projects and to present a predictive tool to assist participants to evaluate the possibility of successful implementation of a project, given a set of CSFs.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Public-private partnerships (PPPs) are viewed as a reform tool for resolving inefficiency and absence of dynamism in water supply delivery in developing countries. However, the requirements for their successful implementation have received very little attention. This paper aims to describe a set of critical success factors (CSFs) that, when given special and continual attention, would ensure a successful project implementation and to provide a predictive tool to aid implementers to evaluate the likelihood of a successful PPP water supply project.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Fourteen perceived CSFs were initially derived from project cases and extant literature, and verified through a two-round Delphi survey. Factor analysis established five critical success factor groups (CSFGs) that were then used to develop a fuzzy synthetic evaluation tool for assessing the chance of a successful project.\nFindings: The five key CSFGs are commitment of partners, strength of consortium, asset quality and social support, political environment, and national PPP unit. The model output showed that, overall, these factors have a \"very high\" positive impact on a successful implementation of a water supply project. Hence, there is an excellent correlation between achievement of the CSFGs and project success. Success indices of individual principal factors are also \"very high\".\nOriginality/value: The study presents a tool to public clients and private audience, and it is hoped that the study will trigger policy development towards PPP practice in developing countries, because these findings have wider implications for legal and regulatory systems, public capacity, financing, public procurement and politics.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
A preliminary study on the quality and safety of street-vended warankasi (a Nigerian soft white cheese) from Ibadan, Oyo state, Nigeria	[ "Heavy metals", "Safety", "Quality", "Cheese", "Microbiological" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The growing global demand for protein requires that the animal protein source such as milk and milk products sold to the public should be safe and wholesome for human consumption. The occurrence of food poisoning worldwide has considerably increased public awareness about food safety and the need for better control of processing points to ensure safe and high-quality products (Sobukola et al., 2009). Analyses of foodborne disease outbreaks worldwide indicate that the greatest majority of foodborne disease outbreaks result from malpractices during food processing in small food businesses and other places where food is processed for consumption (Motarjemi and Kaferstein, 1999).\nMaterials and methods: Materials\nEnumeration of Yersinia spp. by direct culture method: For this procedure, an aliquot of warankasi homogenate was inoculated onto selective agar plates after treatment with an alkali (Fukushima, 1985; Aulisio et al., 1980). Alkaline treatment can be achieved by mixing 0.5 ml of warankasi homogenate with 0.5 ml of 0.72 percent KOH in 0.54 percent NaCl for 30 seconds.\nData analysis: Data were used to estimate means of triplicates +- standard deviation. Duncan multiple range tests was used to compare significant differences between the means (p0.05). For this analysis IBM SPSS Statistics (version 21.0) was used.\nResults and discussion: The results of the proximate analysis showed that the moisture and protein contents (%) of warankasi samples (Table I) were in the range of 47.21+-1.46-51.24+-1.61 and 33.92+-1.18-37.26+-1.42 respectively while the fat and crude fibre contents (%) of warankasi samples were in the range of 6.74+-0.64-8.33+-0.96 and 1.27+-0.02-1.73+-0.09 respectively. The ash content (%) of warankasi samples (Table I) was in the range of 1.31+-0.03-1.86+-0.09. These results and ranges are for the 8 different markets analyzed and similar to the findings of Alalade and Adeneye (2006) and Belewu (2001). The warankasi samples have high amount of protein and fat contents and this agreed with the work of Belewu (2001). This can help in complementing the high carbohydrate-based diets of the people of Nigeria and also reduce malnutrition especially among the vulnerable groups of children and pregnant women.\nConclusion: Warankasi is a popular item in the South West part of Nigeria. The research findings revealed that warankasi sold in the major markets in Ibadan, Oyo State, Nigeria, had high protein content; however, the products were contaminated with CJ and SS which could pose public health hazards. This should draw the attention of stakeholders including decision makers to the need to assess the health risks associated with the consumption of this food and, consequently, take the necessary measures and steps to reduce such risks for safer foods.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the quality and safety of street-vended warankasi, a Nigerian soft white cheese.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A total of 80 samples were collected in two batches of 40 samples each in January and June, 2015 from eight major markets from Ibadan, Oyo State, Nigeria. The samples were analyzed for the proximate components, quality indices (total soluble nitrogen, TSN and volatile fatty acid, VFA), and for the presence of pathogenic bacteria, Campylobacter jejuni (CJ), Listeria monocytogenes (LM), Mycobacterium tuberculosis (MT), Salmonella spp. (SS), Escherichia coli (EC), and Yersinia enterocolitica (YE), and heavy metals such as (lead (Pb), cadmium (Cd), mercury (Hg), and chromium (Cr) concentrations.\nFindings: The results revealed that the values of moisture, protein, fat, crude fiber, and ash contents (%) of warankasi samples were in the range 46.26+-1.41-51.24+-1.61, 33.92+-1.18-37.26+-1.42, 6.74+-0.64-8.33+-0.96, 1.27+-0.02-1.73+-0.09, 1.31+-0.03-1.78+-0.08, respectively. The values of TSN (mgN/kg) and VFA (%) were in the range of 1.19+0.10-2.54+0.18, and 5.79+0.19-9.12+0.30, respectively. The results further revealed the presence of CJ and SS and the absence of LM, MT, EC, and YE from the warankasi samples. Heavy metals detected in all the warankasi samples were generally below the maximum acceptable limits set by the World Health Organization for Pb (0.3 ppm), Cd (0.2 ppm), Hg (0.2 ppm), and Cr (0.5 ppm) with the exemption of samples from Iwo Road and Ojoo which were higher than other samples.\nResearch limitations/implications: This research work was conducted between January and June, 2015 and better results could be obtained if the study had been done for a longer period of time.\nPractical implications: The paper helps in showing the quality and microbial safety of street-vended warankasi and this may bring imperative information and general consciousness on the microbiological safety of warankasi.\nOriginality/value: Much has been done concerning warankasi processing but little work has been done concerning street-vended warankasi. Therefore, this study was carried out to assess it.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Intra-category competition, entry probability, and private label share: Evidence from organic food retailing in Australia	[ "Private label", "Entry probability", "Intra‐category", "Inter‐format competition", "Organic retailing", "Australia", "Retailing", "Organic foods" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1 Introduction: The impressive growth and penetration of private labels in grocery retailing has attracted considerable discussion and research interest in both the trade and academic press. On the academic research front, the private label literature has gone through an evolution: from an initial focus on the effects of private labels on market structures (Kaven and Call, 1967; Stern, 1966) and from profiling private label prone consumers (Burger and Schott, 1972; Coe, 1971; Myers, 1967) to a more recent emphasis on the strategic roles of private labels for retailers (Ailawadi and Harlam, 2004; Ailawadi et al., 2008; Chintagunta et al., 2002; Corstjens and Lal, 2000; Dhar et al., 2001; Mills, 1995; Morton and Zettelmeyer, 2004; Nandan and Dickinson, 1994), optimal marketing actions for private label performance (Choi and Coughlan, 2006; Dhar and Hoch, 1997; Hoch and Banerji, 1993; Kumar and Steenkamp, 2007; Oubina et al., 2007; Raju et al., 1995a, b; Sethuraman, 1992) to analyses of private label success (Lamey et al., 2007; Lamey et al., 2012) and the effects of private label strategy on manufacturer brands (MBs) (Geyskens et al., 2010). The evolution mirrors the increasing importance of private labels in many categories. Consumers' response to private label is another key research area with focuses such as consumer perceptions of private label (Bellizzi et al., 1981; Miranda and Joshi, 2003; Richardson, 1997; Richardson et al., 1994) and the effects of perceived quality differential in consumers' willingness to pay more for national brands (Sethuraman, 2000; Sethuraman and Cole, 1997; Steenkamp et al., 2010). Most research, however, focuses on private labels for conventional supermarket product categories.This study extends private label research beyond conventional supermarkets to the context of organic packaged food, with an independent organic retailer as the focus of the analyses. In particular, using store-level cross-category data from the focal retailer and field data on retail competition, this study examines how competitive factors affect the attractiveness of a product category for private label entry by an organic retailer and the effects of MB assortment on private label share performance.This paper is structured as follows: first, it provides an overview of the Australian organic retail market incorporating information from academic and trade publications, from researchers' field observations, and from interviews. It directs specific attention toward the organic packaged food market. The organic retail market in Australia is a growing sector with unique market structure and category characteristics. This industry situation poses broad implications for private label merchandising of organic foods in Australia. Quantitative analyses follow this discussion. This analysis reflects the continuum of decision making a retailer faces in developing a private label program (following Sethuraman, 2005). In particular, the analyses examines how:* inter-format competition from supermarkets; and* intra-category competition from MBs affects both the probability that the retailer will offer a private label stock-keeping unit (PL SKU) in a category and the resulting private label share of that SKU once offered.The paper concludes with a discussion of some broad implications and areas for future research.\n2 The Australian organic retail market: The demand for organic food products worldwide appears to have expanded rapidly in recent years stimulated by consumer perceptions that organic food products are safe, clean, and ethical (Chang et al., 2003) and from a community desire for sustainable food production and farming systems (RIRDC, 2000). In Australia, organic domestic retail sales have grown over 50 percent in two years from A$623M in 2008 to $947M in 2010 (Kristiansen et al., 2010). The sales value of organic packaged food, in particular, has grown over 17 percent from A$322.7M in 2007 to A$380.4M in 2010 (Euromonitor International, 2011). Australia is an emerging market in comparison with key organic markets such as USA (the world's largest) and Germany (the largest in Europe) with respective sales value for organic packaged foods of USD11,18B and USD2.38B in the year 2010. Forecasts for Australia showing strong growth at a compound annual growth rate of 4 percent so as to reach A$425M by 2015 arise from growing trends such as healthier eating habits, home cooking and demand for natural and wholesome food (Euromonitor International, 2011). Strong growth is also evidenced in mainstream organic food marketing with major manufacturers such as Unilever (e.g. Go Organic), Heinz (e.g. Heinz organic baby food) and Kraft Foods (e.g. Back to Nature) venturing into the organic food industry with their respective organic ranges (Kristiansen and Smithson, 2008).2.1 Market structure and category characteristics\n3 Emergence and perceived strategic roles of private label SKUs: 3.1 The emergence of private label SKUs\n4 Conjectures: 4.1 Probability of private label entry: effects of inter-retail format competition\n5 Data sets: The anonymous focal retailer was one of the eight interviewees that carry PL SKUs within their product assortment. It represents a typical organic retailer in this region given the types of organic product assortments they stock and their emphases on personal service. The focal retailer is considered as one of the relatively larger stores within this region with a store size of approximately 100 m2 and total storewide assortment exceeding 6,000 SKUs. The focal retailer stocks approximately 300 PL SKUs in about 30 food categories. Much like PL programs typical of larger independent organic retailers, these PL SKUs include staples repackaged in-house from bulk (e.g. rice, pasta, flour, rolled oats) and items from contract manufacturers (e.g. vinegar, oil, jam, fruit juices, etc.). The focal retailer uses their store name as their private label, again a common practice amongst the independent organic retailers that have private label programs.In comparison to prior private label studies using data from conventional supermarkets, a sample size of around 30 categories was undoubtedly small. In practice, and within the emerging organic retailing market in Australia, the focal retailer's private label program represents an important development in this market. It is thus a unique quantitative case study for examining several private label decisions at the store level.The focal retailer provided assortment records and sales reports. Observations of the two leading supermarkets within closest proximity to the focal retailer yielded retail competition information (following for example, Ailawadi and Harlam, 2004; Stassen et al., 1999).\n6 Results and discussion: 6.1 Probability of private label entry\n7 Conclusions: Very little research addresses private labels outside the contexts of conventional supermarkets and convenience consumer goods categories. The interviews and field observations provide some insights into the format of private label programs and the retailers' perceived roles of private labels in the context of organic retailing. Findings from logistic regression analyses provide empirical evidence that organic PL SKUs are more likely to be present in categories when supermarket competition is present but are less likely to be present in categories where the concentration amongst MBs is greater. In addition, a greater number of MBs appear to diminish private label share whereas a higher concentration of MB shares appears to enhance private label share.Findings from this study suggest that, when managing their private label program, retailers could use assortment planning to create a category environment that is helpful to the performance of their private label SKUs. In particular, retailers could exercise their control over assortment planning to limit the intra-category competition to be in favour of their PL SKUs. They could do this simply by restricting the number of MBs within a category. This should work to the extent that a greater MB assortment appears to hurt private label performance. However, retailers should avoid an over emphasis on their PL SKUs within a category in light of evidence supporting a positive relationship between category assortment variety and sales performance (Chiang and Wilcox, 1997; Tan and Cadeaux, 2011). Going too far in limiting the number of MBs within a category may also increase the risks of being too dependent on a small number of suppliers which may in turn affect the retailer's power to extract greater channel profits.Previous studies have also identified that it would be conducive to introduce private label SKUs when:* cross-price sensitivity among MBs is low (Raju et al., 1995b; Sayman and Raju, 2004);* cross-price sensitivity between MBs and private label SKUs is high (Raju et al., 1995b); and* the MBs are similar in strength (Sayman and Raju, 2004).These category and market characteristics are, however, not observable in this study given the unavailability of consumer panel data or market data at the category level for organic goods. The generalisability of these findings should be verified when and if such data are available.In summary, this study makes some important contributions to private label research and practice by conducting a pioneering test of the effects of competition between retail formats on the likelihood of private label presence and by extending the private label discussion beyond the conventional supermarket industry.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this study is to examine the entry probability and performance of private labels at an organic food retailer. For a growing sector with unique market structure and category characteristics, it examines how competitive factors affect the attractiveness of a product category for private label entry by an organic food retailer and how the manufacturer brand assortment that the retailer stocks affects private label share.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - This study analyses store level cross-category data from an independent organic retailer and field data on retail competition.\nFindings: - The findings show that organic private label stock-keeping units are more likely to be present in categories with supermarket competition. They also show that concentration of shares amongst manufacturer brands (as measured by the Herfindahl index) negatively affect the probability that the retailer will enter a category with a private label stock-keeping unit (SKU) but positively affects the share of that private label SKU.\nResearch limitations/implications: - Although the results arise from a fairly small sample of around 30 categories, the focal retailer offers a unique opportunity to examine several private label decisions at the store level. Future work could examine in greater depth the competitive interaction between supermarkets and organic retailers and the effects of such competition on their assortment decisions.\nOriginality/value: - By extending private label research beyond the conventional supermarket industry, this study conducts a pioneering test of the effects of competition between retail formats on the likelihood of private label entry.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
The company you keep: The relational models and support expectations of key developer relationships	[ "Career development", "Careers", "Developmental networks", "Relational models", "Relationship expectations", "Career success" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: \"Di me con quien andan, y dire quien eres.\" Spanish proverb that generally translates to, \"Tell me who you walk with, and I will tell you who you are\" (referenced in Trotter, 1999).\nIntroduction: Theories of career now focus on boundaryless (Arthur, 1994; Arthur et al., 2005) and protean (Hall, 1976, 2004) career models. These theories emphasize the self-directed career managed by the individual as a replacement for more traditional and predictable paths toward career success. Relationships are at the center of these career depictions, especially as technological change, globalization, and downsizing prompt individuals to have more concurrent, short duration relationships within and outside their employing organizations (Higgins and Kram, 2001; Kram and Hall, 1996; Kram and Higgins, 2009).Due to such career dynamism, many kinds of relationships are likely important to an individual's career success because such \"developers\" can provide a protege with differentiated forms of support (Cotton et al., 2011; Higgins and Kram, 2001). Higgins and Thomas (2001) defined developers as the people the protege considers as providing career and/or psychosocial support. Having a diversified range of such developers is a common reality to proteges (Allen et al., 1997; Higgins, 2001; Higgins and Thomas, 2001; Kram, 1985; Kram and Higgins, 2009). Researchers have specified a wide variety of social arenas that may produce developers, including work, projects, family, friends, school, and industry sources (Parker et al., 2004). However, per the Spanish proverb above, it is still not clear how and with which developers it is best for a protege to \"walk with\" to achieve career success.Despite the importance of having a diverse set of developers, we still understand little about the expectations associated with the dynamics of developmental relationships. While reciprocal, rational exchange likely describes the nature of some, particularly intra-organizational developmental relationships, this basis stands in contrast to findings that indicate that other factors, such as the matching of interaction preferences and alignment of expectations also affect social connections (Ely and Thomas, 2001; Fiske and Tetlock, 1997, 2000; Kram, 1983). Consequently, exploring the expectations of key developmental network relationships using a robust and empirically supported theory, such as relational models theory (Fiske, 1991, 1992), that claims to explain the dynamics of many different kinds of relationships, may be useful to both developmental networks research and practice. This is important because developer-protege schema congruence may be associated with relationship satisfaction (Ragins and Verbos, 2007) and receipt of career, psychosocial, and role modeling support (Higgins and Kram, 2001) and incongruence with the negative outcomes of distress, frustration, conflict, and dissatisfaction (Eby, 2007).Before going further, it is important to define key concepts in this paper. A developmental network is composed of individuals (e.g. developers) instrumental to a protege's career development and personal learning (Higgins et al., 2007). As compared to mentoring which is focused on the dyadic relationship between a younger, less experienced protege and an older, more experienced mentor (Kram, 1983, 1985; Levinson et al., 1978), developers come from any social arena and offer varying degrees of developmental support (Cotton et al., 2011; Higgins and Kram, 2001; Higgins and Thomas, 2001; Shen and Kram, 2011). Additionally, we define relational properties as the primary relational models that serve to describe developmental relationships along with the kind of support expected and provided in these relationships.To date, the academic literature on developmental networks has focused on the structure of the network, including network size, diversity, and density (see review by Molloy, 2005), as they relate to antecedents such as protege personality traits (Bozionelos, 2003; Dougherty et al., 2008) and intrinsic and extrinsic career success variables (Dobrow and Higgins, 2005; Bozionelos, 2003; Seibert et al., 2001; van Emmerik, 2004; also see the comprehensive reviews by Dobrow et al., 2011; Chandler et al., 2011), as opposed to focusing on the expectations associated with key developmental network relationships. Consequently the research questions that we hope to address are:* What are the key developmental relationships for career-spanning success (study 1)?* What are the relational model and support expectations associated with these key relationships (study 2)?* What developer-protege relationship outcomes may occur when the expectations of the two parties are congruent or incongruent?Before analyzing developer expectations, it is important to identify the key roles to career success. Four primary studies have focused on describing the roles of key developers though three were cross-sectional (Allen and Finkelstein, 2003; Murphy, 2007; Shen and Kram, 2011), and the fourth was career-spanning focusing on the specialized careers of major league baseball hitters (Cotton et al., 2011). These studies give us some sense of the roles of key developers but not necessarily those developers key to career-long achievement across a broad set of industries. It is our hope that the main findings from Study 1 that focuses on a group of inductees from six different halls of fame will help enrich our understanding of a relatively exhaustive list of developers key to individuals' career-spanning success.In addition to identifying these key developer roles, relational dynamics and support expectations for protege relationships with these key developers have also not been explored. Therefore, we hope that the key findings from study 2 will have two important implications. First, by knowing what to expect from these relationships, both proteges and developers may be able to avoid the taboo trade-offs (Fiske and Tetlock, 1997, 2000) associated with missed and/or mismatched developer-protege expectations. Second, by understanding these expectations, individuals may also begin to proactively shape their own developmental networks in a more meaningful and effective way. They will now be able to identify potentially key developers as well as understand how they might want to approach and shape relationships with different developers.Lastly, to understand the potential of exploring relational properties in developmental relationships, it is prudent to examine other literatures. Work in social psychology on the mental models associated with social relationships (Haslam, 1994a) has shown relational models theory (Fiske, 1991, 1992) to be capable of describing the dynamics of a wide array of relationships and behaviors (Bagley, 2010; Boer et al., 2011; Haslam, 1994b; Lickel et al., 2001; Rai and Fiske, 2011). Despite strong support for its descriptive and predictive value, this theory has yet to be applied to developmental network relationships, even as the importance of a protege's use of a variety of developers seems to be increasingly salient in today's turbulent career environment. Because social capital is the basis for developmental networks (Higgins and Kram, 2001), theories that can better describe social relations producing such social capital can benefit developmental networks research and, in turn, individuals and organizations as they attempt to shape relationship expectations, enhance individual performance, and increase career success.To date, the literatures on developmental networks and relational models have yet to interact. An interaction of these two models would likely further explicate developmental relationship expectations of different developer-protege relationships. Furthermore, it will enhance our understanding of how congruence and incongruence of developer-protege schemas relates to positive and negative outcomes. As such, in this paper, we want to not only identify key developer roles but also identify the relational models that are expected to apply to those roles and how these expectations differ amongst these key roles. After ascertaining the differences in protege relational models and support expectations associated with different developer roles, we develop propositions for future research that build on these exploratory findings while integrating relevant literature on schema congruence and incongruence grounded in both the mentoring and relational models literatures. We hope to foster research that will help individuals and organizations reap greater benefits from the variety of developer relationships that proteges may engage.\nDevelopmental relationships: Developmental networks\nMethod and results: Study 1\nDiscussion and implications: Extending exploratory findings through the integration and extension of schemas, mentoring expectations and relational models theories\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to identify key developmental relationships for career-spanning success and to examine relational models and support expectations associated with these relationships. The paper creates propositions associating developer-protege schema congruence and incongruence to relevant outcome variables.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Study 1 employed qualitative coding of developers identified in 77 hall of famer induction speeches and Study 2 used a cross-industry survey of 425 respondents to assess the relational model and support expectations associated with the seven most highly-cited developer roles from Study 1.\nFindings: - Study 1 identified these highly-cited developer roles as a CEO, manager, work teammate, friend, spouse, parent, and unmet hero/idol. Study 2 described the expected relational models associated with these roles and found significant differences in the relational model and support expectations associated across roles.\nResearch limitations/implications: - While study 1 focused on a primarily male sample using retrospective data, it generalized and extended previous research on key developer roles for extraordinary career achievement. Based on the key findings from study 1, study 2 surveyed respondents regarding developer role expectations rather than expectations of particular developer-protege relationships.\nPractical implications: - These findings identify how and with whom proteges should consider initiating and fostering key developmental relationships to enhance their networks while broadening and deepening organizations' understanding of the importance of their members having a variety of organizational and non-organizational developers.\nOriginality/value: - These findings challenge the notion that developer-protege relationships fit a \"one size fits all\" reciprocal exchange motif as it is the first study to explore expectations associated with key developer relationships using relational models theory.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Investigating strategy tools from an interactive perspective	[ "Strategizing in networks", "Strategy-as-practice", "Strategy tools", "ARA model", "Strategic action" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Studies show how an interactive interpretation of the business landscape presented by the industrial network approach (INA) impacts how firms are assumed to act strategically (Gadde et al., 2003; Ritter et al., 2004; Baraldi, 2008). Moving away from traditional interpretations of firms acting according to previously formulated plans based on the best possible use of internal resources, these studies illustrate that strategizing can be considered \"interactive, evolutionary and responsive\" (Hakansson and Ford, 2002, p. 137). With the assumption that firms are embedded in relationships with several important counterparts (Hakansson and Snehota, 1989), strategic action is addressed from an INA with reference to firms' embeddedness in business networks (Johanson and Mattsson, 1992). Therefore, in investigating how firms try to influence their strategic position and that of others, the systematic relation to others is emphasized (Hakansson and Snehota, 2006). Therein, strategic action is not being practiced \"on\" others, as depicted in general strategy literature; rather, strategizing encompasses action and reaction (Hakansson and Ford, 2002; Ford and Mouzas, 2013).\n2. Strategy as an interactive phenomenon and the role of STs: A main finding of the first industrial network studies is that firms often engage in close and long-term relationships with a set of important suppliers and customers (Hakansson, 1982; Ford et al., 1998, 2003). These relationships have a \"substance\" (Hakansson and Snehota, 1995) that goes well beyond the assumptions of traditional economic thinking; these are not \"arm's-length\" relationships that can be easily traded off for others, but often contain \"heavy\" physical and organizational adaptations entwining the individual firms (Hakansson and Waluszewski, 2002). Such relationships stem from interdependencies of firms' resources and activities, and develop through interaction processes in which patterns of mutual investments form over time \"that link the resources and activities of one party to those of another\" (Hakansson and Snehota, 1989, p. 190). To capture how the concept of STs can be reinterpreted from the INA, we first review industrial network theory focusing on the strategic action in each relationship layer.\n3. Methodology: To capture and analyze the interactive effects of ST use, this study uses multiple cases. Three focal firms in the construction and oil and gas (O&G) industries in Norway - ConstructionCo, LiftCo and ContractorCo - were chosen to allow for variation in both industry context and relationship types, and to enable analysis of important and complex relationships.\n4. Three cases of ST use by substance of relationships: 4.1 The resource layer: how framework agreements are used in the ConstructionCo-ConcreteCo relationship\n5. Analytical discussion: Across the three cases, it is evident that the way conventional management methods and techniques, or STs, are used is directed toward trying to influence important counterparts in specific ways. However, simultaneously, this behavior aims at developing specific resources and activities and facilitate future interaction between actors. Thus, the examples illustrate how the firms use STs to affect existing ties, links and bonds, and develop new ones.\n6. Concluding remarks: This paper revisited STs from an interactive viewpoint. If a firm is seen as in control of its resources and activities and as shaping its strategy based on how this internal structure can be used to position it against others, the idea that strategic management methods and techniques are practiced \"on\" others is not strange. Thus, from a mainstream strategic management viewpoint, the concept of STs is unproblematic. However, from an INA perspective, a firm's most important strategic resource is its business relationships; thus, its strategy will largely form in relation to and interaction with relevant others (Gadde et al., 2003; Hakansson and Ford, 2002). Therefore, STs are potentially any \"stuff\" that can be used to affect the long-term development of an important business relationship. In efforts to broaden the concept of STs, SaP studies have tried to consider a more \"interactive\" view (Baraldi et al., 2007). Nevertheless, these studies convey the idea that strategic action is shaped mainly within the firm, while any external influence is that of actors impacting general ideas about strategy, rather than those with which there is a business exchange.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to investigate how the strategic management concept of \"strategy tools\" (STs) can be reinterpreted from an industrial network perspective. It considers how STs are used to influence the substance of relationships and how firms engage in strategic action by using such tools.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Using case study research involving three focal firms, the paper scrutinizes use of selected STs to examine how they are used to systematically relate to others and create benefits and affect development paths in business relationships.\nFindings: STs can be viewed as an integrated part of a networking pattern of mobilizing resources, linking activities and relating actors. Seen in this manner, use of STs can be interaction-facilitating or interaction-creating.\nResearch limitations/implications: In an interactive approach, STs must be seen in relation to others as they are used in strategic (co-)action to engage and involve others. In this view, tools are strategic when used to affect the long-term development of important business relationships.\nPractical implications: Practitioners should acknowledge that the use of a ST to handle counterparts is emerging, and valuable only in relation to specific others. Because the value of STs is unknowable until it is revealed how they can affect the substance of a specific relationship, there is no best-practice or one-size-fits-all approach.\nOriginality/value: This paper illuminates the phenomenon of \"strategy tools\" by considering it from both sides of the business exchange interface.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Women business owners' start-up motivations and network content	[ "Network", "Small business", "Business start-up motivations", "Network content", "Women small business owners" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Small businesses are the backbone of national economies because they significantly contribute to employment, income generation and export revenues. They also stimulate competition and are a source of innovation (Alstete, 2008). In Australia, small businesses represent a significant segment of the business environment (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2010) within which social networking by small business owners (SBOs) has long been identified as a key factor in business success (Watson, 2007). Studies conclude that networks perform important functions, including: help SBOs acquire information and advice; assist SBOs to optimise their resources; enable SBOs to expand their customer base and better compete in competitive markets; and contribute to development of innovative products (Robert et al., 2013; Wiklund et al., 2009). Carter and Evans (2006) maintain that extensive, diverse and complex business networks are more likely to provide SBOs with business opportunities, increase their ability to solve problems and ultimately give them a better chance of success. Furthermore, many small businesses employ relationship marketing to establish strong relationships with their key customers in order to differentiate themselves from competitors. Relationship marketing is defined as \"all marketing activities directed toward establishing, developing and maintaining successful relational exchanges\" (Morgan and Hunt, 1994, p. 22). Benefits of such strategic networking include increased profit through reduced risk, improved communication links, referrals (Hawke and Heffernan, 2006) and increased customer loyalty (Nwakanma et al., 2007).\nMethodology: One of the most common methods for collecting data in social network studies is semi-structured, one-on-one, in-depth interviews (Hudelson, 1994). In the present study, 28 semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted with women SBOs who were recruited through purposeful sampling (i.e. Australian women business owners who owned and managed their own SME, and had agreed to be interviewed).\nFindings: The participants were representative of a wide range of industries and backgrounds. Using pseudonyms to protect their anonymity, a profile of the participants is presented in Table II.\nDiscussion: The network contents of CSBOs and FSBOs showed striking similarities, presumably because the participants in both groups had started their business for financial reasons. Regardless of whether these participants were pulled or pushed into starting a business, the main goal and objective of the business was to build an economically viable business. Hence these women SBOs looked for business opportunities and viewed their networks as an asset to help them expand and grow their business. Their networks were resource driven, mainly motivated by their expectations of additional business and financial rewards. The WFSBOs, on the other hand, were those who started a business mainly in response to parental demands and spouse/partner roles, hence the main goal and objective of the business was to supplement the family income rather than acting as major wage earners in the households. Hence these women relied on their networks for social support and to help sustain repeat business.\nConclusions, limitations and future research: This study responds to a call for research that develops a more nuanced understanding of SBOs' network content. Specifically, it addressed the question: how do women's motivations for starting a small business influence their network content? The findings showed that there were many similarities and differences between the three types of women SBOs' network contents. Thus the findings confirm that the primary motivation for starting a business will influence the women SBOs' network content.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine how women small business owners' (SBOs) business start-up motivations influence their network content.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 28 women SBOs who were recruited through purposeful sampling methods. Interview data on their start-up motivations were used to categorise them into three types: classic, forced and work-family. The interviews explored the network contents of the three categories of participants.\nFindings: There were many similarities between network contents of classic and forced SBOs, as both groups had started their business for financial reasons rather than family reasons. All the participants' networks contained information and advice, economic transactions, intangible support and strong ties. However, the sources and types of network content were different for the classic and forced SBOs when compared to work-family SBOs.\nResearch limitations/implications: This study has limitations that tend to be commonly found in exploratory studies, such as a small sample size. However, the findings lay the groundwork for future quantitative studies that examine associations between SBOs' motivations for starting a business and their network contents.\nOriginality/value: This research responds to calls for studies aimed at developing a more nuanced understanding of SBOs' networking behaviour. The study provides empirical evidence of a relationship between the motivations for starting a business and the network content of SBOs. The findings can be used by businesswomen's network organisations in their mentoring and training interventions.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Academic leadership development programs: a model for sustained institutional change	[ "South Africa", "Higher education", "Sustainability", "Case study", "Leadership development programme", "Participatory action learning and action research" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Universities and other higher education institutions across the world have for several decades recognized the value of developing leadership capacity among academic staff members. Leadership development programs (LDPs) for academics are usually used to cultivate the capacity of senior staff to promote and support the potential of their colleagues for contributing to creation and dissemination of knowledge through research, publication and teaching and for other valuable knowledge-related contributions to their community and beyond. LDPs therefore can reward higher education institutions and society at large, as well as individual academics professionally and personally. Most universities offer academic LDPs in-house and/or off-campus, usually tailored to meet specific academic skills, needs or research fields. Because of the investment potential of these programs, it is important that they are run most effectively to maximize their benefits.\nBackground: South Africa's higher education landscape has changed rapidly over the past few years in moves to address national inequalities post-apartheid (Olivier, 2007, p. 1128). Yet inequalities and dysfunction still disfigure the higher education system (Council on Higher Education (CHE), 2013, p. 54). Despite efforts to increase the number of postgraduate students, particularly black students, most universities have been unable to fill all their postgraduate openings (Mouton, 2007, p. 1088). The problem is even greater at universities of technology (UoTs). Research was not one of their core functions until they were transformed from \"technikons\" into universities over roughly the past decade[1]. The new \"academics\" could not become proficient supervisors overnight, leaving many inexperienced and overwhelmed while trying to take on the new academic supervisor role (Mouton, 2007, p. 1090). Furthermore, many in the current cohort of university researchers are approaching retirement (Mouton, 2007, p. 1079). These circumstances have made it imperative for UoTs to plan and implement academic staff development programs to empower and enable their academic staff to be effective supervisors and solid researchers (Nsimande, 2007, p. 1119).\nCase study: Outline of the LDP\nResults in 2011: In 2011 the nine participants (P) in the LDP showed great interest in the topic of QR throughout the three days. They engaged actively in all aspects of the program and appreciated its participatory, action-oriented approach to self-directed learning and research, encouraging reflection, debate, small-group discussion, networking and a \"new way of thinking\" (P6). This LDP, in literally practising what it preaches, provided an excellent model for participants to use in their own efforts to cascade their learning to colleagues through interactive, practical programs. Here we overview participants' stories using verbatim quotations from the feedback forms they completed at the end of the program.\nResults in 2013: During 2011 the feedback was anonymous and the numbers assigned to participants do not correspond with the numbers assigned to the interview participants in 2013. Data collected in 2013, through individual, semi-structured interviews, focussed on four questions relating to the LDP in 2011:\nDiscussion of results and recommendations: In evaluating the program after two years in light of our interviews with most of the participants, we identify two aspects that can be modified to improve the quality and sustainability of program outcomes for both the institution and people involved. One is the shortcoming in conducting the networking and continued engagement that participants planned and agreed to at the end of the LDP. The group was sufficiently dynamic and cohesive to form a strong collaboration at the time of the LDP as their behavior during the program demonstrated and comments such as, \"I think we have the potential to stay together\" (P7) suggest. Yet as a participant said in 2013 \"we didn't pull it off\" (P2). Had they \"pulled it off,\" their efforts would have been strategically very valuable for the university and for its staff/student community. Their aspiration to create a postgraduate support group was noble, but without continued cohesion among the participants it was never established. Participants offered various reasons concerned with time and priorities; e.g. \"everybody got busy\" (P2), \"we all had very different thoughts about it [collaboration network] and it just stopped\" (P3). With participants from different campuses, \"[...] logistically regular meetings will be a problem\" (P7). One participant expressed the need for a leader/facilitator: \"This group needed a 'driver' - like everything in life\" (P3).\nA model of leadership development: Beer et al. (1990) maintain that three major interrelated factors are needed to revitalize an organization: Coordination or teamwork, a high level of commitment that is necessary for coordinated action, and competencies for problem solving as a team, including analytical and interpersonal skills.\nConclusions: QR makes a valuable contribution to the educational and social sciences. The international literature using this approach has mushroomed in the last two decades. Nevertheless, many researchers - educated in the traditional, positivist paradigm of research - lack a true understanding of QR methods and an ability to use them in their research. Yet knowledge of QR and its underlying philosophical and methodological assumptions is essential for high-quality research and thus for the practical and intellectual knowledge outcomes, theses, publications and successful grant applications that it feeds. Research concerning people's views, values, strategies, behaviors, professional development, learning and transformation and organizational and leadership development/change is more likely to yield rich data and most useful results if it is carried out through predominantly QR methods, rather than through only quantitative/statistical methods.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to evaluate a leadership development program (LDP) for senior academic staff on \"qualitative research\" after two years to establish the success, limitations and overall impact of the program in terms of personal, professional and organizational benefits.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The paper presents the background, outline of the LDP and evaluation of results through participant feedback: at the end of the program; and after two years, using a \"participatory action learning and action research\" (PALAR) approach.\nFindings: All participants were very positive about the design, conduct and learning outcomes of the program in terms of their own and their students' learning during and after the program. But although the workshop had prepared them, some had not cascaded their learning and skills by conducting similar programs in their department, faculty or university wide, which was one of the main original objectives to achieve a multiplier effect across the institution. The authors discuss various reasons for this shortcoming and develop a process model for positive institutional change management in higher education.\nResearch limitations/implications: Medium- and long-term effects of an LDP need to be followed up after a timespan of one to three or five years to establish whether the development has been effective and sustainable and to learn from limitations and shortcomings for future R&D activities.\nPractical implications: The authors identify the limitations and suggest practical institutional changes that encourage cascading of learning in theory and practice with a multiplier effect.\nSocial implications: The paper aims to assist higher education institutions to ensure sustainability in their LDPs.\nOriginality/value: The process model for leadership development in higher education can be adopted, adapted or further developed by other scholars interested in designing, conducting and evaluating a sustainable LDP in their field and organization.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
The moderating role of gender and age in the adoption of mobile wallet	[ "India" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Mobile technology has been transforming the global banking and payments industry by providing convenient payment channels. The impact has been more for developing nations because of the existence of a large untapped customer base comprising unbanked customers. In India, this opportunity has attracted many new players, including start-ups, to come out with mobile wallet services. This has resulted in players from telecom, banking and online retail industry coming out with their own mobile wallet services. Prominent ones are PayTM, MobiKwik, PayUmoney and Amazon Pay, other than the banks that offer their individual mobile wallet services.\n2. Literature review: 2.1 Development of the conceptual model and hypotheses formulation\n3. Research methodology: The first step was to understand the awareness, attitude, behavioural intention and usage of mobile wallet. For this two focus group discussions, first comprising ten working executives, i.e. six males and four females, and second comprising 12 students, i.e. five males and seven females, were conducted. A review of literature was performed for this purpose. Thus, the information collected was subjected to content analysis, which resulted in the generation of few statements. Two experts from industry and three academicians were requested to look at the statements generated and check for content validity. Based on the literature review and focus group discussion, various statements were generated that were grouped under various constructs and used to design a pilot questionnaire. A pilot survey was conducted with 15 respondents (10 students and 5 five working executives) seeking their feedback on clarity, comprehensive and completeness of the statements. Based on the inputs received, three questions were reworded to improve their clarity and understanding.\n4. Analysis of data and findings: 4.1 Measurement model\n5. Summary of findings and managerial implications: This study extended the TAM and UTAUT model and uses gender and age as moderators to investigate the extent to which various antecedents of mobile wallet adoption affect user attitude and intention to adopt mobile wallets in India. To examine the impact of antecedents of mobile wallet adoption on user attitude and intention, 17 hypotheses were formulated. The results of hypothesized path coefficient indicated that out of 17 hypotheses, only two were not supported though they had the desired hypothesized direction. The findings are consistent with arguments made in the recent literature (Bagla and Sancheti, 2018; Sobti, 2019; Shaw and Kesharwani, 2019). Bagla and Sancheti (2018) conducted a study to examine factors responsible for growing popularity of digital wallets in India and found that attractive cashback and rewards, ease of use, convenience, instant money transfer, higher security, wide acceptability and zero transaction fee contribute to its growth. Our study corroborates the findings of a recent study in Indian context, which reported that perceived cost, perceived risk and facilitating conditions have a positive and significant impact on the adoption of mobile payment services in India (Sobti, 2019). A study by Shaw and Kesharwani (2019) reported similar findings wherein PU, subjective norm (ability of peer or reference group to influence adoption) and financial cost were found to be significant predictors of behavioural intention to use mobile wallets. Chopra (2019) conducted a study to investigate the factors that hinder the acceptance of mobile wallet among street vendors in India and found that data privacy, security and trust are the top three factors.\n6. Limitations and scope for future research: Despite the above findings, the study has some limitations that should be addressed in the future. Firstly, the sample primarily comprises students and working professionals from the metros and larger cities in India. Hence, opinions from the other cities and towns, which are away from metro cities, could not be captured. Secondly, a comparative study on mobile wallet adoption behaviours of students and working professional could be an area for future study. Thirdly, the model was conceptualized to explain the adoption of mobile wallets. In future, it would be worth exploring if the model and its hypotheses holds true in case of other technologies such as internet banking, mobile banking and tele banking. Third, this study only examines the moderating effect of gender and age. Because the extent of smartphone usage or degree of smartphone addiction varies between consumers, it can be considered worth examining in future. Furthermore, studies may be carried out to test whether the causal relationship is moderated by other demographic variables such as occupation, income, experience, household size, education qualification and smartphone addiction; moreover, the moderating effect of smartphone addiction played a substantial role in the adoption of mobile wallets. Fourthly, the study is cross-sectional because it analyzes a representative sample, at a specific point in time. Considering that the adoption behavior might undergo a change with passage of time, it is expected that a longitudinal study would yield better results than a cross-sectional one. Thus, it is expected that research work on the above areas would help in generating more academic and managerial implications.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the factors that influence the attitude and behavioral intention towards mobile wallet adoption and to examine the moderating effect of gender and age between antecedents of mobile wallet adoption and user attitude and intention.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Based on the literature review, certain themes around mobile wallet adoption were generated around which inputs were sought through two focus group discussions, first of which comprised working executives and second comprised students. A sample of 744 users of mobile wallet provided their awareness on mobile wallets, various mobile wallet services used and perception on ease of use, usefulness, trust, security, facilitating conditions and lifestyle compatibility (LC). To examine the moderating effect of gender and age, two methods, namely, Henseler's partial least squares-multi group analysis (PLS-MGA), a non-parametric approach, and PLS-MGA, parametric approach, are used. The data was analyzed using partial least square-structural equation modeling.\nFindings: The ease of use, usefulness, trust, security, facilitating conditions and LC significantly influence user attitude and intention. The results show that both gender and age moderate the relationship between select antecedents and attitude and intention and the influence is seen more for males and young users.\nResearch limitations/implications: The sample comprises students and professionals from metros and large cities; hence, the generalizability of the results to the population at large may be limited. This study only examines the moderating role of age and gender. Future studies may include other demographic variables such as education, income, occupation, experience and household size.\nPractical implications: The findings help mobile wallet service providers understand the relevance and influence of various antecedent variables on the attitude and intention to adopt technology. This will help to plan and prioritize attributes for marketing purposes to increase the adoption and usage rates. Moreover, managers should plan strategies to enhance confidence among females and old age customers.\nOriginality/value: The proposed model both investigates the impact of antecedents on user attitude and intention and examines the moderating effect of select demographic variables. There are few empirical studies on the moderating effect of gender and age in the context of mobile wallets in India.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Building internal heat dissipation of special shaped columns composed of concrete-filled square steel tubes based on thermal bridge models	[ "Heat dissipation", "Finite element analysis", "Heat preservation", "Special shaped columns composed of concrete-filled square steel tubes", "Thermal bridge effect" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Large steel structure buildings emerged in Western Europe in the mid-nineteenth century and then spread throughout the world. Compared with other structures, the steel structure is usually made of green, recyclable and easily degradable materials (Pi et al., 2016; Lu and Zheng, 2014). Steel structure buildings are recyclable and easy to be rebuilt and demolished and have good performance in thermal insulation and heat preservation; therefore, the steel structure buildings have been widely used (Xie et al., 2016). It is found from studies that the steel structure residential building has superior seismic resistance, high safety, low construction cost, high construction speed and comprehensive economic benefits, which is the most promising residential type at present. Special shaped columns composed of concrete-filled square steel tubes is a new type of structure that appears in residential buildings with advantages of steel structure and concrete structure, and its various properties have been extensively studied. Zhou, Jia, Xu, Wang and Chen (2015) studied the seismic resistance of special-shaped columns. Through the actual measurement of the test piece, the structure had good ductility, seismic resistance and energy dissipation capacity, and its energy dissipation increased with the increase of the stiffness ratio of beam columns. Wang et al. (2014) analyzed parameters of special-shaped columns such as the bearing capacity, ductility, etc. under low cyclic loading and found that the higher the strength of the concrete is, the higher the ratio of axial force to the compressive strength of concrete is, and the smaller the width-to-thickness ratio of the connecting plate is, the higher the bearing capacity of the structure is. Rong et al. (2017) studied the compression-bending performance of the L-shaped column composed of concrete-filled square steel tubes under eccentric compression and analyzed the mechanical properties of the structure by the eccentric compression experiment and finite element software. Tao et al. (2016) analyzed the bonding properties between the steel pipe and concrete, designed different test pieces and carried out experiments. It was found that the bonding strength of carbon steels was better than that of stainless steels, and the bonding strength could be effectively improved by welding the inner ring to the inner surface of the steel pipe, welding the shear pins and using the expanded concrete. Building thermal bridges will increase building energy consumption and affect building performance. Therefore, it is of great significance to study thermal bridges and internal heat dissipation of buildings. The heat dissipation problem of steel structure buildings is more serious because of high heat conductivity. At present, the main solutions include thermal blocking and local thermal insulation, and research on avoiding thermal bridges in the structure is seldom. In this study, based on the heat dissipation problem inside the building, the role of special shaped columns composed of concrete-filled square steel tubes in the heat dissipation was analyzed. First, the thermal bridge phenomenon of special shaped columns composed of concrete-filled square steel tubes was studied. Then the thermal bridge model was established through ANSYS software, and the related calculations are carried out to prove the effectiveness of the structure for energy saving and heat preservation of buildings. This work makes some contributions to the further perfection of the building insulation structure and offers specific theoretical guidance for the development of real project, which is beneficial to satisfy the use requirement of buildings, realize energy saving of buildings and promote the further application of special shaped columns composed of concrete-filled square steel tubes in actual buildings.\n2. Special shaped columns composed of concrete-filled square steel tubes: Concrete-filled steel tube has been widely used in the construction of high-rise buildings (Hu et al., 2016; Hajjar, 2015). The concrete-filled square steel tube structure refers to pouring concrete into the square steel pipe, which can save more steels and has stronger rigidity with great advantages in the residential system compared with the steel structure. Special shaped columns composed of concrete-filled square steel tubes refers to a combined structure (Zhou, Xu, Wang, Chen and Qin, 2015) formed between concrete-filled square steel tubular columns after connecting by fasteners, which can be effectively combined with the wall. According to the different forms of sections, it can be divided into L-shaped column composed of concrete-filled square steel tubes, T-shaped columns composed of concrete-filled square steel tubes and X-shaped columns composed of concrete-filled square steel tubes. Generally, L-shaped column composed of concrete-filled square steel tubes is used as corner columns, T-shaped columns composed of concrete-filled square steel tubes is used as side columns and X-shaped columns composed of concrete-filled square steel tubes is used as center columns. Special shaped columns have the following advantages:\n3. Establishment of the thermal bridge model: Heat bridge refers to the part where large local heat loss exists at the nodes, corners, etc. inside the building, which will accelerate the heat transfer rate of the wall, form local heat transfer and increase energy consumption, and the water vapor condensation in the air will make the wall black and affect the strength of the wall material (Li et al., 2018). Therefore, the thermal bridge phenomenon inside the building is analyzed. In this study, a steel structure house in Luoyang is taken as the research object, and the thermal bridge of T-shaped columns composed of concrete-filled square steel tubes used in the house is analyzed to compare the heat dissipation of different structures.\n4. The analysis results of thermal bridge: After finite element heat treatment analysis, Figure 3 is obtained.\n5. Discussion: Extending building life cycle and improving building sustainability has attracted more and more attentions (Heidrich et al., 2017). The problem of the heat dissipation inside buildings will increase energy consumption of buildings and reduce the indoor thermal quality, which is not conducive to heat preservation energy saving of buildings. In order to save resources, it is an inevitable choice to develop green and energy-saving buildings (Li, 2014; Wang et al., 2018). In the steel structure residence, due to the high thermal conductivity of the steel, the heat preservation problem is more severe, the heat dissipation is serious and the thermal bridge effect is more prominent. Therefore, finding a suitable method to achieve energy saving of the steel structure buildings has been widely valued by researchers. When designing a residence, the problem of the heat dissipation inside the building can be effectively improved by special structure designs. Therefore, in this study, the heat transfer and heat dissipation of special shaped columns composed of concrete-filled square steel tubes are analyzed by ANSYS.\n6. Conclusion: In this paper, the thermal bridge of special shaped columns composed of concrete-filled square steel tubes is studied, T-shaped columns composed of concrete-filled square steel tubes is taken as an example to establish the thermal bridge model by ANSYS software, and related calculations are carried out. It is found that the temperature of the thermal bridge is slightly low compared to the external wall, but the distribution is even; the heat flux density of the steel part is large, but the overall heat flux density is even and small; the lowest temperature of the thermal bridge is at the corner, which has a thermal insulation effect; the influence area of the thermal bridge is 0.2 m, which will not produce large impact on the wall column; the suitable thickness of the thermal insulation layer of T-shaped columns composed of concrete-filled square steel tubes is 300 mm.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Special shaped columns composed of concrete-filled square steel tubes have broad application prospects in steel structure residential buildings. The paper aims to discuss this issue.\nDesign/methodology/approach: In this paper, the thermal bridge problem of special-shaped column structures is studied, T-shaped column composed of concrete-filled square steel tubes is taken as an example, the finite element thermal bridge model is established by ANSYS software, the heat treatment is calculated by the software and the results are output.\nFindings: According to the finite element results, it can be found that in the thermal bridge model, the temperature distribution is uniform, the heat flux density is small and the heat dissipation where the steel plate locates is serious. The lowest temperature of the thermal bridge is greater than the air condensation temperature, and the affected area is about 0.2 m, which is larger than the thickness of the wall and will not cause too much impact on the wall. It will help to suppress heat dissipation and achieve energy-saving and heat preservation inside the buildings.\nOriginality/value: The experimental results prove the effectiveness of the special-shaped column structure for building energy-saving buildings. This study provides some theoretical basis for further application of special-shaped column structures in architecture.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Information source usage in teen apparel purchases: China, Japan and the United States	[ "Clothing", "Adolescents", "Consumer behaviour", "Japan", "China", "United States of America" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The global teen apparel market appears to be an increasingly desirable target for many international marketers. This is especially true of teens in the USA, Japan and China. According to the Packaged Facts' (2007) \"Teen market in the US report\", there are 26 million 12- to 17-year olds in the USA with an aggregate income of $80 billion. Spending on and by US teenagers is projected to reach $208.7 billion by 2011, up from $189.7 billion in 2006. Perhaps not surprisingly, the largest chunk of this massive sum goes towards apparel, with an estimated 42 percent of the US total teen budget falling into the fashion category (Poggi, 2007). This phenomenon can also be observed in the spending habits of both Chinese and Japanese teens. Young Chinese are considered one of the most relevant fashion product market segments (Kwan et al., 2003). According to St Maurice and Wu (2006), direct spending on or by urban Chinese teens totaled 290 billion renminbi (about $36 billion) annually, with about 10 percent of that going to clothing purchases. Japanese teens have been shown to be particularly fashion-conscious, with preferences for name brands (Martin and Herbig, 2002; Parker et al., 2004).The purpose of this study is to explore the relative extent to which adolescents in China, Japan, and the USA utilize information sources in apparel brand preference formation. These specific teen markets were selected because they represent the three largest nations in terms of gross domestic product (CIA, 2003) and three of the world's largest teen apparel markets. Despite this, an electronic literature search uncovered no cross-national comparative studies involving these three nations and their apparel information source usage.\nLiterature review: Consumer socialization\nMethod: The design of this study involved sampling and surveying teens in Japan, China and the USA. In each country, graduate students identified comparable regions and metropolitan areas in terms of relative socioeconomic status. The comparison process involved a three-way language translation. The questionnaire was initially composed in English and later translated into both Japanese and Chinese. Back-translation techniques were then used for item comparisons to verify concurrent instrument interpretation across the three cultures (Kotabe and Helsen, 2001). The study employed three translators to examine the surveys and make translation comparisons. One translator was fluent in Japanese and English, the second in Japanese and Chinese, and a third was fluent in all three languages.In order to enhance generalizability, two apparel products were selected for inclusion in the study:1. sportswear; and2. jeans.These products represented apparel products that were relevant to the typical adolescent consumer in each of these nations.Respondents included public high school students between 14 and 17 years of age. A total of 488 usable classroom-administered questionnaires were returned for analysis. The Chinese sample included 141 (mage=15.18) students from a high school in suburban Xianyang. The Japanese sample was made up of 112 (mage=16.36) students from a Kyoto area high school. The US sample consisted of a total of 235 (mage=15.99) students from Western Missouri. All participants were native to their respective countries. See Table I for sample characteristic details.Measures\nDiscussion: The USA is generally considered highly individualistic, while Japan and China are typically viewed as collectivistic (Hofstede and Bond, 1984). Japan is considered somewhat more individualistic than China (Hofstede, 1991). The findings of this study suggest categorizing Japanese and Chinese teens as collectivistic may be problematic, as Japanese teens appear to have grown more \"individualistic\" in their thinking and behaviors than US teens. Interestingly, none of the three groups rated parents especially high relative to the other influencing agents, as the vast majority of mean scores were in the range 2-3 using a five-point scale. However, the influence of parents should not be disregarded in teen buying behaviors, especially in China.When considering US teen buying behavior, one should be mindful that members of Generation Y have forged an unusually close relationship with their parents. As noted previously, the US Generation Y is considered to be closer to their parents than other recent generations were to theirs (Weiss, 2003). The US Generation Y also tends to trust their parents and this trusting relationship is likely to enhance brand information exchange. Mascarenhas and Higby (1993) point out that this may be particularly true when shopping for clothing, in that US teens are thought to be more influenced by parents than peers for this particular category of purchases. However, the results of this study indicate that peers and friends are taking a more influential role in directing or influencing shopping behavior.The findings suggest family influence may be declining in Japan as the Japanese respondents rated their level of parental information source usage the lowest of the teens from the three countries examined. The mean usage scores for fathers and mothers ranged from a high of 2.32 for Japanese mothers to a low of 1.69 for Japanese fathers. It has been reported that Japanese fathers typically work long hours during the week and spend more time socializing with colleagues and customers on weekends than they spend with their children. As a result, Japanese men account for a much smaller percentage of the spousal childcare time than do US fathers (Strom and Strom, 2002). While this may explain the Japanese sample's low ratings of fathers, it does not explain the nearly equally low ratings of mothers. Perhaps the highly trendy Japanese teen culture simply has little use for brand information input from their more collectivistic-minded parents, at least with regards to their fashion tastes. This may be especially true of the products used in this study, as both jeans and sportswear are items likely used by Japanese teen to express their own \"individualistic\" identities.Chinese teens rated each of their parents more highly as apparel information source than did the US and Japanese teens. This is not surprising considering the dominance of the single-child family structure in collectivistic China, which results in teens not having to share parental attention with siblings. While these parental ratings are high, the Chinese teens gave very similar ratings for parents and friends/peers. It may well be that as China has become more open to Western influences; teens may now tend to view parents as lacking sufficient product knowledge to serve as an information source when faced with making decisions on fashion items such as clothing.\nImplications: Numerous differences between the teen samples regarding information source usage were found in this study. As expected, the individualistic US sample rated the likelihood of using advertising and salespeople higher than did the Chinese teens, and their use of salespeople higher than the Japanese. The findings suggest that the Japanese teens are generally more open to using advertising than the Chinese, and the Chinese teens are more willing to use salespeople than the Japanese. This suggests that when marketing apparel to Japanese teens, marketers should emphasize advertising over retail salespersons.Clearly, the data suggest that advertising remains a powerful tool for reaching the US teen market. However, advertising directed at the US teen should also stress the approval of friends and peers. Conversely, while the Chinese sample reported the highest reliance on friends/peers, parents were also rated highly. Here again, the results suggest that friend and peer approval should be stressed in advertising to Chinese teens, but it must also be remembered that this group uses their parents more than either of the other two groups examined. Interestingly, the Japanese sample falls between these two groups and seems to lean more toward the US sample than the Chinese sample. This finding suggests that marketers should avoid lumping Asian cultures into the \"collectivist\" category and that the Japanese teen appears to have grown increasingly independent, as evidenced by their reported low information usage level ratings for family, friends, and peers. In fact, the US teens reported significantly higher usage of peers/friends than the Japanese, except in the case of peers and sportswear. This tendency of the Japanese teens toward being more \"individualistic\" and independent may well be why much of the world's teen pop culture, including fashion, now originates in Japan (Kamamura, 2006). Marketers may benefit from stressing the individualistic nature of their products when approaching the Japanese teen market.\nLimitations: This study focused on Hofstede's dimension of collectivism-individualism. However, no single cross-cultural construct can begin to explain all of the between-nation differences found in this study. For example, the Chinese sample's reported low likelihood of using advertising as an information source could be explained by other factors, such as the Chinese advertising industry's reported problems with misleading and deceptive claims, inferior production quality, and lack of standardized practices (Xinhau News Agency, 1995).The findings in this study may not generalize well to teens in each of the three countries. This is likely especially true in the case of the Chinese sample, which was drawn from the country's less progressive mid-section. Cui and Liu (2000) argued that significant regional differences in purchasing power, lifestyles, media usage and consumption patterns exist among Chinese consumers. Therefore, different findings may have resulted had a larger sample been drawn from the more developed and affluent Eastern coastal region of China. Thus, the ability to generalize the findings of this study to the larger populations of the respective nations is limited and additional research is needed.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - China, Japan, and the USA represent three of the world's most important teen apparel markets. The purpose of this study is to consider the sources of apparel brand information utilized by 14- to 17-year olds in these three nations. Nine hypotheses are developed based on the interpersonal influence and the individualism/collectivism constructs.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Respondents include public high school students between 14 and 17 years of age from the nations of China, Japan and the USA.\nFindings: - Chinese teens report a greater likelihood to use their parents as apparel information sources than do the US and Japanese teens. Of the three groups, the US teens report the greatest likelihood of using marketer based information sources (i.e. advertising and salespersons).\nPractical implications: - The findings suggest the need to develop specific apparel marketing strategies directed at teens targeted in these nations.\nOriginality/value: - Few, if any, studies have examined differences between Asian and US teens in their apparel information source usage.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Factors for the adoption of green building specifications in China	[ "Developing countries", "Sustainable development", "Factor", "Green specifications" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The construction industry has a profound impact not only on economic development and public social life, but also on the natural environment (US Green Building Council (USGBC, 2003)). The construction industry has consumed more global nonrenewable and renewable resources such as water, raw materials and energy, and emitted waste such as air pollution (Tatari and Kucukvar, 2011) or physical waste (Berardi, 2013). Consequently, it is significant to find a sustainable way to reduce waste, improve efficiency and use renewable energy resources in the construction industry. With the rising global attention (Kibwami and Tutesigensi, 2016) and the demand for sustainable construction, building green buildings has been an efficient way as it can minimize the impact on the natural environment and maximize human health. It also uses energy-efficient appliances and systems to utilize fewer resources, like water, electricity, gas and energy, and increases the use of recycled materials, like natural linoleum or bamboo flooring to reduce waste during the construction process (Yudelson, 2009; Zhang et al., 2011). It has been claimed that green buildings can not only give the construction industry environmental, economic and social benefits, but also can provide a sustainable development opportunity as it can minimize the pollutants, renew natural resources [...] through sustainable buildings. Consequently, the research on the concepts and practices of green buildings has been accepted and adopted both in developed and developing countries (Gou and Xie, 2016).\n2. Influencing factors for the adoption of green specifications: There were few researchers and practitioners who have investigated the barriers that hinder the adoption of green specifications in construction. In the previous research, the factors such as higher cost, lack of knowledge and awareness of sustainable construction have been listed.\n3. Research method: 3.1 Research framework\n4. Research results and discussions: 4.1 Rank analysis\n5. Findings and discussion: 5.1 Factor 1: green technology\n6. Conclusions and implications: The construction industry has consumed more global resources. Sustainable construction is a useful way for resource saving and sustainable development. Green specifications are the basic guarantee and reference for sustainable construction. However, in China, green building specifications has not been well used which hindered the process of sustainable construction. This study presents a comprehensive explanation of the barriers that hinder the adoption of green building specifications in China. Based on literature review, 18 critical barriers that affect the adoption of green building specifications in China are initially identified by conducting the questionnaire survey. In order to understand the interrelationship among factors better and clearly, this paper uses factor analysis and rank technique method for further analysis. The study has identified that government-related factors are the foremost factors for the adoption of green specifications in China. By making factor analysis, the basic 18 critical variables are categorized into five factors: green technology and techniques; awareness and attitude; governments' policies and regulations; market demand; and cost. The results also indicate that the most dominant one of the five clusters pertains to regulations and policies. The findings tend to highlight the factors that affect the adoption of green specifications in China, and give policymakers advice to better implement green specifications in China. Results show that solutions to overcome the barriers in China mainly depend on the government. The results can also give other developing countries reference for better adoption of green specifications.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Green specifications are some of the most important strategies for energy saving and describe the best practice in the field of sustainable construction. They have great effects on resource saving and environmental protection. The demand of sustainable construction has spurred the emerging and development of green specifications. However, there are many factors that affect the adoption of green specifications in China. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the factors that affect the adoption of green specifications in China.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Based on the comprehensive literature review, a questionnaire survey has been conducted to with major stakeholders in construction area to identify issues concerning the adoption of green specifications in China. In total, 18 variables that affect the adoption of green specifications in were summarized. Then this study uses factor analysis and mean score method to analyze 18 variables which the authors get from the questionnaire.\nFindings: Using the rank analysis and factor analysis, the variables have been ranked, analyzed and categorized into five independent factors. They are summarized as: green technology and techniques; awareness and attitude; policies and regulations; market; and economics. This study provides a variable reference for policy makers to put forward focused policies and incentives for green specifications implementation and industry practitioners to better understand of green specifications adoption in China.\nOriginality/value: This paper makes a contribution to the understanding of the factors that affect the adoption of the green specifications in China. The results can also contribute to better adoption of green specifications in other developing countries.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Emerging market currency risk exposure: evidence from South Africa	[ "Currency risk", "Emerging markets", "Stock markets", "Panel data models", "Asset pricing models", "C23", "F23", "F31", "G12" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: In an increasingly integrating global economy, the volatility of exchange rates poses a risk to both multinational firms and domestic firms. Much research has been dedicated to the study of the so-called foreign exchange exposure puzzle (Bartram et al., 2010; Bartram and Bodnar, 2007). This area of research emerged after the fall of the Bretton-Woods system and gained momentum in subsequent periods (Dufey, 1972; Heckerman, 1972; Shapiro, 1975).\nLiterature review: Muller and Verschoor (2006b) conducted a survey of the empirical literature on foreign exchange exposure of firms. It must, however, be pointed out that the literature reviewed in their survey is exclusively focused on studies conducted in the developed markets context. The survey synthesizes the many studies that have been conducted, extracting key lessons and identifying key questions that remain unanswered. Muller and Verschoor (2006b) show that despite the arguments espoused in the theoretical literature, demonstrating the link between firm value and exchange rate changes, there has been very limited support in the empirical literature for the exchange rate exposure hypothesis in the developed market context. The survey concludes by observing that consensus regarding the factors influencing the foreign exchange risk exposure of firms is yet to be established. However, they argue that the theoretical literature has enhanced our appreciation of the dynamics at play in relation to the issue of exchange risk exposure. With regard to the empirical literature they conclude that the findings of the empirical literature are mixed, and that \"the bulk of the evidence suggests that exchange rate fluctuations affect, to a certain extent, shareholder wealth\".\nMethodology: Data\nThe Fama-French three-factor model: Fama and French (1993) have demonstrated that equity returns can be sensitive to size and value factors, and not just the market index. Basiewicz and Auret (2010) and Strugnell et al. (2011) show that size and value effects do help to explain the variation in equity returns of firms listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE). Kodongo and Ojah (2014) and Kodongo (2011) apply the international capital asset pricing model (ICAPM) and APT respectively, and in both cases, find that Africa's equity markets, including South Africa are partially segmented. Kodongo (2011) recommends the use of Fama and French (1993) to take into account idiosyncratic factors. Thus, the study will apply the following model:\nResults and discussion: Empirical tests based on the capital asset pricing model framework\nSummary of results: We analysed the degree of foreign exchange exposure of non-financial firms is South Africa on the basis of four alternative asset pricing models in line with augmented market model of Jorion (1990), the three-factor asset pricing model of Fama and French (1993), the four-factor asset pricing model of Carhart (1997) and the five-factor asset pricing model of Fama and French (2015), respectively.\nConclusions and recommendations: The study provides an account of the foreign exchange exposure of nonfinancial firms from an emerging market perspective. The study analysed the degree of foreign exchange exposure of nonfinancial firms in South Africa on the basis of the standard model of Jorion (1990), and made a methodical contribution in the emerging markets of context of Africa, by applying the Carhart (1997) and Fama and French (1993, 2015) in the estimation of foreign exchange exposure levels of South African nonfinancial firms. The study was conducted on the basis of four alternative exchange rate proxies, i.e. the TWC, the USDZAR, the EURZAR and the GBPZAR.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the level of foreign exchange exposure of listed nonfinancial firms in South Africa. The study spans the period January 2002 and November 2015. Foreign exchange risk exposure is estimated in relation to the exchange rate of the South African Rand relative to the US$, the Euro, the British Pound and the trade-weighted exchange rate index.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The study is based on the augmented-market model of Jorion (1990). The Jorion (1990) is a capital asset pricing model-inspired framework which models share returns as a function of the return on the market index and changes in the exchange rate factor. The market risk factor is meant to discount the effect of macroeconomic factors on share returns, thus isolating the foreign exchange risk factor. In addition, the study further added the size, value, momentum, investment and profitability risk factors in line with the Fama-French three-factor model, Carhart four-factor model and the Fama-French five-factor model to account for the fact that equity capital markets in countries such as South Africa are known to be partially segmented.\nFindings: Foreign exchange risk exposure levels were estimated at more than 40% for all the proxy currencies on the basis of the standard augmented market model. However, after controlling for idiosyncratic factors, through the application of the Fama-French three-factor model, the Carhart four-factor model and the Fama-French five-factor model, exposure levels were found to range between 6.5 and 12%.\nResearch limitations/implications: These results indicate the importance of controlling for the effects of idiosyncratic facto0rs in the estimation of foreign exchange risk exposure in the context of emerging markets of Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA).\nOriginality/value: This is the first study to apply the Fama-French three-factor model, Carhart four-factor model and the Fama-French five-factor model in the estimation of foreign exchange exposure of nonfinancial firms in the context of a SSA country. These results indicate the importance of controlling for the effects of idiosyncratic factors in the estimation of foreign exchange risk exposure in the context of emerging markets.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Intentions to adopt safe food storage practices in older adults: An application of the theory of planned behaviour	[ "Behaviour", "Consumer attitudes", "Food safety", "Education", "Consumer", "Older consumers" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: There are approximately 51.8m episodes of foodborne illness every year in Canada and the USA combined (Scallan, Griffin, Angulo, Tauxe and Hoekstra, 2011; Scallan, Hoekstra, Angulo, Tauxe, Widdowson, Roy, Jones et al., 2011; Thomas et al., 2013). Symptoms can vary depending on the pathogen and individual characteristics. For instance, the CDC (2019a) have identified people with higher risk of foodborne and two of those groups are older adults (65+) and those with weakened immune systems. Typically, older adults fall into the latter group as well because of the natural aging process (e.g. decline in immune function) and chronic health conditions (e.g. diabetes, heart disease) they acquire over time (Divo et al., 2014). Engaging in safe food handling practices at home is imperative for high-risk groups such as older adults because of the increased susceptibility and severity of consequences attributed to foodborne illness (World Health Organization, 2016). Furthermore, trends in population aging show that there will be a global increase of older adults and the United Nations (2015) estimates that 2.1bn individuals will be aged 60 and over by 2050, nearly double today's numbers.\n2. Material and methods: 2.1 Study design and participants\n3. Results: 3.1 Descriptive data\n4. Discussion: The present study investigated older adults' intentions to perform safe food handling at home. The models explained a meaningful amount of variance in older adults' intentions to safely store foods. Gender and past behaviour only significantly predicted intentions in storing leftovers within recommended guidelines. Women were more likely to have stronger intentions to store leftovers than men, which suggests a disparity in food storage behaviours between men and women. Studies have demonstrated that women have stronger risk perceptions than men and are more likely to consider health risks associated with foods (Dosman et al., 2001; Williams and Hammitt, 2001). This is perhaps due to existing gender roles where women have the primary responsibility for food preparation and storage at home, but there is some evidence in recent years that this is slowly changing as more men engage in food preparation (Taillie, 2018). There is also some evidence that safe food handling is habitual in nature (Chow and Mullan, 2010; Mullan et al., 2014; Young, Reimer, Greig, Turgeon, Meldrum and Waddell, 2017) and past behaviours can sometimes predict intentions to follow a desired behaviour in the future. Future research investigating older adults' food handling should explicitly measure these habits and determine which food handling behaviours are significantly predicted by habits.\n5. Conclusion: The TPB is a useful framework for investigating adoption of safe food handling behaviours in older adults, especially safe storage which is an underperformed practice by this group. The present study found all TPB antecedents to be predictors of behavioural intentions except attitudes, which was only a significant predictor of intentions to safely thaw meats. Traditionally, education campaigns have focussed on increasing food safety knowledge but these findings along with previously published theory-based research suggest identifying constructs which drive behaviour change and targeting them may lead to more effective safe food handling behaviour change.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to apply the theory of planned behaviour (TPB) to determine which psychosocial factors are predictors of older adults' safe food storage practices at home.\nDesign/methodology/approach: An online structured questionnaire was developed and administered to older adults (60+). Two behavioural intention outcomes were investigated: thawing meats safely and storing leftovers within recommended guidelines. The survey instrument measured socio-demographic and TPB variables: attitudes, subjective norms, perceived behavioural control and intentions. A measure of self-reported habitual behaviour was also recorded and used to determine whether past practice influenced behavioural intentions.\nFindings: Respondents (n=78) demonstrated good intentions to safely defrost meats and store leftovers. The models accounted for 41 and 48 per cent of the variance in intentions to perform safe storage behaviours. Attitudes and subjective norms were predictors of intentions to safely thaw meats. Habitual behaviour was a significant predictor of behavioural intentions to safely store leftovers. Perceived behavioural control was a significant predictor of intentions to thaw meats and store leftovers.\nResearch limitations/implications: The sample size was small, and results are to be interpreted with caution.\nPractical implications: The results indicate that theory-based solutions to solving food safety among consumers may be a feasible strategy.\nOriginality/value: The study is the first of its kind to apply the TPB to this consumer group.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Mainstreaming women into disaster reduction in the built environment: A guideline for Sri Lanka	[ "Sri Lanka", "Built environment", "Natural disasters", "Guideline", "Women’s vulnerability" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The aftermath of the Indian Ocean tsunami in 2004 demonstrated that there were significant gender issues in Sri Lanka. According to the United Nations (2009), male survivors from the tsunami outnumbered female survivors by three or four to one in Sri Lanka. It is stated that the women's death toll in the tsunami was equivalent to as much as 80 per cent in some parts of the country (Ariyabandu, 2009; APWLD, 2005). The prevalence of gender issues was clearly evident in the tsunami recovery and reconstruction process.\nMethodology: The paper is based on a study which incorporated a social constructivism view point to design the research. The research design associated the constructionism ontology and interpretivism epistemology. It adopted a case study approach as the strategy of enquiry and the case study design comprised a single case, holistic design, with a single unit of analysis. The unit of analysis was determined as the process of mainstreaming women into DRR in the built environment with a country specific and cross-sectional case study boundary in relation to spatial and temporal variables. Sri Lanka was selected as the case study for the research.\nIntegrating local communities into disaster reduction in the built environment: The Indian Ocean tsunami in 2004 was an eye opener for Sri Lanka causing the country to re-think its disaster management approach. The tsunami not only paved the way for providing a legal basis for instituting a disaster risk management system in the country, but it also caused a shift from a response-based disaster management approach to a more proactive approach to disaster management (Disaster Management Centre - Sri Lanka, 2005). However, the lack of public consultation in disaster reduction in the built environment was evident throughout the rebuilding process. A report which analysed the response, recovery and rebuilding efforts of Sri Lanka seven months after the 2004 tsunami noted that moving from a process of telling people what they could have to one in which people were asked what they wanted was a task that most governmental and non-governmental officials, were ill prepared to implement (APWLD, 2005). It suggested that aspects such as the layout of resettlement communities, i.e. the distance between houses, etc., needed to have evolved from a process of consultation with the community and with experts in the field.\nExisting practices to integrate local community: Although community consultation is not a common practice within the built environment in Sri Lanka, the environmental impact assessment (EIA) process provides some provision for the local community to intervene in the development decision-making process. It is an internationally agreed assessment procedure that identifies and predicts the likely environmental, social and other effects of proposed new development projects that have potentially significant environmental impact, and examines the alternatives based on preferred or most economically, environmentally and socially sound options for achieving the project objectives (Withanage, 2006; Kodithuwakku, 2004). EIA legislation in Sri Lanka allows a 30 day mandatory public commenting period for the relevant stakeholders, including the general public, to convey their opinions about the proposed development (Withanage, 2006). This consultation stage of the EIA was seen as the most appropriate current framework in Sri Lanka to embed the process of mainstreaming women by the interviewees.\nStatus of mainstreaming women into DRR: According to Enarson and Meyreles (2004), Sri Lanka has been a pioneer in the research on gender and disasters in South Asia. However, the level of implementation of gender sensitive policies and programmes in DRR is still not satisfactory in the country. In particular, the aftermath of the 2004 tsunami exhibited the country's inadequate gender sensitive policies and actions in relation to disaster management. According to APWLD (2005), access during the post-tsunami phase to healthcare was a critical but significantly difficult task for women, especially for pregnant women and women with small children. Furthermore, there were incidents of rape, molestation and physical abuse of women and girls during the unsupervised rescue operations and in the temporary shelters.\nGuidelines for mainstreaming women into DRR in the built environment: Factors influencing mainstreaming women\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to introduce a guideline to mainstream women into disaster reduction in the built environment in Sri Lanka.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The paper is based on ten in-depth interviews conducted with professionals engaged in disaster risk reduction in the built environment in Sri Lanka. The interviews are complemented by a comprehensive literature review conducted on the impacts of 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami on women in Sri Lanka, and the country's status of mainstreaming women into disaster reduction in the built environment.\nFindings: The paper presents a guideline for mainstreaming women into disaster reduction in the built environment in Sri Lanka which consists of factors influencing the process, main steps, parties responsible, required resources, required expertise, appropriate stages of development to conduct the process, barriers to the process and how to improve the process.\nOriginality/value: At present, there are no guidelines which specifically inform how to mainstream women into disaster reduction in the built environment in Sri Lanka. Such guideline is significant to reduce women's vulnerability to natural disasters and also to tackle disaster vulnerabilities of the built environment in general.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
What a difference a role makes: Occupational and organizational characteristics related to the HR strategic role among human resource managers	[ "Human resource management", "Strategic HR roles", "HR performance", "HR role framework", "Israeli strategic HRM" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: In the human resources (HR) community, there is continuous and unresolved debate whether HR as strategic partner is myth or reality. As HR academics and practitioners, we constantly hear managers make such remarks as \"HR is doing, not thinking\" as opposed to \"HR is taking a major role in our strategic decision-making process.\" In this study, we explore why some HR practitioners hold a strong strategic partner role, while other HR colleagues hold an administrative role. Since the early 1990s, the strategic partner role has been emphasized as the major role HR practitioners should hold and play (Conner and Ulrich, 1996; Pritchard, 2010; Caldwell, 2011; Ulrich et al., 2012, 2013). HR strategic partners take an active part in running their businesses, develop and implement organizational strategy, consult with and to other members of the organization in decision-making processes and are focused on finding ways to improve their organizations and deliver better organizational results (Ulrich et al., 2012, 2013). Moreover, prior research suggests that organizational abilities to transform, change and adapt to the external environment are highly correlated with the strategic role HR practitioners hold (e.g. Caldwell, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2008; Alfes et al., 2010; Ulrich et al., 2012).\nHR practitioners as strategic partners: models of HR roles: During the last three decades, many theoretical models of HR practitioners as strategic partners have emerged. Although each model defines its own unique terminology, there is a strong consensus about the basic components of strategic HR roles (Bhatnagar and Sharma, 2005; Pritchard, 2010). The most popular and highly cited model of strategic HR roles was suggested by Ulrich's (1997) pioneering work (Antila, 2006; Lemmergaard, 2009; Pritchard, 2010; Caldwell, 2011). Ulrich's model suggests that the role of HR as strategic partner is the combination of four distinct roles: strategic partner, change agent, employee champion and administrative expert. This model has both drawbacks and advantages (see e.g. Lemmergaard, 2009). For the purpose of this study, we apply Ulrich's strategic HR roles framework (Conner and Ulrich, 1996; Ulrich, 1997) for two main reasons. First, Ulrich's model is one of the most frequently quoted models in the literature of strategic HR roles (Pritchard, 2010). Second, his theoretical model is backed up by empirical findings and methodological instruments which enable replication (Conner and Ulrich, 1996; Bhatnagar and Sharma, 2005).\nMethod: Sample and selection of participants\nResults: Figure 2 presents scores on each of the four HR roles. Accordingly, the most prominent HR role among Israeli HR practitioners was the administrative expert role, followed by employee champion, change agent, and finally, business partner. These findings are quite similar to previous studies based on Ulrich's typology, especially in non-western countries (Afiouni et al., 2013; Mamman and Al Kulaiby, 2014). Our findings suggest that many Israeli HR practitioners still view their role mainly as oriented toward daily activities and revolving around employees' needs, rather than toward long-term processes and business needs (an operational focus vs a strategic focus). Finally, the four HR roles are highly correlated among themselves (Table II), mainly between the change agent role and the business partner role (R=0.84).\nDiscussion: The classic HR strategic role framework (Ulrich, 1997) is simple, workable and very common not only among HR scholars but also among HR practitioners, given its simplicity and clarification regarding four significant HR roles. There is, however, variance between HR practitioners in the degree that they assume a strategic HR positioning. Most of the recent research in this academic field, however, has mainly focused on competencies needed for HR practitioners in order to be effective strategic partners (for a full list, see: Ulrich et al., 2015).\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Based on the human resources (HR) role framework (Conner and Ulrich, 1996), the purpose of this paper is to empirically explore why HR practitioners differ in their strategic partner role positioning. The present study suggests and tests a descriptive model regarding occupational and organizational characteristics associated with strategic HR role positioning.\nDesign/methodology/approach: In all, 100 questionnaires were collected from Israeli HR practitioners. Hierarchical regressions were used to test the association between occupational and organizational characteristics and the strategic role perception among HR practitioners.\nFindings: Although the findings only partially supported the suggested model, significant associations between occupational and organizational characteristics and HR strategic positioning were found. HR practitioners in volatile organizational environments adopt a strategic role perception. Moreover, years of experience are also associated with an HR strategic role perception. Specifically, the major predictors of attaining a strategic partner role amongst HR practitioners are location of organizational activities mainly in the metropolitan area, and involvement in major organizational changes.\nResearch limitations/implications: The sample had a positive bias of respondents. Questionnaires were delivered mainly to highly educated HR practitioners in notably professional HR departments. Data were based on self-reported one-time questionnaires.\nPractical implications: The research has implications for the processes of academic education and professional training of HR practitioners and also their recruitment in organizations.\nOriginality/value: To the best of the authors' knowledge, recent studies aimed at exploring sources of variance in the strategic role perception amongst HR practitioners are rather scarce. This research helps to address this gap, while also broadening the literature regarding HR communities in the Middle East.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Strategies for maximizing organizational absorptive capacity	[ "Organizational learning", "Absorptive capacity", "Barriers", "Enablers" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: In the contemporary hypercompetitive environment, in which firms are forced to adapt at increasingly shorter time intervals, continuous learning has become critical to organizational effectiveness and long-term survival (Jimenez-Jimenez and Sanz-Valle, 2011; Easterby-Smith et al., 2008; Baskarada and Watson, 2017). While the concept of organizational learning is very broad, and there is arguably still no coherent organizational learning theory (Santa, 2015), key processes include knowledge acquisition, information distribution, information interpretation, and organizational memory (Huber, 1991).\nMethod: The views presented in this paper are not based on any single study. Instead, they have emerged from authors' extensive experience in empirical research (primarily, qualitative case studies), management (including academic and research administration), and consulting (in a range of public and private organizations). Authors' relevant prior research, among others, includes studies on information governance, organizational learning, organizational ambidexterity, foresight, and knowledge management. Support for the claims made in this paper is provided through anecdotal evidence and related literature.\nDiscussion: Potential absorptive capacity depends on the depth and breadth of knowledge of people involved in information acquisition and assimilation (Cohen and Levinthal, 1990; Lane et al., 2006), the extent of external networks (Van Wijk et al., 2003), the depth and breadth of scanning (Volberda, 1996), the outlook time frame (short to long term), and the number and types of information sources (Baskarada, Shrimpton and Ng, 2016). As different knowledge domains are organized and expressed in similar ways, knowledge of one domain may positively influence the learning of a different domain (Cohen and Levinthal, 1990; Reagans and McEvily, 2003). Thus, diversity of background knowledge is a critical enabler of potential absorptive capacity (Lane and Lubatkin, 1998). Diversity of knowledge is also important when it is not known which areas of expertise may be most relevant in the future. Given that the depth and breadth of knowledge and the extent of external networks are largely a function of the number of personnel, ceteris paribus, it may be expected that larger organizations would have higher potential absorptive capacity (Van Wijk et al., 2008).\nConclusion: While knowledge diversity is critical for potential absorptive capacity, knowledge overlap is critical for realizing absorptive capacity. This highlights a potential difficulty in buying or outsourcing absorptive capacity. Although other organizations may have the required knowledge diversity and high potential absorptive capacity, they will lack much tacit domain knowledge required to realize that potential absorptive capacity.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to discuss strategies for maximizing organizational absorptive capacity.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The views presented here have been derived from authors' extensive research and professional experience. Support for the claims made is provided through anecdotal evidence and related literature.\nFindings: The viewpoint discusses how organizational absorptive capacity may be maximized through actions and interactions of a wide range of individual, managerial, organizational, and inter-organizational factors.\nOriginality/value: The viewpoint may assist practitioners with developing strategies for improving vicarious learning. From a theoretical perspective, the claims made in the paper present fertile ground for future empirical testing.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Teachers' self-efficacy beliefs, self-esteem, and job stress as determinants of job satisfaction	[ "Job satisfaction", "Ireland", "Self-esteem", "Self-efficacy", "Teachers", "Job stress" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Job satisfaction is defined as \"a pleasurable or positive emotional state resulting from the appraisal of one's job or job experiences\" (Locke, 1976, p. 1304). Previous research indicates that job satisfaction is crucial, due to its associations with work performance, physical and mental health, and career decisions (Caprara et al., 2003, 2006; Fritzsche and Parrish, 2005; Judge et al., 2001; Skaalvik and Skaalvik, 2009). Teachers dissatisfied with their work display lower work commitment, negatively impact on student motivation through emotional contagion (Hatfield et al., 1993), may fail to satisfy their student's needs for autonomy and competence (Ryan and Deci, 2000; Klusmann et al., 2008), and are at greater risk of leaving the profession (Ingersoll, 2001).\nMethod: Given the findings of previous research, the following hypotheses were tested:\nResults: Descriptive statistics and group differences\nDiscussion: Over the previous two decades, an extensive body of research has emerged on the factors that may help to explain or predict teacher job satisfaction (e.g. Judge and Church, 2000; Judge et al., 2002). However, limited research has examined teachers' job satisfaction in Ireland. Given the important influence of job satisfaction on teachers' performance, commitment, and physical and mental wellbeing, the overall aim of the present study was to examine the factors influencing job satisfaction among Irish primary school teachers. To achieve this, we examined: potential gender differences in job satisfaction, self-efficacy, self-esteem, and perceived stress; the relationship between self-efficacy, self-esteem, and job satisfaction; how perceived stress correlates with self-efficacy, self-esteem, and job satisfaction; and which of the predictor variables best predicts job satisfaction.\nConclusions and recommendations: This study provides valuable information on the factors influencing Irish primary school teachers' job satisfaction, a population largely overlooked previously in the literature. More specifically, this study highlights the important influence of perceived stress on teachers' job satisfaction. Importantly, perceived stress is likely to be a modifiable variable that could be effectively targeted at an individual and/or organisational level to improve teachers' work satisfaction (i.e. stress management, training, counselling, organisational restructuring, and job redesign). The results of the present study also provide a clear and important direction for future research: the qualitative exploration of the sources of teacher stress. A qualitative approach would allow for the in-depth exploration of the situational factors contributing to perceived stress, which could then be targeted by local educational authorities and school decision makers.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the role of teaching self-efficacy, perceived stress, self-esteem, and demographic characteristics (age, gender, education, and years of teaching experience) in predicting job satisfaction within a sample of 121 Irish primary school teachers.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Survey data were collected from teachers from eight primary schools. Hypotheses were tested using a comparison of means, correlations, and multiple regression.\nFindings: Results indicated that the predictor variables accounted for 22 per cent of variance in teachers' job satisfaction. However, only perceived stress was found to explain unique predictive variance, with high levels of occupations stress related to low levels of job satisfaction.\nPractical implications: Perceived stress should be targeted in efforts to improve teachers' job satisfaction.\nOriginality/value: The results make an additional contribution to the literature by providing important information on the factors contributing to teachers' job satisfaction in Ireland.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Struggles for cooperation: conflict resolution strategies in multicultural groups	[ "Conflict management", "Collectivism", "Individual behaviour", "Group behaviour" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Understanding the impact of cross-cultural diversity on cooperation and conflict resolution processes in teams is a critical factor for team success and organizational effectiveness. Until recently, this issue was mainly studied in geographically dispersed teams, with members from different cultural contexts (Earley and Gibson, 1998). Nowadays, due to globalization and increased population mobility, teams operating in one cultural context are increasingly cross-culturally diverse. Cooperation is essential whenever people have to coordinate activities of differentiated tasks (Wagner, 1995). Therefore, cooperation in culturally diverse teams is a significant topic of organizational research (Wagner, 1995).The individualism-collectivism \"cultural syndrome\" has consistently been found to be a significant difference among cultures in a large number of studies (Earley and Gibson, 1998; Hofstede, 1980; Oyserman et al., 2002; Triandis, 1996). Collectivists conform more to group norms than individualists, and have more cooperative groups than individualists. The cooperation of individualists, on the other hand, is instrumental: when they can only achieve their individual goals in groups, individualists do not differ in their levels of cooperative behaviour from collectivists (Wagner, 1995).Differences in cultural values between collectivistic and individualistic societies influence attitudes toward conflict and conflict management (Kirkbride et al., 1991; Lee and Rogan, 1991; Leung, 1988; Taggar and Haines, 2006; Ting-Toomey et al., 1991; Wheeler, 2002). Conflict with out-groups is perceived as natural by collectivists. Collectivists tend to see more differences between the in- and out-groups, and they do not consider it a virtue to put themselves into other people's shoes (Triandis, 1994). When dealing with the in-group, on the other hand, the primary focus of collectivists is to avoid actions that will strain relationships and lead to weakening and dissolving the relationship. Individualists nevertheless tolerate and are able to cope with high levels of within-group conflict (Leung, 1997). Therefore, group members' cultural values are certainly related to the way members deal with intra-group conflicts. Research to date mostly focused on making group level inferences by averaging levels of individualism-collectivism of the individual group members and little to no interest was shown in conceptualizing cultural values as a configural group property (Klein and Kozlowski, 2000). In our study, we consider the diversity of cultural values as a configural group property, defined as the variability of individual cultural values within a group. Thus, we extend current research by capturing the impact of specific team configurations with respect to cultural values on conflict management strategies.Therefore, the main aim of the present study is to explore the impact of the diversity in individualism-collectivism of the group on the conflict resolution styles used by this group. We take into account both the average level of the individualism/collectivism as well as the diversity of individualism/collectivism in the team. We first outline our theoretical framework and discuss the hypotheses of the study. In the second part, we articulate our study design and detail the methodological approach. Finally, the third part of the paper presents the findings and their implications.\nConceptual framework: Cross-cultural issues in conflict resolution\nMethod: Sample and procedure\nResults: Mean, SDs, and correlations between the variables considered in this study are presented in Table I.Correlations reveal a positive association between relational conflict and avoiding, contending and third party conflict management strategies. These correlations are not surprising, since groups experiencing high levels of relationship conflict are also more likely to engage in different strategies of dealing with intra-team conflict. As a consequence, the level of relationship conflict was added in the regression analyses as a control variable to rule out the possibility that a particular conflict management strategy is actually influenced by the level of intra-team conflict. Moreover, we have controlled for group size in order to exclude the possible associations between group size and conflict management strategies, as well as to exclude any group size effect from the diversity measures. In order to test our hypotheses we have estimated a regression model for each type of conflict management style in which we entered group size and level of relational conflict in the first step as controls, mean of individualism-collectivism on both horizontal and vertical dimensions in the second step, group variety in cultural values (as the Rwg scores) in the third step, and disparity (as the coefficient of variation) in cultural values in the fourth step of the regression. The results of these regression analyses are presented in Table II. The variance inflation factor scores were lower than 2.2, therefore, no major multi-collinearity problems are identified.Group size has a small negative impact on the use of cooperative conflict resolution style. As shown also in the correlation table, a higher level of relational conflict was related to higher use of the avoiding, contending, and third-party resolution styles.For the mean levels of horizontal/VI/collectivism, we found partial support for only one of our hypotheses (namely, H4). HC had a negative impact on avoiding and contending, and a strong positive impact on cooperating (partial support H4). Vertical individualism had a positive impact on avoiding.Table II also highlights the impact of variety in individualism-collectivism on conflict resolution styles. Low scores on Rwg reflect a high dispersion of the scores. As expected, variety impacted conflict resolution styles to a larger extent than the mean scores. As stated in H5, variety in cultural values had in general a positive impact on cooperation (significant effects for horizontal individualism and vertical collectivism), yet the result for VI is opposed to the hypothesized effect. Variety with respect to VI had a positive impact on avoiding and third party interventions, and a negative effect on the cooperating strategy. Hence, we received only partial support for H5. For group disparity in cultural values, only one relation was significant: disparity in HC impacted positively on third party. Therefore, no statistically significant results were found to support the claims of this hypothesis.\nDiscussion: This paper set out to investigate the impact of various types of group diversity in individualism-collectivism on conflict resolution styles in groups. The main contributions of the study are the following: we extended the scope of knowledge by moving from the individual to the group level of analysis. In addition, we used group diversity indicators to identify group configurations that impact on conflict resolution strategies. The discussion is organized around two points:1. How the general level of individualism-collectivism in a group predicts conflict resolution strategies?2. How the two group configurations (variety and disparity) of individualism-collectivism affect the conflict resolution styles?Level of conflict\nImplications of the findings: The results have several theoretical and practical implications. First, our data showed that predictions based on the mean level of individualism-collectivism for each group are poorer and sometimes contrasting with those based on diversity indices. This implies that results obtained at the individual level of analysis cannot be \"freely imported\" to the group level and that group compositional configurations should be taken into account when exploring the impact of cultural values on conflict management strategies. Our results show that small and consistent within-group differences in cultural values is in general conducive for cooperation, yet VI seems to give the opposite pattern of results. Next to the inconsistent pattern of results for group disparity in cultural values, this suggests that several mechanisms are at play in explaining the impact of compositional configurations on conflict management strategies. The systemic explanation that small inter-individual differences are easier to bridge seems to hold in general, yet other mechanisms like minority influence could play an important role as well. Moreover, research on cultural values and conflict management in groups could benefit from integrating research on leader's preferred conflict management strategy (Yukkl et al., 2009). Interactions between leadership and cultural values could yield interesting results on when and how minority influence mechanisms are at play. Also, further research on group compositional configurations with respect to individualism-collectivism is strongly needed. It could be that cultural values are interdependent in impacting on conflict management strategies. Different patterns of cultural values are likely to co-occur at the intra-individual as well as within-group levels. Therefore, the particular case of cultural values acting as moderators for cultural values should be explored in multi-level models since intra-individual and within-group configurations in cultural values could yield distinctive effects on conflict management strategies. Second, our research shows again that different types of diversity have a different impact on group functioning (Curseu et al., 2007; Harrison and Klein, 2007). In this research, we chose to use an existing taxonomy (Harrison and Klein, 2007) for cross-cultural groups. By using this taxonomy, we were able to advance hypotheses with respect to the mechanisms underlying the influence of individualism-collectivism in group conflict resolution strategies.In terms of practical implications, the most important results of this study are in line with the ones reported by Earley and Mosakowski (2000), and thus have important consequences for cooperation management in multicultural groups. Managers should be aware that group members viewing themselves as unequal to and independent from others (scoring high on VI) are more likely to cooperate with people holding similar cultural values, while in general, small and consistent within group differences in the other three dimensions presented here are conducive for cooperation. Another team configuration beneficial for cooperation is the homogeneity with respect to HC. In other words, groups where all members feel they are equal and connected are very likely to adopt cooperation as a dominant conflict management strategy. Nevertheless, cultural values will most likely interact with other diversity dimensions as well, and thus managers should be aware of these complex interactions and their impact on cooperation when designing teams. Similar with previous research (van Dick et al., 2009), our study shows that managers should focus on building a shared group identity that bridges across individual differences within groups.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The aim of this paper is to examine the influence of group composition in cultural values on conflict management styles in groups.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - A field study using data from 125 groups was conducted.\nFindings: - The results show that in groups where members feel they are equal and connected (horizontal collectivism) cooperation is better, and contending and avoiding conflict management styles are used less. When people view themselves as unequal and independent (vertical individualism (VI)) the avoiding style of conflict management is more frequently used. Within-group similarity (low variety) in VI leads to more cooperation and less avoidant conflict management strategies as well as less third party interventions. High group variety in views of being unequal, but interconnected (vertical collectivism), as well as in the views of being equal but independent (horizontal individualism), leads to more cooperative conflict resolution strategy.\nPractical implications: - The results show that small and consistent within-group differences in cultural values are beneficial (with the exception of VI) for cooperative strategies. By showing that group compositional configurations in cultural values (vertical/horizontal individualism and collectivism) impact on conflict management strategies, the study has important implications for team design.\nOriginality/value: - The paper extends current research by conceptualizing cultural values (it considers the horizontal vs vertical orientation in individualism-collectivism) as configural group properties and by testing the impact of specific team configurations in cultural values on conflict management strategies.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Attitudes and approaches of Irish retrofit industry professionals towards achieving nearly zero-energy buildings	[ "Stakeholders", "Energy efficiency", "Construction professionals", "Nearly zero-energy buildings", "Retrofit industry" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The focus of construction in Europe has shifted from new builds to refurbishment to achieve member states' energy efficiency targets. Indeed, the current rate of refurbishment in Europe is around 1 per cent (BPIE, 2013). A major share of the building stock in Europe is older than 50 years and about 40 per cent of the existing residential buildings were constructed before the 1960s when the building regulations for energy consumption of buildings were limited (BPIE, 2011). In Ireland, residential buildings cover 77.3 per cent of the 234 million m2 of total floor area (BPIE, 2015a) and comprise 27.1 per cent of total energy consumption (Howley and Holland, 2014). During the Celtic Tiger construction boom (1990-2006), floor area increased in the average dwelling by 16.6 per cent, indicating a rising energy demand (O'Leary et al., 2008). More recently, Irish Government policies are targeting improvements in the energy efficiency of buildings, particularly in the residential sector. There are immense opportunities in this area for Ireland; for example, the potential primary energy savings of 13.5 TWh in the residential sector would represent almost 30 per cent of the total energy demand of 44 TWh (Scheer, 2015). The delivery of nearly zero-energy buildings (nZEB) by upgrading existing buildings depends heavily on the policies, practices, and expertise of the construction industry.\n2. Methodology: The aim of this investigation is to understand the attitudes and approaches adopted by retrofit industry professionals in their practices or businesses towards delivering or achieving nZEB. To this end, a three-tier methodology was designed comprising a survey (90 respondents), a workshop (85 participants) and a series of in-depth interviews (11 participants). The surveys, workshop and interviews were structured into themes to assemble details about the status of the industry and its stakeholders (Table II). This methodology enabled the identification of major barriers, gaps and challenges existing in the retrofit industry in Ireland. A similar research technique was applied to evaluating the Irish industry scenario by a consortium of organisations in Ireland, although it was focussed on the upskilling of industry stakeholders through training (BUSI, 2013a). Davies and Osmani (2011) also adopted a triangulated approach to evaluating the low-carbon housing refurbishment challenges and incentives. Such use of different methods in data collection ensure consistency, reliability and validity of results (Gul and Menzies, 2012).\n3. Results and discussion: 3.1 Survey results: assessing the retrofit practice\n4. Summary and conclusions: The three-tier study outlined the spectrum of attitudes and approaches in the retrofit industry, highlighting multiple barriers, gaps and challenges in Ireland. The results from Section 3.1, 3.2 and 3.3 are summarised in Table VI below under two broad headings: practice and industry (technical, environmental, and industrial); and enforcement and governance (legislative, social, and economic); and followed by comprehensive briefings on these categories.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: There is profound demand for higher skills and expertise in retrofitting the existing building stock of Europe. The delivery of low- or nearly zero-energy retrofits is highly dependent on technical expertise, adoption of new materials, methods of construction and innovative technologies. Future Irish national building regulations will adopt the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive vision of retrofitting existing buildings to higher energy efficiency standards. Construction industry stakeholders are key for the achievement of energy performance targets. Specifically, the purpose of this paper is to assess the attitudes, approaches and experiences of Irish construction professionals regarding energy efficient buildings, particularly nearly zero-energy buildings (nZEBs).\nDesign/methodology/approach: Data were collected through a series of quantitative and qualitative methods, including a survey, a workshop and detailed interviews with professionals in the retrofit industry. The structure of this approach was informed by preliminary data and information available on the Irish construction sector.\nFindings: There is a substantial amount of ambiguity and reluctance among the professionals in reaching the Irish nZEB targets. The growing retrofit industry demonstrates low-quality auditing and pre/post-retrofit analysis. Basic services and depth of retrofits are compromised by project budgets and marginal profits. Unaligned value supply chain, poor interaction among nZEB professionals and fragmented services are deterrents to industry standardisation.\nPractical implications: This study will enable construction industry stakeholders to make provisions for overcoming the barriers, gaps and challenges identified in the practices of the retrofit projects. It will also inform the formulation of policies that drive retrofit uptake.\nSocial implications: This study has implications for understanding the social barriers existing in retrofit projects. Support from clients/owners has a diverse impact on energy performance and retrofit decisions. Community-based initiatives are key to unlock the promotion of nZEBs.\nOriginality/value: This paper provides an overview of current activities of retrofit professionals and analyses the barriers, gaps and challenges in the industry.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Privacy by design and customers' perceived privacy and security concerns in the success of e-commerce	[ "Data protection", "Electronic commerce", "Online transaction", "Personal information", "Privacy by design", "Privacy concerns", "Organization practices" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Industry reliance on information communication technologies (ICT) has grown exponentially in the present dynamic and highly competitive, challenging, and constantly changing business environment where government, business, and private individuals are exploring and using new technologies. As the internet evolves as a relatively safe and secure place to conduct business and monetary transactions, there has been a rise in the number of online services, an increase in the adoption of e-commerce and an increase in use of the internet as a commercial tool for conducting business to consumer (B2C) as well as business to business (B2B) transactions. As business becomes more dependent on technology, the use of ICT is unavoidable and must be adopted in order to provide convenient services for customers and to ensure a competitive advantage over other businesses (Evans and Sawyer, 2009). Given the pace of development of online services, the situation may already have evolved to the point where the provision of effective online services has become necessary to remain in the market rather than a competitive advantage.\n2. PbD: In the 1990s, the concept of \"PbD\" was first proposed by Cavoukian (2009a, b), when the notion of embedding privacy into the design of ICT was not very popular. PbD refers to the philosophy and approach of embedding privacy into the design specifications of various technologies. This may be achieved by building the principles of Fair Information Practices (FIPs) into the design, operation, and management of information processing technologies and systems. PbD consists of a number of principles that can be applied from the onset of system development to mitigate privacy concerns and achieve data protection compliance (Cavoukian, 2010).\n3. Perceived privacy and security concerns: In the context of e-commerce, information privacy and data security is concerned with the privacy of the information that is generated as an end result of customers' actions and online behaviour. Fundamentally, it includes and deals with the customers' online activities and consists of information collection, sharing, use, reuse, and storage of data such as transactions, personal details, and demographic information. Online privacy is also known as \"Internet privacy\". Boritz et al. (2011, p. 5) defined internet privacy as an \"individual's right to access and control their personal information with respect to its collection, use and transfer over the Internet\". This information is generated as the end result of e-commerce transactions (Milberg et al., 2000; Petty, 2000; Rezgui et al., 2003). All business transactions require information exchange and themselves generate further data (Caudill and Murphy, 2000; Shapiro and Baker, 2001).\n4. Conceptual model: The potential of privacy and security concerns in e-commerce technologies has caused many organisations to invest large sums in implementing e-commerce systems. Evaluating organisational practices and user's concerns in the success of e-commerce systems is thus an important issue for both practitioners and researchers. While many researchers have proposed several success models for information systems and e-commerce systems, these models are subject to considerable debate regarding the benefit of using e-commerce and user satisfaction constructs which is consistent with the technology acceptance and marketing literature. It is therefore imperative for research to develop a general conceptual model which will provide a better understanding of CPPS, particularly in relation to the success of e-commerce web sites based on the previous studies.\n5. Research design: This section of the paper presents a discussion of the research design and the research methodology. The research study design is explanatory in nature in order that the users themselves clearly define their information privacy concerns and data security issues in the context of e-commerce from the end-user's perspective. We also sought to establish the measures have been taken by organisations to protect data and information privacy concerns. The extant literature in the field of privacy, security, and individuals' concerns forms the fundamental blocks on which this research is built. Furthermore, as the literature on PbD is not yet rich enough to provide a sound conceptual foundation for investigating the PbD concept, an exploratory qualitative study was undertaken. Specifically, focus group interviews with consumers and in-depth interviews with privacy managers were conducted to develop a conceptual model of PbD. Due to its rich, explorative and descriptive nature, qualitative research is appropriate for data collection and analysis (Sambamurthy and Zmud, 1999; Mingers, 2001; Myers, 2009). Exploratory research often builds on secondary research, \"such as reviewing available literature and/or data, or qualitative approaches such as informal discussions with consumers, employees, management or competitors, and more formal approaches through in-depth interviews, focus groups, projective methods, case studies or pilot studies\" (De Haes and Van Grembergen, 2009). The use of qualitative methodologies is incorporated to further substantiate the research findings and to reach a greater understanding of the research problems, the dynamics behind information privacy concerns, data security issues, and the means employed by organisations to minimise these issues. It also provides the opportunity for direct contact with the field of research to be studied and illuminates the observable facts under investigation (Cavaye, 1996; Fern, 2001; Kamberelis and Dimitriadis, 2005; Myers, 2009). Data were collected from organisations through one-on-one interviews with staff and from customers through focus groups as follows.\n6. Findings: 6.1 Companies - information technology and systems\n7. Discussion and conclusion: Ensuring the privacy of customers' information and data security is one of the most common user concerns affecting e-commerce adoption and its continued growth. This research has provided a better understanding of CPPS in general and in particular, in relation to the success of e-commerce web sites, by exploring the state of information privacy and data security in e-commerce, the concerns expressed by the customers, and the factors that elevated or minimised these concerns in relation to the organisations' practices. It is concluded, on the basis of the responses generated by the personnel from different organisations, that they are involved in integrating the privacy practices and the organisational policies and philosophy to safeguard the customers' interests by protecting their personal information through the creation of an authorised access system which restricts access to sensitive data.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to gain a deeper understanding of customers' perceived privacy and security (CPPS) by investigating privacy concerns, data security, and exploring the factors that elevate or minimise these concerns in relation to organisations' practices.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The research study utilises an explanatory research design. Data were collected from six organisations from different industry sectors through in-depth interviews with managers and from customers' through four focus groups of a high-user demographic segment.\nFindings: The paper identified Privacy by Design (PbD) in the area of organisations' practices as well as identifying the main areas of CPPS. These themes were used as the basis for an analysis of customer concerns instrumental to the success of e-commerce.\nPractical implications: The findings will inform the development of a general conceptual model. This will provide a better understanding of CPPS in general and in relation to the success of e-commerce web sites and transactional sites in particular.\nOriginality/value: The value and the originality of the paper comes from the adoption of the \"PbD\" paradigm. Organisations have to explore the factors that elevate or minimise customers' concerns in relation to adopting and continuing to use online transactions. It is necessary for organisations to do this because when privacy and security practices are clearly disclosed, customers increase their intention to use, or continue to use online transactions.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Impact of corporate social responsibility claims on consumer food choice: A cross-cultural comparison	[ "Discrete choice experiment", "Food claims", "Organic foods", "Environmental responsible", "Socially responsible", "Carbon zero", "Food", "Consumers", "Social responsibility", "Consumer behaviour", "Cross‐cultural studies" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The past 20 years have witnessed the development of a research stream investigating how corporate social responsibility (CSR) can support the marketing of a company and its products to consumers. Despite this enduring research interest, only few studies have examined the impact of CSR efforts on consumer product valuation (Taneja et al., 2011). Knowledge about the impact of CSR communication on consumer behaviour would provide companies with valuable information to justify, manage and communicate their CSR activities (Wood, 2010; Du et al., 2010).Of those studies existing, most either examine the effect of CSR for durable goods and services (Auger et al., 2003; Salmones et al., 2005) or mainly use student samples (Brown and Dacin, 1997; Russell and Russell, 2010), for which effects sizes cannot be assumed to be representative of actual consumers (Peterson, 2001). Specifically for the food sector, Hartmann (2011) provides an extensive review of corporate social responsibility studies and concludes that \"there still is no clear answer 'when, how and why' consumers respond to corporate responsibility\" (Hartmann, 2011, p. 304). This research contributes to the existing body of knowledge by examining the impact of point of purchase information on social and environmental responsibility, on consumers' food choices across seven international markets.1.1 Concept and international dimensions of corporate social responsibility\n2. Material and methods: 2.1 Food claims\n3. Results: 3.1 Claim awareness, penetration and trust\n4. Conclusion and practical implications: To address the research question, this study compared the influence on consumer choice of two CSR claims, communicating social and environmental responsibility as shelf talkers at the point of purchase, to other competing food claims. Although social and environmental responsibility showed similar levels of awareness, purchase penetration and trust, they differed significantly in consumer valuation. The implicit WTP derived from a choice experiment with visual shelf simulations was on average three times as high for the environmental than for the specific social responsibility food claim. This higher consumer valuation of environmental relative to social food benefits agrees with previous research on consumer food values (Lusk and Briggeman, 2009). From a consumer perspective CSR food claims were confirmed to stand in competition with other existing food claims and are strongly dominated in awareness and consumer valuation by organic claims. Over all markets, the average WTP for the organic claim was more than twice as high as for the environmentally responsible CSR claim. Consumers have been found to associate the organic food claim with a variety of benefits, including environmental and social fairness benefits, which likely result in a higher salience and valuation than competing CSR claims.Regarding the second research question, significant differences in consumer valuation, awareness, purchase penetration and trust into food claims were found across the markets analysed. Congruent with previous findings, there appears to be higher consumer awareness and trust into CSR claims in North American, particularly US markets, relative to European countries, where the concept of CSR was only more recently introduced. While the price premium consumers are willing to pay for environmentally responsible claims was positive across all markets analysed, consumers demanded a discount for wine labelled socially responsible in France and Francophone Canada. The French interpretation of CSR as rather focusing on managerial practices than consumer communication is one potential reason for this negative consumer evaluation.If food producers have to decide between participating in the established organic production and labelling program and communicating their own CSR activities with according food claims, then the organic strategy will provide higher consumer valuation and the potential for higher price premiums. Producers also have to consider that considerable communication efforts are required to reach awareness and consumer trust into CSR claims that are similar to organic claims. If a company has to decide between communicating social or environmental CSR activities, then this study suggests a focus on environmentally responsible programs, which are valued higher by food consumers.Considerable differences were observed in the impact CSR claims have on consumers across different markets. International food producers are recommended to focus their communication efforts for environmental CSR activities in the US, Anglophone Canada and Germany. Social CSR activities should not be communicated with point of purchase claims in France and Francophone Canada, where they may lead to negative consumer reactions.Despite the contributions of this study, it was limited to wine of French origin as a food product and future research should seek to generalise these findings to other food categories and different origins. One specific \"socially responsible\" CSR claim was chosen for this study and consumers' reaction to other social claims should be tested. A higher positive impact of social CSR claims on consumer choice is likely for food products originating in countries with more prevalent social problems.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The study seeks to assess the impact of two different corporate social responsibility (CSR) claims, relating to social and environmental dimensions, on consumers' wine choice across international markets. It analyses how point of purchase CSR claims compete with other food claims and their awareness, penetration and consumers' trust are examined.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - A discrete choice experiment with a visual shelf simulation was used to elicit consumer preferences and to estimate marginal willingness to pay for CSR and other food claims across the UK, France, Germany, the US East Coast, the US Midwest, and Anglophone and Francophone Canada.\nFindings: - CSR claims relating to social and environmental responsibility have a similar awareness, penetration and consumer trust, but differ in their impact on consumer choice, where environmental corporate responsibility claims benefit from a higher marginal willingness to pay. Consumer valuation of CSR claims significantly differs across international markets, but is consistently lower than for organic claims.\nOriginality/value: - This is the first cross-national study that analyses the impact of CSR claims on consumer food choice relative to other food claims using large representative consumer samples. The strength of the paper also pertains to the utilisation of innovative choice experiments covering a large range of choice relevant product attributes.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Identifying critical risk practices among street food handlers	[ "Food safety", "Microbial contamination", "Risk behaviours", "Street food handlers", "Street foods" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Globally, around 2.5 billion people consume street food everyday (FAO, 2007). Millions of people in India consume a wide variety of ready-to-eat street foods and beverages everyday. Street foods contribute to 40 percent of daily diet of urban population in developing countries like India (Consumer International, 2011; Muinde and Kuria, 2005). There are about 1.5 lakh street food vendors in south Indian city of Hyderabad and it was found that about one-fourth of Hyderabad's population avails food or beverages from street food at least once during the day (Chada et al., 2012).\nMethodology: Study design\nResults: Prevalence of foodborne pathogens in street vended foods\nDiscussion: Raw foods, especially ready-to-eat vegetables, salads, sprouts, cut fruits have been often implicated in outbreaks of foodborne diseases in both developed and developing countries (Kumar et al., 2006). Salad vegetables such as carrots, radish, tomatoes, lettuce, cabbage, cucumber, coriander were examined and reported to have the presence of Staphylococcus aureus, E. coli, Enterobacter spp., Klebsiella spp., Providentia spp. and Pseudomonas aeruginosa (Vishwanathan and Kaur, 2000), whereas vegetable salads in Nigeria have shown Coliforms, Enterobacter spp., and Streptococcus spp. (Akusu et al., 2016). In the present study, carrots and onions were chosen as they are commonly served along with majority of street foods in India more so in Hyderabad. Risk behaviors such as improper maintenance of cutting/chopping boards, mopping cloth and unclean hands acted as a potential source of contamination of salads. These results are similar to those reported in a study conducted in Spain, where surface counts were higher on cutting boards showing insufficient cleaning procedures (Rodriguez-Caturla et al., 2012). The percentage of contamination with foodborne pathogens was found to be high in carrots compared to onion samples (Table I). Similar results were reported by Ghosh et al. (2007) and Maatta et al. (2013) with fecal coliforms, S. aureus and Coliforms and Yersinia enterocolitica, respectively.\nKey messages for vendors: Salads:\nConclusions: In the present study specific food safety practices of street food vendors which lead to microbial contamination for three commonly consumed foods in Hyderabad were identified. The results also helped us in prioritizing the risk behaviors which lead to microbial contamination. Incorporation of behavior change communication component in the food safety training programmes in changing the behaviors for those prioritized risk behaviors will have a good impact.\nLimitations and strengths of the study: The limitation of the study is that it covered only limited varieties of street vended foods. The strength of the study is the assessment of food safety practices quantitatively with respect to microbial contamination.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to identify and prioritize the key food safety practices among street food handlers that lead to microbial contamination in selected street foods of Hyderabad, India. These key food safety practices will help develop and design tailor-made training material for street food vendors in future.\nDesign/methodology/approach: It is a cross-sectional study conducted in south Indian city of Hyderabad. Stratified random sampling method was employed. A total of 463 samples of street foods were collected from five zones of Hyderabad. They included 163 salad toppings, 150 fresh fruit juices and 150 panipuri samples. Identification and enumeration of foodborne pathogens and indicator organisms (S. aureus, E. coli, Salmonella spp., Shigella spp., Bacillus cereus, Yersinia spp.) were performed as described by USFDA-BAM. Information on food safety knowledge and handling practices from street vendors were collected using a structured questionnaire. Associations between hygiene practices and bacterial pathogens were done using ANOVA. Risk estimation of food safety practices was assessed by calculating odds ratio.\nFindings: Microbiological analysis indicated that a large number of carrot (98.1 percent) and onion (75.5 percent) samples were contaminated with E. coli. Peeled and cut fruits left uncovered have 13.4 times risk (OR: 2.40-74.8) of E. coli contamination compared to the covered ones. Panipuri samples picked from the vendors who did not have soap at the vending unit had significantly (p<0.001) higher contamination of fecal coliforms than those who had.\nOriginality/value: This study is the first of its kind in the study area.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Balancing knowledge strategy: codification and personalization during product development	[ "Knowledge management", "Product development" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Knowledge and its management are critical to fostering sustainable competitive advantage (Nonaka, 1994; Miller et al., 2007). According to the knowledge-based view, a firm's primary purpose is the integration of knowledge, and the creation and deployment of dynamic capabilities (Grant, 1996). This is particularly true in knowledge-intensive work such as the design and development of products, where knowledge is both a key ingredient as well as a key outcome of the work. Product design and development (PD) requires the rigorous application of theoretical and practical knowledge from various sources, and for this reason the proper management of knowledge (or the lack of it) can influence the results significantly. As such, several researchers (Kusunoki et al., 1998; Hansen, 1999; Hoopes and Postrel, 1999; Kessler et al., 2000; Subramaniam and Venkatraman, 2001; Subramaniam, 2006) used PD contexts to study and illustrate knowledge phenomena.In a study of 25 different business organizations that included consulting, healthcare and technology firms, Hansen et al. (1999) observed that firms used two strategies to foster the exchange of knowledge between their employees: codification and personalization. It was noted that each firm followed one of these strategies predominantly, while using the other in a supporting role. Based on these observations, Hansen et al. proposed that a given firm should adopt an 80-20 balance of the strategies, and cautioned against using them in equal proportions. While later research (e.g. Haesli and Boxall, 2005) found some support for this biased approach, other research (e.g. Jasimuddin et al., 2005; Mukherji, 2005) argued against it and advised that both codification and personalization must be followed by a firm in a balanced manner to successfully manage its knowledge. Thus, how the balance of the two strategies influences performance has been discussed in literature; while some believe that a balance is favorable, others recommend the opposite. The aim of this paper is to explore the adoption pattern of these strategies by PD units in India and examine if it has any implications for the units' performance.\n2. Theoretical background: 2.1 Codification and personalization: strategies for managing knowledge\n3. Method: 3.1 Interview-based initial investigation\n4. Analyses and findings: To address the study's key questions, statistical analyses were carried out using SPSS 16.0, which along with their findings, are presented here in sequence.4.1 t-test and bivariate correlation\n5. Discussion: Codification and personalization are described in the literature as distinct and generic strategies for sharing knowledge in organizations. It was found that employees in all the units surveyed engaged in both these strategies. It was noted (Table V) that codification and personalization were significantly correlated with each other, suggesting some reinforcing relationship between the strategies. This could be due to other generic drivers which make individuals want to share their knowledge with, and seek knowledge from each other, irrespective of how they do it. This is consistent with Haas and Hansen (2007, p. 1136), who observed that someone accessing and reading an electronic document may decide to contact the author of that document, whereas someone obtaining personalized advice from a colleague may receive a tip about the existence of a useful electronic document. Thus, even if a firm treats the two as strategically independent interventions, a dependency is likely to emerge in actual practice, wherein each fosters the growth of the other.5.1 Personalization, a greater differentiator\n6. Limitations and closing comments: The current study is exploratory in nature. A noticeable limitation of the study is the use of a small sample size that included only 19 PD units. Hence, the results cannot be easily generalized to a larger population of PD organizations in particular and to other organizations in general. It is noted that the purpose of this exploratory study was essentially to set a platform for more expansive empirical studies that can address the study's questions more rigorously and generate more conclusive results.It is felt that other factors can also be explored in trying to understand the preference for personalization over codification, and some potential avenues that future studies can take are discussed here. First, differences in the nature of knowledge across industries might play a role. It is possible that in some industries, where the core technology is in a mature stage of its lifecycle, knowledge sets are better developed and objective and the PD team works with standardized knowledge for the most part. In such situations, codification might be a preferred choice.Second, the influence of PD unit size on the preference for either strategy needs can be explored. It might be expected that larger size invokes a greater dependence on codification, as the proportion of employees that one can have an interpersonal knowledge exchange with, will decrease as the number of employees increases. Along these lines, it might also be interesting to explore whether and how the use of technology moderates the diminishing influence of size on interpersonal exchange.Third, the organization's culture can have an influence on whether employees lean towards personalization or codification. In cultures where there is plenty of warmth and comradeship, employees might naturally choose interpersonal contact as a more convenient means to exchange knowledge. A similar argument may arise with work context. Gaining deeper insights into this issue can facilitate better decisions for knowledge managers, particularly those looking at large scale investments in technology to improve knowledge sharing.The issue of the \"right-balance\" of codification and personalization for facilitating effective knowledge sharing also merits deeper investigation. Longitudinal studies on this topic might reveal insights into how firm preferences for these strategies change with time and may spawn valuable recommendations.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - This paper aims to understand the knowledge strategies followed by product development (PD) units in Indian manufacturing firms.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Following literature, knowledge strategy was characterized in terms of \"codification\" and \"personalization\". A total of 284 employees across 19 different PD units spread across India were surveyed to understand the knowledge strategies followed. Using SPSS, various statistical tests and analyses were conducted.\nFindings: - Personalization was consistently the preferred strategy across the PD units; however, the balance of personalization and codification was not quite in the 80-20 ratio (one strategy practised predominantly with the other in a supporting role) as suggested by some strands of previous research, and this did not have any strikingly visible negative influences on product development performance. Further, organizations do not differ as much from each other on levels of codification, as they do on personalization.\nResearch limitations/implications: - In contexts such as product development, it may be important to pursue knowledge strategies with greater equanimity compared with other contexts that previous research has highlighted. The study bears implications not only for the formulation and implementation of knowledge strategies during product development, but also for the body of enquiry into managing knowledge in organizations.\nOriginality/value: - The research contributes to a relatively less researched area in knowledge management and suggests directions for future work in the area.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Discovery, difference, careers and change. Part 2: difference and careers	[ "Careers", "Individual behaviour", "Reflective listening" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: In the first part you determined what your Jungian profile was, taking into account any suppressions or repressions that occurred during your formative years. In this second part, we cover four topics:1. the reality of difference;2. impact of difference on career prospects;3. valuing difference; and4. techiques to improve relationships and careers.\nThe reality of difference: Once we read the definition of each preference in each of the four dimensions (see part 1) and the supporting beliefs and behaviours, what is immediately apparent is that each is at the opposite end of the dimension line. If that line is drawn through the alphabet from A to Z, one preference is located at A and the other at Z. This reality of difference is highlighted by the language used. If you look at each preference in each dimension, each side has the language that appeals to it, the opposite of the language that appeals to the other side. We summarise the key words/phrases for each preference in each of the four dimensions shown in Table I.\nImpact of difference on career prospects: When we look at the impact of differences on career success, I am assuming that you work for a large organisation which requires a wide range of people with diverse profiles to operate successfully, i.e. in addition to the core business and client service functions, there are also IT, marketing, finance, and personnel functions. The organisations could operate in the private or public sector and be profit or non-profit making. You will be able to judge for yourself the extent to which the points made hold true in your particular work situation and environment.Before we look at each dimension and explain which has the edge and why, it is worth reporting some fascinating research into what enables you to get promotion i.e. have an effective career. The research was carried out by the HR department of IBM in the 1990s. The research identified three factors that determined your career prospects - how well you did the job (performance), what image you created in the organisation for which you worked (image) and how big was your network - to how many people in the organisation did you project your image (exposure). The percentage contribution for each factor was as follows:10 per cent for performance;30 per cent for image; and60 per cent for exposure.The messages are clear:How you manage your relationships at work is the key to promotion - image and exposure add up to 90 per cent.*People can rise \"to their level of incompetence\" as performance constitutes a miserly 10 per cent.With this in mind, let us turn to the preferences in each dimension in turn.Extrovert-introvert preference for obtaining energy and focusing\nValuing difference: Jack Sprat could eat no fat, Jackie could eat no leanNo problem as together they had never been.When two people meet who have opposite profiles, they take an instinctive dislike to each other. Psychological opposites do not attract. Let us take just one behaviour from each dimension to reinforce this point which we have already made earlier.So Jack Spratt exhibited these four behaviours to Jackie when he met his new boss for the first time and Jackie exhibited the opposite behaviours (see Table II).If they were both to stay true to their preferences, then this relationship would not last very long. Both would get black marks, but the brutal reality of power politics is that, if push came to shove, Jack would be allowed to pursue his career in a different company.Typically, there are rarely complete opposites in preferences and, typically, each party makes some effort to understand and live with the differences. So we have:Jack Sprat could eat no fat, Jackie could eat no lean;Yet betwixt the two of them, they licked the platter clean.Compromise does not produce synergy. The optimal outcome is that difference is managed to create added value. Now let us imagine Jackie was in fact married to Jack and the favourite dish they shared together was roast pork and the difference was on the fat/lean dimension. In the world of compromise, Jack would religiously scrap off all the fat. He would then cook the pork and eat the rather dry and tasteless end product, but he knew no better. Jackie on receiving the fat from Jack would remove every single trace of lean, and then cook it and eat it - a rather bland and samey taste, but she knew no better.Let us now assume that both Jackie and Jack recognise that difference could potentially add value, that a key to personal growth is experimentation, trying different things out. Because of this belief, they respected each other and said to each other. \"If you like fat/lean - then maybe it is not all bad\".They then took the first step towards a fundamental change - a little risk, but entirely consistent with their current like of fat/lean. They cooked the pork in its own natural juices and produced some fantastic crackling and meat, enriched with its own juices. They separated out the fat and lean and Jack started tucking into his lean and Jackie her fat. First of all Jack exclaimed: \"This is the best bit of lean, I have ever, ever tasted\", met almost simultaneously by Jackie's shriek of delight; \"This is the best bit of fat I have ever, ever, tasted\".In fact, they did more and each, very tentatively, tasted the other's delight and found it was not quite as bad as they had been led to believe (as the hated lean had traces of that lovely fat and the hated fat had traces of that lovely lean). In fact, a few months later, the rhyme had changed:Jack and Jackie Sprat loved both fat and leanAnd every day together they licked the platter clean.Instead of compromise, they had achieve a real win/win where added value had been produced both in terms of their own growth, the growth of the relationship and the profitability of their company.Simple to write, of course, less easy to achieve. In the final section we consider a key strategies to improve relationships and enhance career prospects.\nTechniques to improve relationships and careers: Carl Jung wrote in 1933:A typology is designed, first and foremost, as an aid to a psychological critique of knowledge ... The valuable thing here is the critical attempt to prevent oneself from taking one's own prejudices as the criterion for normality (Jung, 1933).In other words, if we want to become wiser as we get older, we need all of us to walk along the path to completeness.The first step is to discover your true profile, covered in part 1. The second step, also referred to in part 1, is to look at your existing job and determine whether it plays to your natural strengths. If it does not, and you will know this if most of the time you are demotivated and stressed, then you should seek a new role, job or even career that you enjoy most of the time, as it turns you on. During this process, which will take some time as \"Rome was not built in a day\", you should take the second step. You consciously and deliberately set out to appreciate that, what you consider the dark side of each dimension, is in fact lit up by the soft brilliance of a full moon on a cold frosty winter's night.Then you, with a positive mindset established, start to walk into that moonlight and experience the other side of each dimension. This needs to be a progressive act - one step at a time - and you should start with the dimension, the other side of which you find least unattractive, which is an easy choice if it is one where you have been suppressed, as you will have become comfortable with many of the behaviours. You should start with the behaviour that you consider most easy to master - creating success and then building on success. Never quantum leap out of a comfort zone; it is far better to crawl out very slowly.Over time, you will be able to operate competently and confidently and without undue stress in each dimension and that is as complete a person as you can be. The benefits are enormous. You will be considered the wisest person anyone else has ever met. More importantly, you will be able to relate to and develop an effective relationship with any TOP you meet, which is highly career progressive.I conclude part 2 with two specific strategies that will give you a competitive edge in relationship, and hence career management. The first is how to deal with someone who has a natural preference for L in decision making, but has gone into excess under stress and the second is the empathetic or matching strategy.L in excess\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to enable the reader to recognise that from each natural preference on the four Jungian dimensions flow opposite beliefs, behaviours and language; that difference initially is perceived negatively; and to provide strategies that will create real value from difference, improving their ability to manage relationships and enhancing their career prospects.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The paper defines each preference on each of the four dimensions: extroverted or introverted preference for obtaining energy and focusing; practical or concept preference for gathering and using information; logical or harmony preference for taking decisions; and structured or flexible preference for operating in the outside world. It sets out the words and phrases used for each preference and proves that they are polar opposites. The paper highlights the importance of relationships to career prospects in large diverse organisations. It demonstrates that the most effective profile for career success in such organisations is ECLS. The study details how the use of the technique reflective listening enables the individual to calm down an angry boss and leave him/her with a perception of competence. The paper also indicates how, whatever the reader's profile, he/she can gain a competitive edge in career and relationship terms if he/she both follows a personal path to completeness in all the dimensions and develops empathy by adopting a matching strategy.\nFindings: - The paper finds that there is a difference in the dimensions results in difficult relationships with opposite profiles. In modern, large, diverse organisations, the ECLS profile has a competitive edge in career terms. This natural edge can be overturned by individuals who are prepared to pursue a personal path to completeness and use an effective empathetic approach to managing relationships.\nOriginality/value: - The paper provides a demonstration of how the distribution of introverted and extroverted preferences in the chain of command can have a major impact on career prospects. It also shows how individuals, who use a positive approach to managing differences, can maximise relationship and career success, whereby they themselves follow the path to completeness in the four dimensions, and others adopt a strategy where they match the other person's (particularly the boss's) beliefs, behaviours and language.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Able but not willing? Exploring divides in digital versus physical payment use in China	[ "Digital divide", "Technology adoption", "E-inclusion/exclusion", "E-science", "Grid computing" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: In 2004 China commenced the \"Village Access Project\" to provide basic telephone services to rural areas and by 2008 had achieved connection of at least two workable telephone lines to 99.5 per cent of its total administrative villages (Xia and Lu, 2008). In the same year China became home to the world's largest national population of mobile phone users (Cellular News, 2008) and the world's largest national population of internet users (Macfie, 2008).\nMethod and data: This paper sets out to explore nuanced consumer behaviour amongst non-users of digital payment technologies in the context of a globalising digital economy. Such behaviours may prove to be exhibited by a very small proportion of the overall population, described in statistical terms as \"outliers\". The difficulty of using small samples of an unknown distribution to identify outliers in the overall population has long been recognised (Hume, 1739) and hence the first requirement of the data for this study was that it should be large in scale relative to the population being studied.\nExploring willingness and ability: physical vs digital payment methods: From our sample we selected consumers who had established a pattern of repeat purchases, allowing us to separate out consumers that may have rejected the products being offered rather than the channels.\nA C5.0 model of physical vs digital payment method use: In this study of payment method use in one city in China, the decision tree resulting from the modelling was found to correctly classify the behaviour of 73 per cent of the whole sample on the basis of customer demographics and order characteristics. This model is shown in Figure 7 where the attribute that explains splits in the behaviour of the population better than any other, the attribute with the highest information gain, is shown furthest to the left. This is described as the \"root\" node, though generally depicted as the top of the tree.\nDiscussion: The model presented in Figure 7 both confirms expectations and offers new insights. At the top of the tree we see highly significant splits in the population that can be thought of as \"rules\" describing behaviour. For example, one \"rule\" that applies to the whole population is:\nConclusions: The move from local, indirect and physical market channels to global direct digital market channels is predicted to accelerate. In 2014, McKinsey and Company reported that 90 per cent of the US population lived within ten minutes of three or more different banks, but by 2020 they predict that more than 95 per cent of banking transactions will take place though direct or digital channels (Bollard et al., 2014).\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: China is the world's largest user market for digital technologies and experiencing unprecedented rates of rural-urban migration set to create the world's first \"urban billion\". This is an important context for studying nuanced adoption behaviours that define a digital divide. Large-scale studies are required to determine what behaviours exist in such populations, but can offer limited ability to draw inferences about why. The purpose of this paper is to report a large-scale study inside China that probes a nuanced \"digital divide\" behaviour: consumer demographics indicating ability to pay by electronic means but behaviour suggesting lack of willingness to do so, and extends current demographics to help explain this.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The authors report trans-national access to commercial \"Big Data\" inside China capturing the demographics and consumption of millions of consumers across a wide range of physical and digital market channels. Focusing on one urban location we combine traditional demographics with a new measure that reflecting migration: \"Distance from Home\", and use data-mining techniques to develop a model that predicts use behaviour.\nFindings: Use behaviour is predictable. Most use is explained by value of the transaction. \"Distance from Home\" is more predictive of technology use than traditional demographics.\nResearch limitations/implications: Results suggest traditional demographics are insufficient to explain \"why\" use/non-use occurs and hence an insufficient basis to formulate and target government policy.\nOriginality/value: The authors understand this to be the first large-scale trans-national study of use/non-use of digital channels within China, and the first study of the impact of distance on ICT adoption.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Ambidexterity, performance and environmental dynamism	[ "Survey", "Spain", "Ambidexterity", "Manufacturing performance", "Environmental dynamism", "Sand cone model" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Today's globally competitive markets mean that the practice of operations management (OM) increasingly addresses both traditional cumulative approaches to improvement and the more disruptive innovation and adaptation processes necessary to create and cope with radically different tasks, technologies, and territories (Lavie and Rosenkopf, 2006; Raisch et al., 2009). In more theoretical terms, the fundamental challenge inherent in balancing exploitation/exploration (March, 1991) can be helpfully framed using the debate regarding resource-based (e.g. Wernerfelt, 1984; Barney, 2001) and dynamic capabilities (DC) (Teece et al., 1997, p. 516) related advantage. Resource-based theory (RBT) argues that cumulative resource factors, as typified in OM by the layers (i.e. quality, delivery, cost, flexibility) of the \"sand cone\" (Nakane, 1986; Ferdows and De Meyer, 1990; Corbett and Whybark, 2001), are critical to the sustainability of any competitive advantage because they create barriers to imitation that prevent advantages being \"competed away\" too quickly (e.g. McGee and Thomas, 1986; Mahoney and Pandian, 1992). Conversely, others in this debate have argued that it is the mechanism whereby an organization can purposefully create, extend, or modify its resource base (Helfat and Peteraf, 2003), its DC that especially in \"high velocity\" markets are the key to competitive survival via adaptation and experimentation (Patel et al., 2012).\n2. Conceptual background: As noted above, this study can be usefully linked to questions of resource-based (exploitation) and/or DC-based (exploration) advantage. RBT has been particularly influential in OM (e.g. Lewis, 2000; Pandza et al., 2003; Miller and Ross, 2003; Rungtusanatham et al., 2003; Holcomb and Hitt, 2007) but, as Teece (2006) has argued, it is the distinct skills, processes, procedures, and decision rules underpinning DCs which allow managers to identify threats and opportunities for their firms and to reconfigure assets to address these threats and realize these opportunities. In other words, these perspectives appear to suggest very different interpretations of the challenge of competitive survival but each have their limitations. For example, it has been argued (e.g. Ahuja and Lampert, 2001) that focusing on exploitation can improve performance in the short-term, but that these companies will not adapt easily to the changes of the environment (i.e. competency traps). Conversely, others have observed that companies with exploration capabilities may be able to change quickly but can struggle to properly exploit current strengths (Volberda and Lewin, 2003).\n3. Research methodology: 3.1 Target population and questionnaire procedure\n4. Results: In order to analyze the relationships between variables, SEM was used and the program EQS 6.2 was deployed. This methodology was used because it is considered \"the most sophisticated statistical techniques in the group to find evidence in support of the sand cone model\" (Schroeder et al., 2011, p. 4885). Also, SEM was chosen because it allowed us to examine how the different dimensions of the sand cone are influencing one another. Moreover, we tested for common method variance (common method bias) (Siemsen et al., 2010) to address possible problems with systematic error variance shared among variables, and we checked that The Harman's single-factor had a very poor fit: GFI=0.568, AGFI=0.479, CFI=0.41, NFI=0.44, RMSEA=0.147, showing no sign of common method variance. We conducted two different analyses. First, we have included the variables about ambidexterity and the sand cone model (Figure 1). Second, we contrasted this relation when considering different environments (Figures 2 and 3). The fit indices used to estimate the measurement models are presented in Table V.\n5. Discussion: Based on a theoretically derived and empirically grounded study, this paper explored two key research questions: the relationship between organizational ambidexterity and manufacturing performance (in the guise of the sand cone model) and, the impact of environmental dynamism on this relationship. Before discussing each of these questions in turn it is important to note the following limitations of this study - which we hope will also offer fruitful avenues for future research. First, although we tested for common methods bias, the study relies on one key informant per firm. Future studies should seek out multiple informants per firm as suggested by Guide and Ketokivi (2015). Second, both ambidexterity and the sand cone are dynamic concepts and a cross-sectional survey can only infer its temporal characteristics. Future longitudinal research, informed by the relationships uncovered in this study, would allow for direct inspection of the processual developments. Finally, different environmental characteristics should be considered, going beyond low and high environmental dynamism.\n6. Conclusions and implications: This study theoretically and empirically refines our understanding of the relationships between manufacturing performance via the sand cone model, environmental dynamism, and ambidexterity. Two research questions are addressed using SEM in a sample of 231 Spanish manufacturing companies. Findings illustrate a significant relationship between ambidexterity as the basis and enabler for manufacturing performance improvements, calling for an ambidextrous sand cone model. The study illustrates that this relationship is influenced by the company's wider environment. This relationship is further emphasized when companies work in a dynamic environment. Quality, speed, flexibility, and cost improvements are supported by a company's capability to drive ambidexterity.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between organizational ambidexterity, the ability of companies to explore new and to exploit existing processes simultaneously, and manufacturing performance as represented by the sand cone model. Moreover, the paper analyses the impact of stable and dynamic environments on this relationship.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A set of research questions are tested using structural equation modeling on a sample of 231 Spanish manufacturing companies.\nFindings: Results illustrate a significant relationship between ambidexterity as the basis and enabler for manufacturing performance improvements, building on the sand cone model and its dimensions of quality, delivery, cost, and flexibility. This relationship is further emphasized when companies work in a dynamic environment.\nPractical implications: The study contributes to practice by investigating the important and yet under-explored relationships of ambidexterity, the sand cone model, performance, and a company's wider market environment. Findings suggest a positive relationship between the sand cone model and ambidexterity capability.\nOriginality/value: This study adds to the limited theoretical and empirical understanding of the relationships between ambidexterity, the sand cone model, environmental dynamism, and performance. It also contributes through a set of empirical data derived from Spanish manufacturing companies.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Can I make a difference here? The impact of perceived organizational support on volunteer commitment	[ "Volunteers", "Non-profit organizations", "Commitment", "Perceived organizational support", "Perceived influence", "Self-expression" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Volunteerism is defined in the literature as an ongoing activity directed toward improving the well-being of others (Omoto and Snyder, 1995). There is little doubt that voluntary work is of significant value because of its positive impact on communities, society in general, as well as for the volunteers themselves. Given the need to maintain adequate levels of volunteerism, it is of critical importance for volunteering organizations to understand how to retain their volunteers for the long-term, particularly because volunteer turnover can be very costly in terms of decreased organizational morale, recruitment, training and decreased ability to effectively serve the public (Musick and Wilson, 2008). As we witness shifts from lifelong volunteering commitments to a more sporadic kind of volunteering, the capacity to motivate volunteers to remain with the organization for the long-term has been reduced (Wilson, 2012). This underscores the importance of developing a better understanding of the factors that can influence volunteer commitment.\nConnecting POS to volunteer commitment: Organizational commitment exists when \"the identity of the person is linked to the organization\" (Sheldon, 1971, p. 143) or when \"the goals of the organization and those of the individual become increasingly integrated or congruent\" (Hall et al., 1970, p. 176). These definitions suggest that commitment describes a situation in which an individual identifies with an organization and its goals and wishes to maintain membership in order to facilitate these goals. More recently, Mowday et al. (1982) define organizational commitment as \"the process by which people come to think about their relationship with the organization [...] a mindset in which individuals consider the extent to which their own values and goals are congruent with those of the organization\" (p. 26).\nMethod: Sample and procedure\nResults: Descriptive statistics were evaluated using SPSS. Path analysis was conducted using Amos 17 to test the model of organizational commitment in a voluntary organizational context and analyze the full set of hypotheses, as illustrated in Figure 2. Path analysis allows the simultaneous modeling of several related regression relationships. To determine if the path from the predictor (organizational support) to the outcome (organizational commitment) were explained by the proposed mediating variables (self-expression and perceived influence), we used mediation analyses adapted to structural equation modeling (SEM). In SEM, mediation is established through a direct effect of the predictor on the outcome variable, and the model including the mediators must fit the data well, with all paths in the predicted direction being significant (Holmbeck, 1997; Kelloway, 1998). To assess whether mediation exists, therefore, we compared our fully mediated model with a direct path model from the predictor (POS) to the outcome (organizational commitment) as recommended by Holmbeck (1997) and Kelloway (1998). Finally, we examined the parameter estimates of the structural paths to determine the nature of the support for specific hypotheses.\nDiscussion and summary: For traditional, paid employees, employers may attempt to use financial rewards to secure employees' loyalty or productivity. However, for unpaid volunteers, individuals' performance and loyalty cannot be obtained through financial incentives (Rhoades and Eisenberger, 2002). We cannot assume that the dynamics of organizational commitment necessarily operate in the same manner for both paid employees and volunteer workers. Rather, we need to extend our understanding of sources of influence on organizational commitment within the volunteer context.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to empirically examine the impact of perceived organizational support (POS) on organizational commitment in the voluntary and not-for-profit sector. The study extends the work done so far on the mediating roles of self-expression and perceived influence.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This paper reports an empirical research study which examined the impact of POS on organizational commitment in the voluntary and not-for-profit sector. Survey data were collected from a sample of health services workers (n=275) from a large not-for-profit organization.\nFindings: Analyses showed that perception of organizational support positively influenced self-expression. In addition, self-expression mediated the relationship between perception of organizational support and organizational commitment, and both self-expression and perceived influence were statistically significant in their relationship with organizational commitment.\nResearch limitations/implications: First, because of the cross-sectional nature of the authors' design, it is difficult to establish the direction of causality. For example, POS and organizational commitment may be reciprocally related. It is possible that volunteers who are committed may perceive themselves as being valued and contributing members of the organization. Second, the measures used in this study were based on self-report, suggesting therefore that method variance could possibly influence the results. Because the measures reflect individual perceptions, it was not possible to obtain data from sources other the participants. However, preliminary CFA analysis showed that each measure was distinct which should minimize concerns about method variance. Further, some scholars argue that common method variance may be overstated and not as severe as is generally claimed (Lindell and Whitney, 2001).\nPractical implications: Given the need to maintain adequate levels of volunteerism, it is of critical importance for volunteering organizations to understand how to retain their volunteers for the long-term, particularly because volunteer turnover can be very costly in terms of decreased organizational morale, recruitment and training, and decreased ability to effectively serve the public. The authors' study serves to underscore the fact that those organizations needs to be mindful that volunteers need to perceive adequate organizational support and feel the opportunity for self-expression if those volunteers are to remain committed.\nSocial implications: The authors' study extends the work done so far on the mediating roles of self-expression and perceived influence in the relationship between POS and organizational commitment in voluntary and other not-for-profit organizations. The results suggest that POS positively influenced self-expression but not perception of influence. It also suggests that self-expression mediated the relationship between POS and organizational commitment, and both self-expression and perceived influence are statistically significantly related to organizational commitment. Even though prior research has examined POS as an antecedent, outcome, and a mediator, there is a paucity of research that has examined the proposed model within the context of voluntary and other not-for-profit sectors. Given the current rate of expansion in the voluntary sector, it is the authors' hope that the present study will provide an impetus for additional research in this area.\nOriginality/value: Few studies have examined the impact of POS on self-expression and perceived influence, and the resulting impact on organizational commitment in the voluntary sector. This paper makes a notable contribution to the literature by empirically exploring this understudied relationship.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Learning culture spreads light at Luminary: Training framework is "golden thread" of enduring quality and consistency	[ "Organizational culture", "Employee development", "Organizational development" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: A UK information-technology services company has expanded rapidly by developing a systemic learning culture, where teaching and learning are integrated into company life.\nThree types of learner: \"As a start-up company, we did not have our own training, but had three basic types of learner - graduates with awareness of new technologies but no working experience, experienced recruits and established employees,\" Neil Warnock explained.The objectives for the graduates were to understand company culture, gain confidence to work with clients, follow and believe in the company's standards and procedures.The experienced new employees needed to embrace Luminary's standards and procedures, and approach tasks consistently using \"the Luminary way\". Equally, they brought fresh insights and experiences that Luminary could learn from, so the company encourages them to create or enhance training modules.The established employees needed to increase their awareness of new-technology areas, improve existing skills - both technical and customer-facing - and feel a sense of career development.\nFlexible training framework: \"Technology and practices are evolving rapidly and we believe the only way forward is to embrace continual learning and knowledge sharing - not only between staff but also with customers,\" said Neil Warnock. \"To this end, we designed a flexible framework with more than 60 assisted self-teach modules at its core. The flexible framework could adapt to individual needs, customer demands and changing technologies. A modular approach was essential to deliver training to experienced and inexperienced people in parallel and on demand.\"The modules are prepared and delivered by a network of training mentors drawn from subject-matter experts within the company. A training coordinator accepts requests for training, identifies the most appropriate person to deliver it and schedules its delivery. The training coordinator also monitors feedback forms. Four basic categories are covered:1. Company - which includes Luminary's background, its philosophy and culture, its customer and people principles, its sales process and its quality ethic.2. Technology foundation - which helps to ensure that each employee works to the company's standards and procedures.3. Technology-specific - which comprises one-day beginner/overview modules and more detailed specialist modules.4. Personal development - which conveys the standards of professionalism the company expects, and includes, for example, time management, meeting etiquette and presentation skills.\nChannels of training delivery: Training is delivered through multiple channels. At the initial induction, the management team introduces each new starter to the company history, objectives and philosophies, target client market, sales propositions, and customer and people principles. A recommended reading path through the company's quality procedures is provided.All employees attend a \"boot camp\" away-day with the management team within three months of starting. During the away-day, the induction materials are explored in detail, in a relaxed and informal environment.End-of-month presentations or workshops take place on a topic that employees feel would be most beneficial. The sessions are coordinated, but not delivered, by the training coordinator. Subjects covered include new or revised company procedures (such as testing procedures or project-management systems) or technical topics.Company weekends are two-day events, staged every six months, when employees meet and make presentations on various topics. Employee feedback is gathered to determine the agenda. Training may include, for example, role-plays, team-building exercises or training videos.\"Down time\" for training is planned, based on development needs identified at appraisals. Where project schedules demand, ad hoc training - sometimes from external training providers - supplements scheduled training. Learning gained from external training is normally transferred into a Luminary-specific reusable training module.More than 60 training modules, split into disciplines, lie at the core of the training framework. They can be delivered through self-learning, in the classroom, or by mentoring and shadowing. Predicting demand and coordinating availability of the people who attend is difficult, so most of the modules are \"assisted self-teach\" e-learning modules, with Luminary-specific materials and exercises. The training coordinator assigns an appropriate mentor to help the learner, and assess the completed exercises.Modules are developed by employees who already know the subject or have done research, possibly following an external course. This is cost-effective, flexible and tailored to the company's needs.\"We use company standards and real-world examples and exercises, where possible,\" Neil Warnock explained.Each participant has a career mentor and a rigorous peer-review cycle exists for all units of work. An internal online skill-tracking system, known as Cleverdick, has been established, and project \"wash-ups\" consider the lessons that can be learned from each aspect of the training. At the end of each module, the company encourages feedback through assessment forms, and modifies modules accordingly.\nResults of the training: Training has continued since the company was founded in October 2003, covering 30 new staff, including five graduates. The company, an Investor in People organization, won a UK National Training Award in 2006 and was singled out for a sponsored award by the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD).\"Four out of our five raw graduates are now in customer-project teams and exhibit maturity way beyond that expected,\" said Neil Warnock. \"Two have themselves created new training modules and four have presented training at company weekends.\"A total of 15 employees have worked on successful customer projects using technology that was new to them, and employees themselves have created and delivered more than 60 reusable training modules. Most employees have been training mentors.Of 32 people to have been recruited to the company, only two have left, and appraisal feedback suggests that employees feel valued and that their contribution and talents are recognized.\"Every single individual has obtained new skills, and these have been used effectively and profitably on customer projects,\" commented Neil Warnock. \"Individuals and teams work on various projects and technologies to a consistent set of standards that they designed, share knowledge willingly, and take ownership of specialist training areas. Our flexible training framework accommodates change easily and cost-effectively. Staff are successfully rotated between projects in all of our key accounts to supplement skills, relieve boredom and reduce dependencies on individuals.\"\"We are a people business dedicated to staff development and making our customers successful. Everything else follows. We use technology to create business solutions, and we believe passionately that by equipping our people with this lifelong-learning framework, we will continue to excel.\"\"Rapid but sustainable company growth has been achieved. Our training framework, with modules owned and delivered by staff through multiple forums, delivers a \"golden thread\" of enduring quality and consistency that has directly led to success. Teaching and learning are integrated into company life to form a unique systemic learning culture that is scalable, gives us competitive edge and which continues to create employment contributing to the region's economic growth.\"Sarah Pennock, of the New Technology Institute, which has provided external training and advice to the company, commented: \"Luminary has placed training at the very heart of the business, with an enviable progression path for all employees that starts from day one. Having seen Luminary grow quickly, with exciting projects being won through new sales development, we have seen proof of its investment in training being key to real success.\"Steve Barker, IT director for DS Ltd, said: \"Last year we engaged Luminary to help us with a major complex software project, and three of my own staff went through part of Luminary's internal training program. We now plan to enhance our own training modules, procedures and standards with several of Luminary's. What's more, Luminary has encouraged this on the basis that it will make DS more successful in serving its customers. That's what I call good service. For such a young company, it is already very mature and enjoys many benefits from carefully designed vocational raining - both culturally and commercially.\"\nNote: David Pollitt, Human Resource Management International Digest editor, wrote this article.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - This article describes the systemic learning culture achieved at UK information-technology services company Luminary Solutions, where teaching and learning are integrated into company life.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Outlines the training framework devised, the categories of people trained, the ways in which training is delivered, and the outcomes of the training.\nFindings: - Reveals that four out of our five raw graduates are now in customer-project teams and exhibit maturity beyond that expected. Two have themselves created new training modules and four have presented training at company weekends. A total of 15 employees have worked on successful customer projects using technology that was new to them, and employees themselves have created and delivered more than 60 reusable training modules. Most employees have been training mentors. Of 32 people to have been recruited to the company, only two have left, and appraisal feedback suggests employees feel valued and that their contribution and talents are recognized. Every individual has obtained new skills, and these skills have been used effectively and profitably on customer projects.\nPractical implications: - Describes how Luminary Solutions uses training to support sustainable economic growth.\nOriginality/value: - Emphasizes the importance of flexibility, and of making the maximum use of skills available within the organization.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
The influence of organizational culture and job design on job commitment and human resource performance	[ "Organizational culture", "Job design", "Job commitment", "HR performance" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The globalization of the economy in which the global competition is inevitable has created an increasingly free and rigorous competition arena as the result of Uruguay Round 1994 (Gallagher, 2000). This is a logical consequence of the application of General Agreement on Trade of Services (GATS) and World Trade Organization (WTO) agreements. The result of parliamentary ratification of the participating countries principally agreed on the liberalization of global goods and services that freely enters the domestic market, and also the protection of the goods and services of domestic products of a participating country which is not restricted.\n2. Theoretical background: Job Design research shows that jobs can be designed to foster autonomous motivation (Hackman and Oldham, 1976 in Foss et al., 2015) and knowledge sharing (in Foss et al., 2015). Two particularly important dimensions of Job Design with respect to autonomous motivation are job variety and autonomy. The latter refers to the extent to which a job provides the employee with freedom to decide when and how to carry out specific tasks (Hackman and Oldham, 1976 in Foss et al., 2015). Job autonomy and variety offer employees a sense of responsibility and volition and make the job more multifaceted and interesting, which are essential for autonomous motivation to thrive. Furthermore, by providing autonomy to employees, management signals confidence in their level of competence and their motivation to carry out the focal tasks (Benabou and Tirole, 2003). A job that provides employees with autonomy and variety therefore strengthens employees' feeling of being competent and self-determined. In other words, such a noncontrolling Job Design is supportive of autonomously motivated behaviors, such as knowledge sharing.\n3. Material and method: The research population consisted of all employees of a national company offering consultation services, from four big ISOEC: PT. Yodya Karya Company, PT. Hutama Karya, PT. Adhy Karya, PT. Waskita Karya both at the headquarters and at the branch level which spreads in some areas in Indonesia. Based on the staff's portfolio as of December 31, 2016 recorded at the headquarters and at each work unit branch throughout Indonesia. Referring to the approach to SEM modeling with an average population of 600 employees for each enterprises, the sample to be used as respondents consisted of 100 employees for each enterprises, and total 100x4 enterprises=400 samples.\n4. Result and discussion: Evaluation of model\n5. Discussion: Based on the analysis of the hypothesis testing results, it is obvious that Job Design has a positive and significant effect on employees' Job Commitment. Thus, the hypothesis stating that Job Design affects Job Commitment is proven. The findings of this study are in line with the findings of Steers and Porter (1983) suggesting that individuals' characteristics, job characteristics and work experience are the factors that affect commitment and performance. More specifically, work experience has a dominant effect on commitment. Estimation results for the dominant Job Design are an objective work appraisal. While the dominant indicator for Job Commitment is morale. Both of these indicators show a close relationship because to retain ongoing Job Commitment, one should be able to retain the spirit or morale as proposed by Allen and Meyer (1993).\n6. Conclusions, implication and recommendations: Based on the analysis results, it can be concluded that the variables Job Design and Organizational Culture have a significant direct effect on Job Commitment. Likewise, the effect of Organizational Culture and Job Commitment on Human Resource Performance is also significant. However, a different result is shown in the result of the direct effect of the variable Job Design on the variable Human Resource Performance, which indicates that the variable Job Design does not have a significant direct effect on the variable Human Resource Performance. In other words, the intensity of the Job Design value will not affect the intensity level of Human Resource Performance. In addition, a mediating effect of the variable Job Commitment is found on the effect of Job Design and Organizational Culture on Human Resource Performance.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to analyze the relationship between Job Design, Job Commitment and Organizational Culture with Human Resource Performance: a study of the construction services provided by national consultants.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The research population consisted of all employees of a national company offering consultation services, from four big Indonesian State-Owned Enterprises Contractors: PT. Yodya Karya Company, PT. Hutama Karya, PT. Adhy Karya, PT. Waskita Karya Referring to the approach to SEM modeling with an average population of 600 employees for each enterprises, the sample to be used as respondents consisted of 100 employees for each enterprises, and total 100x4 enterprises=400 samples.\nFindings: The variables Organizational Culture and Job Design have a significant direct effect on Job Commitment. Likewise, the effect of Organizational Culture and Job Commitment on Human Resource Performance is also significant. However, a different result is shown in the result of the direct effect of the variable Job Design on the variable Human Resource Performance, which indicates that the variable Job Design does not have a significant direct effect on the variable Human Resource Performance. In other words, the intensity of the Job Design value will not affect the intensity level of Human Resource Performance. In addition, a mediating effect of the variable Job Commitment is found on the effect of Job Design and Organizational Culture on Human Resource Performance.\nOriginality/value: The use of Job Commitment to exercise a mediation effect on the relationship between the effect of Job Design and Organizational Culture on Human Resource Performance, and the research site (no previous research investigating this relationship).\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Building relationships with the new media in a cyber landscape	[ "Social media", "Public relations", "Health care", "Media", "Instagram", "Media relations", "Hospitals" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nThe media landscape: then and now: What industry has not changed in the past quarter century because of the Digital Age? Indeed, it has affected practically everything that makes up our professional and personal lives: how we learn, how we inform, how we sustain and how we interact. Even industries that previously had no connection to the digital world cannot function - much less succeed - without some kind of presence on the cyber landscape.\nCase study: engaging bloggers and influencers at NYU Langone Health: Public relations changed significantly with the advent of social media. It not only changed the way we communicate, but it changed and expanded the actual job functions that most PR professionals perform. Now, PR professionals are expected to be well-versed in social media, and often these are the people at organizations who are running their brand's social media feeds. Additionally, reporters are often quite active on social media, so it can be a place to interact and engage with them and share a brand's news directly with followers.\nThe emergence and impact of social media: Social media has changed the media landscape by creating a two-way dialogue not only with reporters but also with the general public. Social media has turned everyone into a reporter and commentator. The public can now have significant influence on brands by breaking news stories, commenting on issues, complaining about services and much more. And with a third of the world's population using social media, this can have significant impacts on brands in both positive and negative ways.\nHow organizations communicate with the \"new\" media: There used to be a time in the news business when there were robust rosters of \"beat reporters\" covering a host of industries - finance, technology, agriculture, education, religion fashion and, of course, health care. Some of the larger newspapers with more robust pockets and heterogeneous readerships still maintain a semblance of this system. But as budgets tighten and readers and viewers dwindle, many have abandoned the \"beat\" system and established larger pools of cheaper, less specialized and, ultimately, less knowledgeable reporters and correspondents.\nConclusion: Clearly, there have been significant changes in many industries because of the new digital age and the introduction of so many forms of new media compared to 20 years ago. The landscape of media relations has been particularly disrupted because the way we communicate is now so different. Social media has had a huge impact on PR and communications. Everyone now is potentially a reporter, with the ability through social media to influence major news coverage and shift perspectives. The way we read the news is different as well. There are many more outlets and people online whom we trust, even if they are not part of the mainstream \"trusted\" media. In fact, trusted media no longer exists, with the advent of \"fake news\" and the era of lies and fabrications being on the record as truth. The way PR professionals build relationships with reporters has also changed. It is rare a reporter will now make the time to meet in person. Communications and PR professionals need to pivot and change with the changing times. Those who will be most successful will embrace the new while also holding onto the traditions that allow those in the profession to still build person-to-person, trusted and authentic relationships to tell the stories that matter most to the target audiences.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: What industry has not changed in the past quarter century because of The Digital Age? The purpose of this paper is to discuss the effect of the digital age on media.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This paper takes the design of an author viewpoint.\nFindings: The Digital Age has affected practically everything that makes up our professional and personal lives - how we learn, how we inform, how we sustain and, certainly, how we interact.\nOriginality/value: Even industries that previously had no connection to the digital world cannot function.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
The dynamics of IT-business strategic alignment: evidence from healthcare information systems implementation	[ "Strategic alignment", "IT-business alignment", "Healthcare information systems", "Implementation", "Management practices", "Case study" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The strategic alignment between business and information technology (IT) has been a top managerial concern for both information systems (IS) practitioners and researchers because this alignment allows firms to better unleash the value of IT investments and, consequently, perform better (e.g. Chan et al., 1997; Chan and Reich, 2007; Chan et al., 2006; Oh and Pinsonneault, 2007; Preston and Karahanna, 2009; Reynolds and Yetton, 2015; Tallon et al., 2000; Tallon and Pinsonneault, 2011; Tallon et al., 2013). IT-business strategic alignment has been defined as the \"fit between two or more of these components in terms of addressing the needs, demands, goals, objectives, and/or structures of each component, such that management of the business and IT remain in harmony\" (Gerow et al., 2014, p. 1960). Previous studies have focused on the antecedents and benefits of aligning business and IT strategies, and the results of these studies suggest that successful IT-business strategic alignment can help an organization to create competitive advantages and outperform its competitors by more effectively utilizing IT resources and better responding to the market (e.g. Baker et al., 2011; Beer et al., 2005; Cumps et al., 2009; Miller, 1992; Reich and Benbasat, 1996; Sabegh and Motlagh, 2012).As their internal and external organizational environments continue to change, firms need to adjust their IT and business strategies and form new alignments. Thus, there is a growing body of literature that views IT-business strategic alignment as a dynamic process rather than a static outcome. Most previous studies on the dynamics of strategic alignment have focused on confirming the dynamics of strategic alignment, identifying the factors that create dynamics in alignment, determining how to conceptualize and measure alignment at the process level (e.g. Chan and Reich, 2007; Chan et al., 2006; Sabherwal and Chan, 2001; Tallon, 2008) and developing competencies for adapting to changing environments (e.g. Yeow et al., 2018). However, examining the dynamics of IT-business alignment is still challenging. Organizations find it difficult to fully articulate their strategies in a dynamic environment. As a result, achieving alignment is a continuous process of aligning with emerging strategies, which act as moving targets, and requires the simultaneous development and reconfiguration of IT and business resources across multiple organizational processes (Chan and Reich, 2007; Coltman et al., 2015; Marabelli and Galliers, 2017). Therefore, this paper examines how the IT-business alignment of an organization evolves during specific IS implementation processes to identify the sources of misalignment, understand the role of actions taken over time to align strategies and resources and examine how strategies and infrastructures are executed dynamically.In addition, this study focuses particularly on the social dimension of alignment and the role of this dimension in achieving IT-business strategic alignment. Social alignment is defined as \"the state in which business and IT executives within an organizational unit understand and are committed to the business and IT mission, objectives, and plans\" (Reich and Benbasat, 2000, p. 82). Among the various dimensions of strategic alignment identified in previous studies, social alignment has received increasing research attention in the past 15 years (e.g. Karahanna and Preston, 2013; Schlosser et al., 2015; Wagner et al., 2014; Wu et al., 2015) because social alignment facilitates the closing of knowledge gaps and the development of a shared understanding between IT and business (Preston and Karahanna, 2009; Reich and Benbasat, 2000; Schlosser et al., 2015). While previous research has focused on the antecedents of the social dimension of alignment and the relationship between the social and intellectual dimensions (Karahanna and Preston, 2013; Wagner et al., 2014), the role of social alignment and its impact on downstream performance remain unclear. This study incorporates the social dimension of alignment to investigate the role of this dimension in achieving IT-business strategic alignment.To fulfill the aforementioned research aims, we conducted a case study of a healthcare organization that implemented healthcare information systems (HIS) to enhance performance. Compared to business organizations, healthcare organizations are particularly suitable subjects for investigating alignment for the following reasons: (1) hospitals are special organizations that are heavily regulated by medical boards, and thus, elements in social alignment (such as top management support and shared understanding) may significantly positively affect the openness of hospitals to changes in IT/business strategies and corresponding adjustment in IT/business structures; (2) the diversity of different hospital units results in substantial differences in business strategies/structures and related IT strategies/structures that require dynamic competencies in achieving alignment and (3) the domains of knowledge are distinct between hospital units and IT professionals, thus making social alignment particularly necessary, although challenging. Statistics show that 20% of HIS implementations are considered failures due to technical failures, financial failures and people-related issues (Hook, 2017). There is little doubt that IT is playing a growing role in how healthcare organizations deliver services. However, without knowledge from the business units of organizations, the effects that can be achieved through technology alone will be limited. Therefore, a healthcare organization can serve as a research context to facilitate a greater understanding of the dynamics of alignment and an opportunity to examine the changes in alignment and the role of social alignment as HIS are extended.In summary, the research questions addressed in this study are as follows: (1) how does the alignment of the implemented HIS and the organizational strategy change over time and (2) how does the social dimension of alignment play a role in achieving strategic alignment?By examining alignment from a dynamic perspective and developing a process model of IT-business strategic alignment, this study contributes to the literature in three ways: First, this study adopts a dynamic view and suggests that there are two different patterns (i.e. an IT strategy-driven pattern and a business strategy-driven pattern) through which strategic alignment can be achieved, subject to environmental factors, the focus on either the business strategy or the IT strategy and the available resources. Second, this study develops a process model of IT-business strategic alignment; this model complements previous studies and offers a holistic view of strategic IT management. Third, this study highlights the role of social alignment in maintaining internal collaborations and external partnerships and in facilitating IT-business strategic alignment. This study also presents practical implications for practitioners regarding the nature of and countermeasures for managing IT-business strategic alignment.The rest of the paper is organized as follows: First, we develop the theoretical background for this paper. Next, we explain the research methods. Then, we describe and analyze the case data, and finally, we discuss the findings, limitations and implications of this study.\n2. Theoretical foundation: Alignment between organizational components is crucial for improving organizational performance (Beer et al., 2005; Reich and Benbasat, 1996). As IT continues to increasingly play strategic roles in organizations, IT-business strategic alignment has become a focus for researchers in their investigations of the relationship of this alignment to organizational performance (e.g. Henderson and Venkatraman, 1999; Luftman and Brier, 1999; Reynolds and Yetton, 2015; Tallon and Pinsonneault, 2011). 2.1 IT-business strategic alignment\n3. Research method: This study adopted a qualitative case study approach (Eisenhardt, 1989), and we analyzed qualitative data with expectations based on prior theories. Additionally, we allow unexpected findings and explanations to emerge from the data when building our process model of IT-business alignment. In particular, to analyze HIS implementation in different business units, we first identified theoretical factors based on the examination of current literature and an assessment of informant comments. Then, we draw conclusions about the dynamic process of alignment and implementation. 3.1 Case selection\n4. Case findings: 4.1 Preparation of HIS implementation through establishing social alignment\n5. Discussion: Strategic alignment is not static but dynamic, with different patterns occurring in multiple phases. The pattern of IT strategy-driven alignment emerges mostly when the planning of IS implementation is uncertain. The pattern of business strategy-driven alignment determines the level of organizational performance that can be facilitated by IT strategic planning. IT strategy-driven alignment pattern ensures constant support for the business strategy, and the business strategy-driven alignment pattern guides and directs the IT strategy to accommodate changes in the business strategy. We visualize the different patterns in Figure 2. The left panel shows how the IT strategy functions as a driver to facilitate IT implementation, shape the business strategy and transform an organization's infrastructure to achieve alignment. The right panel of Figure 2 illustrates how the business strategy-driven pattern of alignment is achieved. 5.1 The dynamics of IT-business strategic alignment\n6. Theoretical and practical implications: 6.1 Theoretical implications\n7. Limitations and future research: This study is not without limitations. First, this study focused on the dynamic process of IT-business strategic alignment in the context of HIS implementation in a healthcare organization. However, because organizational contexts may vary in terms of size, structure, IT capabilities and the nature of the adopted IT, other dynamic patterns of IT-business strategic alignment could emerge. For instance, while this study focused on the implementation of HIS, which is a relatively mature digital application with a clear vision, other firms may wish to implement emerging technologies (such as blockchain), whose areas of application are far from well developed. Hence, future research may explore the dynamic process of IT-business strategic alignment in other organizational contexts. Second, while this study highlighted the role of social alignment in a dynamic alignment, the combined effects of different dimensions of alignment remain unclear. Future research may extend the current work to establish a more comprehensive understanding regarding this issue. Third, while the case study method was adopted in this research, future studies on this topic may rely on other methodologies for further empirical testing of our findings.\n8. Conclusion: This paper advances our understanding of the dynamics of alignment by identifying different patterns that arise in achieving IT-business alignment. This paper suggests that the achievement of alignment should be examined in longitudinal terms because a single alignment pattern may not remain in effect over an extended period. Based on a case study analysis, this paper identifies two patterns of strategic alignment, namely, IT strategy-driven alignment and business strategy-driven alignment, and investigates the transitions between alignment and misalignment. In addition, this paper explicitly links social alignment to strategic alignment and business performance. This paper makes important contributions to the literature on strategic alignment by taking a dynamic view of alignment, identifying different patterns of alignment, emphasizing the role of social alignment and developing a comprehensive process model. From a managerial perspective, managers should periodically scrutinize the IT-business alignment patterns of their organizations and develop dynamic capabilities for achieving alignment.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: This study intends to reveal how to manage the dynamic process of information technology business (IT-business) strategic alignment; managing this alignment is an unknown yet critical issue that must be addressed by any firm trying to unleash the business value of their IT investments.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This study presents our case study of a healthcare organization after healthcare information systems (HIS) implementation and investigates the strategic alignment between the implemented HIS and the organizational strategy from a dynamic perspective.\nFindings: Two different patterns of alignment (i.e. an IT-strategy-driven pattern and a business-strategy-driven pattern) are identified, and a process model of the IT-business strategic alignment is developed. Moreover, this study focuses on the social dimension of strategic alignment and examines the role of this dimension, which is critical and fundamental with respect to other dimensions, in achieving strategic alignment.\nResearch limitations/implications: This paper makes important theoretical contributions to the understanding of strategic alignment by taking a dynamic view of alignment, identifying different patterns of alignment, emphasizing the role of social alignment and developing a comprehensive process model.\nPractical implications: From a managerial perspective, managers should periodically scrutinize the IT-business alignment patterns of their organizations and develop dynamic capabilities for strategic alignment.\nOriginality/value: While most of the literature on the dynamics of strategic alignment have focused on confirming the dynamics of strategic alignment and identifying the factors that create dynamics in alignment, this study examines IT-business alignment as a continuous process over time, thus providing a novel perspective. Moreover, while the role of social alignment and its impact on downstream performance remain unclear in the current literature, this study incorporates the social dimension of alignment to investigate the role of this dimension in achieving IT-business strategic alignment.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Microaggression experiences of different marginalized identities	[ "Gender", "Religion", "Sexual orientation", "Race", "Intersectional identities", "Microaggression" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: There has been much debate and research interest in recent years on the concept of microaggressions, which denotes subtle form of bias and discrimination such as slights, snubs or perceived insults directed toward minorities, studied predominantly through the lens of race. Racial microaggressions are defined as \"brief and commonplace daily verbal, behavioral, and environmental indignities, whether intentional or unintentional, that communicate hostile, derogatory, or negative racial slights and insults to the target person or group\" (Sue, Bucceri, Lin, Nadal and Torino, 2007; Sue, Capodilupo, Torino, Bucceri, Holder, Nadal and Esquilin, 2007, p. 273). Although the focus on microaggressions is somewhat recent, the term was first coined in the 1970s referring to \"subtle, stunning, often automatic, and non-verbal ex-changes which are 'put downs'\" (Pierce et al., 1978, p. 66). Since the mainstreaming of research on racial microaggression by Sue and his colleagues (Sue, Bucceri, Lin, Nadal and Torino, 2007; Sue, Capodilupo, Torino, Bucceri, Holder, Nadal and Esquilin, 2007; Sue et al., 2008; Sue, 2010), the concept has begun to be applied to other marginalized groups and demographics such as ethnic minorities and people of color (Clark et al., 2014), gender (Basford et al., 2014; Gartner and Sterzing, 2016), discrimination based on one's religion (Husain and Howard, 2017) and sexual orientation (Shelton and Delgado-Romero, 2011; Woodford et al., 2013).\nMethodology: Given the difficulty in operationalization of microaggressions (Lilienfeld, 2017) and the early stage development of research in this area, we employ a qualitative lens to understand the concept of microaggressions and the experience of exclusion. The methodology involved detailed focus group discussions with participants who qualify as holding one or more marginalized identities, and then engaging in a phenomenological analysis of the data. While participant recruitment was not specifically intersectional, in the focus groups, an intersectional discussion naturally emerged. We conducted focus groups with subjects of each identity category to identify the types and nature of microaggressions and related behaviors that may result in exclusion. Focus groups are considered an effective means of obtaining in-depth information on concepts such as microaggressions, which are still in nascent stages of development (Creswell, 2013).\nDiscussion: Microaggression, or the varied forms of knowingly or sometimes inadvertently communicated slights, snubs, rebukes or invalidations that signal some degree of exclusion, is an area of increasing research interest. Because these are tacit and subtle in nature, they sometimes slip through the cracks of awareness, even though their effect on the recipient can be potent. If someone perceives the words, actions or behavior of another individual as a slight, put down, or invalidation of some sort, even when that may not be the intent of the other party, it would still qualify as a microaggression if it is experienced as such. Existing literature on microaggressions has tended to focus on singular identities, and even within that, understandably so for a phenomenon whose understanding is still evolving, there is much variation in how microaggressions are classified or categorized (Lilienfeld, 2017).\nConclusion: Given the nascent stage of the microaggression research program, our study is an attempt to add to the body of knowledge on microaggressions, from the perspective of the recipients of such aggressions. We examine the microaggression experience along differing minority identities that include race, gender, religion and sexual orientation. In exploring the nature of microaggressions, analysis of the focus group transcripts reveal some common themes across the microaggressions directed at marginalized minority identities. The six emergent themes are discussed and we draw attention to an important influencer of the microaggression experience, namely, the frequency or repetition of occurrence and the historical experience of the experiencer. We highlight new forms of microaggressions, add to the microaggression taxonomy and draw attention to the experience of intersectional microaggressions, an avenue for future exploration.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Given the nascent stage of research on microaggressions, the study is an attempt to better understand the experience of microaggressions and examine it from the point of view of different marginalized minority identities. The purpose of this paper is to report on the subjective experience of microaggressions from the lenses of gender, race, religion and sexual orientation.\nDesign/methodology/approach: To explore how microaggressions are experienced by different identities, the authors conducted four focus group studies with university students at a prominent Midwestern university. Each focus group focused on the experience of microaggressions for a particular identity group.\nFindings: The authors discuss the nature and forms of exclusion that occur through microaggressions, and offer six microaggression themes that emerged as common across the marginalized identities studied. The authors add to the microaggression taxonomy and highlight the role of repetition in how microaggressions are perceived. The authors also discuss intersectional microaggressions.\nOriginality/value: While various studies have focused on reporting microaggression themes with regard to singular identities, this study is potentially the first that explores microaggression themes across different marginalized identities. The findings highlight novel forms of microaggressions such as the revealing or making visible of marginalized identities, and microaggressions emanating from within a minority group directed at other members within the same identity group, what the authors call as in-group microaggressions. The authors highlight and point to the need for more work on intersectional microaggressions.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Mobile claim management adoption in emerging insurance markets: An exploratory study in Thailand	[ "Insurance", "Customer satisfaction", "Claim motor insurance", "M-insurance", "Mobile claim service", "Motor insurance in Thailand" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The advances in mobile wireless networks and the significant reduction in the price of mobile devices has created opportunities to financial service providers to offer their services on mobile devices. The applications improve customer orientation by enhancing business processes (Gruhn et al., 2007; Liang et al., 2007) that mostly focus on secure payment transactions, sending and receiving information, account access management, and value added to products and services (Tsang et al., 2004; Hernandez, 2011). However, the insurance industry has started to use mobile technology for mission-critical data tasks in real-time, and to use mobile collection systems for \"anytime-anywhere\" payment transactions. Application designers face several challenges which must be considered in designing mobile applications (Churchill and Munro, 2001; Sairamesh et al., 2004). As mobile service application design must successfully integrate several disciplines, including process design, technology system design and application prototyping, the study reviews business process re-engineering, consumer concerns, and the creation of an innovative model that can be used as a future guideline for empirical research on mobile application prototyping (Wang et al., 2005).\n2. Literature review: The following sections describe the theoretical framework related to the proposed model are TAM, DOI, and Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB). Moreover, the understanding of mobile services and factors influencing adoption of new technology and mobile services especially mobile insurance are presented as follows.\n3. Research methodology: The research is based on a literature review of TAM and DOI focusing on key words of mobile services adoption, mobile banking and internet technology adoption, mobile insurance service adoption, and TAM of M-insurance and self-service. The results were formulated to develop the research framework and semi-structured questions for in-depth interview the experts and focus group discussions.\n4. Data collection and analysis: Data analysis methods were defined for the interviews and focus group discussions. The content record was analysed were managed in details and categorized as key influencing factors of M-insurance acceptance. However, the results show the numerical scales that repeat same answers from the focus group interview records.\n5. Findings: 5.1. TAM for M-insurance for motor insurance claim service adoption in Thailand\n6. Conclusions and managerial implications: 6.1. Conclusion and managerial implication\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore the adoption of a mobile insurance claim system (M-insurance) and develops a framework for the adoption of M-insurance by consumers.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This study assesses mobile technology for claim management through the lens of the technology acceptance model (TAM) and diffusion of innovation (DOI) models as a major guideline, using exploratory research through in-depth interviews with four executive experts who are first movers in mobile claim motor insurance in Thailand. Semi-structured interviews and open-ended questions were used to conduct group interviews of insurance consumers who mostly use smartphones. The data were collected in a qualitative research approach from Thai insurance consumers (n=177), and contents were classified and analysed to gain strong insights into respondent opinions, comments, attitudes, behaviour, and experiences.\nFindings: The results indicate that the external (social) factors influence attitude and behaviour of consumers which link to their intention to adopt M-insurance. These external factors include: preference for face-to-face service; confidence of insurers in accepting claim; and risk of claim knowledge that might cause legal issues among others. In application, the findings shall meaningfully enhance insurer firms' improvement of adoption rate and development of future features and functions of M-insurance.\nResearch limitations/implications: This study is based on insurance consumers in each region of Thailand but focuses only on mobile claim management for motor insurance. Although the findings bring new insight and understanding of consumer preferences and behaviours, they were not tested statistically.\nPractical implications: The study has practical implications for motor insurance claimants who are concerned over the complicated policy conditions, the perspective risk of claim knowledge and fault admission, and the on-site investigation by surveyor for another party. These are the guidance impediments to overcome M-insurance adoption improvement.\nOriginality/value: Previously, TAM and DOI approaches have been employed to study general adoption of M-banking by quantitative research which confirmed descriptive data and tested the hypothesis, but neglected crucial data. However, M-insurance is different from M-banking in term of features and functions, purpose and process of usage, and legal liability. Therefore, this study is one of a few empirical studies that attempt to identify insightful factors to consumer uptake of M-insurance which is in its early stage and lacks an underpinning TAM model. This study contributes by identifying insights of \"pull\" factors to successfully develop M-insurance in Thailand.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Use and measurement of social media for SMEs	[ "Social media", "SMEs", "ROI", "Measurement" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Social media describes \"the way in which content (particularly news and opinions) has become democratised by the Internet and the role people now play not only in consuming information and conveying it to others, but also creating and sharing content with them\" (Cook, 2008, p. 7). Social media has brought revolutionary new ways of interacting, participating, cooperating and collaborating and involves users generating content and connecting with people through a many-to-many, rather than the traditional \"one-to-many\", communication approach. A range of services, technologies and applications are commonly associated with social media including social networks, blogs, podcasts, wikis, RSS feeds, forums, media sharing and social bookmarking (Safko, 2010; Kaplan and Haenlein, 2010; Cook, 2008).\nUse of social media: Safko (2010) describes social media as an extension of traditional media employing a more sophisticated set of tools, techniques and technologies for connecting, building relationships and social interactions. Similarly, Edosomwan et al. (2011) agree that the concept of conversation, social interaction and engagement is not something new but has evolved to incorporate enhanced digital technologies. Although both authors highlight the evolution of media, they also emphasise its interactive and social qualities for the communities of users involved in sharing, communicating and working together.\nMeasuring return of investment (ROI) of social media: The social media measurement conundrum has sparked much debate in recent times, as more and more companies adopt the use of social media platforms to take their products or services online. Calculating this investment can be a complex task but any business which fails to do so will jeopardise their ability to demonstrate the full rewards of its use.\nPlanning social media: Current literature highlights how vital a comprehensive planning process is to the success of social media adoption if it is to result in a positive ROI (Stockdale et al., 2012; Nair, 2011; Sexsmith and Angel, 2011; Bernoff and Li, 2008; Constantinides et al., 2008). Planning should not only address the objectives for social media use such as engaging with customers and setting expectations, but also how a company will measure the economic value and business benefits. As Hoffman and Fodor (2010) argue \"the question is not whether to blog or tweet, but what objectives need to be achieved and which set of tools with their corresponding metrics can best achieve them\". Once an organisation has a strategic framework and has set goals, objectives and metrics, only then will they be in a position to choose the appropriate social media (Bernoff and Li, 2008).\nSocial media analytical tools: There are a growing number of analytical tools which enable companies to gather data and measure the impact of social media on their business processes. Many social media platforms offer their own built-in analytical services such as Facebook Analytics, Twitter Analyser and YouTube Analytics which provide information on traffic and popularity such as the number of followers, likes, comments, etc. Other tools provided by search engines such as Google Analytics and Google Alerts can be used to analyse site traffic and the amount of times a brand, company or product has been mentioned. Other proprietary software exist which can report on the fuller impact of a company's social media investment across a variety of social media platforms. For example Radian6, Alterian SM2 and SAS, not only provide statistical information but also attempt to analyse sentiment and interpret the tone of conversation.\nResearch method: Research involved a questionnaire survey designed to gather background information about each SME, the social media that they use and perceived usefulness, the SME's objectives for using social media, the benefits they attribute to social media and methods that they use for measuring those benefits. Scottish SMEs were invited to complete the questionnaire in a number of ways: direct e-mail, articles in local newspapers, newsletters, as well as promotion through social media (namely, Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn). The survey was distributed and analysed through Survey Monkey. In total, 116 online surveys were completed, however, ten were completed by non-SMEs (more than 250 staff) so are not included in the following results.\nSurvey results: The results of the questionnaire survey are outlined as follows.\nDiscussion: The results gathered from this research indicates that SMEs find value in certain types of social media such as LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook while other media such as wikis and podcasting are not as useful in a business capacity. SMEs believe social media is very important for the business and introduce it to build relationships with customers, increase brand awareness, showcase expertise and gain new contacts. The uses of social media found from this research are largely similar to those highlighted by Divol et al. (2012), Stockdale et al. (2012), Nair (2011), etc.\nSocial media models: Many of the models suggested for social media ROI evaluation (e.g. Hoffman and Fodor, 2010; Murdough, 2009), despite their different structures, have one thing in common: they agree that clearly defined goals, objectives and metrics have to be agreed upon prior to an organisation's entry into the social media arena and that these should drive any decision on which social media platforms and analytical tools an organisation should use to measure and deliver results. As such, organisations should know what they hope to achieve through their social media endeavours before they enter into the social media environment.\nRecommendations: An overarching framework that provides direction for SMEs to measure ROI of social media is outlined in Figure 2. The framework consists of three main stages: planning; implementation and evaluation. The planning stage should involve setting goals, defining objectives and outlining suitable metrics for measuring the impact of social media. The second stage entails implementing appropriate social media tools (depending on goals, objectives and metrics identified in previous stage), implementing methods for analysing social media (this may incorporate specific analytical tools and/or interaction and monitoring by specific personnel) and ongoing measurement of the quantitative and the qualitative aspects of social media. The third stage is the evaluation of both short-term and long-term benefits and an assessment of the longer-term ROI. The benefits will involve quantitative and qualitative benefits and by breaking down the benefits into shorter identifiable chunks it will be easier to ascertain the longer term benefit.\nConclusions and future research: In conclusion, the ever-changing and complex social media environment requires organisations to plan their social media investments with care. Organisations must understand the area of business which they want to address, formulate measurable goals, objectives and corresponding metrics before deciding which social media platforms are most suitable to leverage these. Before entering into the social media environment, companies should \"listen\" to what is being said about their company's brand, as this can help drive appropriate goals and may inform the timing of entry into a particular environment. Importantly, as social media demands a long-term investment and as social media is all about \"people\" and \"relationships\", organisations should be prepared to participate in dialogue and open conversation, and spend time developing effective relationships with customers in order to ensure positive outcomes. Social media measurement is in many ways \"highly subjective and completely unique to the interpretation of the entity doing the measuring\" (Owyang and Toll, 2007). The sentiment or tone of some content could be \"misconstrued by analysis that evaluates language too literally, or by an audience or reader whose interpretation can be subject to regional or cultural biases\" (Owyang and Toll, 2007). In undertaking to measure ROI, the focus on financial returns must not be lost, although the benefits associated with intangible conversation and participation can lead to future returns.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to investigate why small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are using social media and how they should measure its return on investment (ROI). The measurement of economic value associated with the use of social media by business is discussed in order to construct a model designed for analysing the ROI of social media for SMEs. The importance of a planned entry into the social media arena, formulation of measurable goals and objectives and understanding the business process are presented as vital pre-cursors to measuring, and indeed attaining, ROI.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A literature review was compiled to explore the current thinking that exists on business use and measurement of social media in mainstream academic literature and other business-oriented publications. Primary research in the form of a survey was conducted with SMEs to determine the usefulness of social media and how SMEs measure its ROI.\nFindings: SMEs find some social media applications more valuable than others but 65 per cent of the companies surveyed did not measure the ROI. An overarching framework, aimed at SMEs, is presented which advocates that SMEs should take a strategic focus and plan their use of social media, and draw insight from both quantitative and qualitative data when measuring ROI.\nOriginality/value: Most existing research on social media is related to large organisations and tends to focus on technical and commercial use rather than examining the value and ROI gained from social media from an SME perspective. This paper offers a simple framework to help SMEs plan their use of social media as well as measure its true value.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
A model to improve management of banking customers	[ "Customer lifetime value", "Customer relationship management", "Customer value management", "Hierarchical Bayesian model", "Latent class regression model", "Product portfolio management" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Due to the inherent complexities of the financial sector industry related to the high level of competition (Worthington and Welch, 2011), the comparatively long duration of many relationships with customers (Leverin and Liljander, 2006), and the fact that it can take several years for customers to become profitable (Reichheld, 1996), nowadays financial service providers realise the importance of an effective Customer Relationship Management (CRM) (Oztaysi et al., 2011). Within this industry, decisions about customers are crucial, but complex, because companies have to recognise hazardous customers' relationships in order to be avoided, which will ensure the survival. In this regard, CRM has potential to help financial services providers to acquire new customers, retain existing ones, and maximise their lifetime value through a more efficient provision of financial products (Krasnikov et al., 2009; Xu and Walton, 2005). Consequently, given the existence of vast amounts of customer's data recorded in customer databases, the phenomenon known as marketing accountability has grown in importance to manage customer base by taking into account its value to the firm (customer value management, CVM) (Verhoef and Lemon, 2013). Therefore, careful assessment and segmentation of customers offer benefits in the decision making process related to customer management to this industry.\n2. Literature review: 2.1 Approaches to model CLV\n3. Research framework: The proposed model is based on the CUSAMS theoretical framework, used to complement the classification of components and drivers of CLV identified by Persson and Ryals (2010). In line with the traditional customer value literature (e.g. Berger and Nasr, 1998; Kumar and Shah, 2009), we include past behavioural data available from the customer database (customer transaction behaviour). According to our knowledge, this set of variables has not been studied together in other previous CLV models.\n4. Methodology: 4.1 Data\n5. Results: 5.1 Predictions of product usage and contribution margin\n6. Theoretical contributions and practical implications: This study is an attempt to provide theoretical contributions to the customer value analysis literature. In particular, we have extended the classification of components and drivers of CLV proposed by Persson and Ryals (2010) using the CUSAMS framework (Bolton et al., 2004). In particular, from the results obtained in the first sub-model related to the usage model, we can observe a large variation among the different banking services considered (all the variables considered as drivers of usage are significant for, at least, one of the products included). In this regard, this model emphasises the importance of considering a wide range of products offered by the company in order to provide a complete picture to determine which customer behaviours better predict the usage of financial services (Park et al., 2014). On the other hand, regarding the contribution margin model, dynamic cross-buying, average monthly assets and liabilities, total quantity of purchases and one-period lagged of contribution margin are the drivers that better predict contribution margin component of CLV. Therefore, we are in line to previous authors, who state that cross-selling contributes to customer profitability (Prinzie and Van den Poel, 2008). We also get support to the idea that intensity of product usage (in terms of average monthly assets and liabilities) is also a good driver of contribution margin (Haenlein et al., 2007). Finally, we also corroborate that total quantity of purchases (Venkatesan and Kumar, 2004) and one-period lagged of contribution margin (Villas-Boas and Winer, 1999) are good drivers of contribution margin.\n7. Conclusions: Within the banking industry, an optimal CRM strategy is a key issue under the current growing competitive pressure that encourages banks to increase profits and reduce costs. In this context, the proposed CLV model is a valuable tool designed to carefully assess and classify banking customers using transaction data of individual customers and covering customers' relationships with a portfolio of products of the company. Previous CLV models are mostly conceptual, generalisation is one of their main concerns, are usually focussed on single product categories using aggregated customer data, and they are not design with a special emphasis on their application as support for managerial decisions. In response to these drawbacks, the proposed model will enable decision makers to improve the understanding of the value of each customer and their behaviour towards different financial products. Consequently, the proposed model allows the CVM (Verhoef and Lemon, 2013) (see Figure 2), causing less waste of marketing spending and more effective allocation of marketing resources to customers and marketing instruments.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to provide a customer lifetime value (CLV) model to carefully assess and classify banking customers using individual measures and covering customers' relationships with a portfolio of products of the company.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The proposed model comprises two sub-models: (sub-model 1) modelling and prediction of CLV in a multiproduct context using Hierarchical Bayesian models as input to (sub-model 2) a value-based segmentation specially designed to manage customers and products using the latent class regression. The model is tested using real transaction data of 1,357 customers of a bank.\nFindings: This research demonstrates which drivers of customer value better predict the contribution margin and product usage for each of the products considered in order to get the CLV measure. Using this measure, the model implements a value-based segmentation, which helps banks to facilitate the process of customer management.\nOriginality/value: Previous CLV models are mostly conceptual, generalisation is one of their main concerns, are usually focussed on single product categories using aggregated customer data, and they are not design with a special emphasis on their application as support for managerial decisions. In response to these drawbacks, the proposed model will enable decision makers to improve the understanding of the value of each customer and their behaviour towards different financial products.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Product data management practices in high-tech companies	[ "Product data management", "Product life cycle", "Large enterprises" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1 Introduction: In modern global economy, companies are forced to continuously come up with new innovative products to improve, or even maintain, their market position. Work is typically organised in a multi-site, multi-project and multi-cultural environment leading to a situation where companies must pay especial attention on ensuring that product data (PD) are correct and flowing rapidly, ideally in an automated manner, between all the actors in the value chain (Gimenez et al., 2008).Current business environment is typically dependent on data-systems. In engineering and manufacturing companies, efficient data management practices have become one of the key aspects for business efficiency. Data management practices are emphasised when companies collaborate with their partners, suppliers and subcontractors relating to R&D or manufacturing. Shortening time-to-market, increasing product complexity with decreasing product lifecycles (PLC), growing legal and environmental requirements, together with demands for continuous costs reduction and higher operational efficiency set challenges for today's manufacturing companies. (Ameri and Dutta, 2005; Stark, 2005; Saaksvuori and Immonen, 2004; CIMdata, 2002). Traditional solutions are not adequate to tackle these challenges. Product data management (PDM) has become one of the most important considerations for companies, especially in engineering and manufacturing industries. Design and manufacturing processes benefit significantly of improved PD sharing, and the usage and visualisation possibilities offered by PDM (Chan and Yu, 2007). In order to be competitive, companies require a common presentation of PD that is electronically transferable over organisations (Saaksvuori and Immonen, 2004). This is yet to be fully realised (Abramovici, 2007).The main purpose of introducing PDM is to help companies to manage their operations electronically, making it more efficient and effective. PDM systems typically control all basic data on how to design, maintain, and dispose a product. If a company is not able to control product related data, it will be difficult to for them get the product under control (Stark, 2005). PDM helps to organise and utilise data, enabling accelerating time-to-market due to reduced lead-times (Huang et al., 2004; Sulaiman, 2000; Philpotts, 1996).This paper studies the different elements of PDM systems, including practical realisation of PDM in selected case companies. This includes discussing definitions, processes, and data systems related to PDM solutions. These issues are studied to attain practical knowledge on PDM systems and to provide tangible descriptions on how companies are applying PDM practices. In addition, the current challenges are clarified. The above can be condensed into the following research questions:RQ1. What type of practices companies utilise for PDM purposes?RQ2. What are the main challenges of PDM in high-tech companies?This study addresses the research questions in a qualitative manner both, through literature and industry interviews. A simplified PDM system frame was also created to support the analysis.\n2 Literature review on PDM and related concepts: Managing PD has became a challenging task for manufacturing companies who simultaneously need to design and re-design products in a shorter time, while trying to respond to changing market needs and environmental concerns, improve product reliability and offer add-on services (Trappey et al., 2008; Yang et al., 2007). Product development process requires improved solutions for handling PD in order to better support collaborative engineering and management of product development projects, product structures, documents and quality (Yang et al., 2007; Rouibah and Ould-Ali, 2007). To develop product designs, feedback from the field is required (Jun et al., 2007). Other company functions, aside product development, also require better data management practices. For example, supply chain performance is heavily dependent on product related data handling (Huang et al., 2003, 2005; Johansson and Medbo, 2004).PD are created and utilised in different business functions with disparate ways (Sudarsan et al., 2005). PD are referred to as \"information broadly related to a product\" (Saaksvuori and Immonen, 2004). Thus, is often used interchangeably with the term product information (Fensel et al., 2001; Liu and Xu, 2001). Also, the term information systems, which covers business related aspects is often used interchangeably with data systems that addresses more operational issues. PD can be divided into product definition, PLC data and metadata (Saaksvuori and Immonen, 2004). Product definition and lifecycle data can further be divided into static and dynamic data. It can be said roughly that PDM involves managing the static PD, specifications such as bill of materials, and operational instructions. Product lifecycle management (PLM), on the other hand, also covers the dynamic PD which occurs during distribution, usage and end-of-life (Yang et al., 2007; Hribernik et al., 2006; Simon et al., 2001). PDM is defined to integrate and manage processes, applications and all kind of information that define products across multiple systems and media (Stark, 2005; Saaksvuori and Immonen, 2004; Philpotts, 1996).The concept of PLM is closely related to PDM. The common view is that PLM is the predominant concept covering also PDM activities (Stark, 2005; Sudarsan et al., 2005; CIMdata, 2002). CIMdata (2002) defines PLM to be \"a strategic business approach that applies a consistent set of business solutions, which support and integrate business processes and functions through product lifecycle\". PLM provides the capability of collaborative product - process actions, integrating people, processes, and technologies (Ming et al., 2007). This definition is widely used in earlier studies. Good PLM system is seen to require one common PDM process as PDM is the foundation for PLM (CIMdata, 2002), even though PLM is lately seen to be replacing the PDM concept (Gimenez et al., 2008).Regardless of PDM and PLM covering the entire PLC, in practice data management is still focused towards managing product development and design data, and the methods used to collect PD from middle and end-of-life phases are incomplete (Yang et al., 2007; Jun et al., 2007; Abramovici, 2007). Unfortunately, in practice the relevant feedback information from the field cannot be adequately obtained and utilised for later product design versions.PDM system connects PD related product and process management, providing an infrastructure for controlling and sharing data for users together with a related user interface (Rueckel et al., 2005; Stark, 2005). The content of PDM systems is not unified and varies by a definition. PDM systems contain at least the following basic modules (Kumar and Midha, 2006; Stark, 2005):* information warehouse or data vault;* information warehouse management: tracing any data related actions;* document management;* configuration management (CM);* product structure management;* product and workflow structure: definition modules;* workflow and process management; and* system administration management.According to the above listed, compatibility with other IT systems is an essential element of PDM systems (Wei et al., 2009; Maletz et al., 2007).PDM systems are used for gathering data from specific software, such as computer-aided design (CAD), computer-aided manufacturing (CAM), FEM, and for storing and administrating data centrally (Stark, 2005). Standard definition of product related data are a key for integrating activities in a value-chain, and for making application integration possible and more functional (Gimenez et al., 2008). Common definition of PD includes creating understanding over data collation needs in later PLC phases, covering the end-to-end (E2E) view of a product, as requested by Yang et al. (2007) and Jun et al. (2007). According to these two authors, PDM and PLM technologies involve also other challenges. For example, current technologies are not at a satisfactory level to provide reasonable solutions for supporting the increasing need to deliver tailored products (Ming et al., 2007), and to better support the integration of products' mechanic, electronic and software components (Abramovici, 2007). In complex product environment, the diversity of data formats, such as free text, structured and semi-structured data and combinations of these, together with variety of data sources creates a challenge for data management within integrated systems (Feng et al., 2009; Yang et al., 2009).\n3 Research process: This research is qualitative in nature. PDM/PLM was first studied by the using existing literature as a key source. The empirical study consists of a workshop and industrial interviews. The research process is shown in Figure 1.At first, a workshop was arranged together with three companies to discuss topical issues on PDM. The attendees are experts in the field, offering a wide perspective on the subject. Based on the workshop and earlier research, a preliminary PDM system frame was created to aid analyses. The frame is aimed to aid further studies in order to focus on the three PDM elements identified important.The interview questionnaire was formulated based on the created PDM frame and understanding obtained through the literature (see the Appendix for the questionnaire). Interviews were conducted in a qualitative manner, allowing the interviewees to explain and clarify the cases and topics as entities. Interviews were conducted in four heterogeneous companies to obtain a wider view on the studied subject. The study included altogether 12 interviews. The interviewed industry experts were selected carefully on the basis of their professional background and expertise. Selected participants hold responsible positions related to product management, and PDM. The experience and the current interests ensured high motivation among the participants and up-to-date knowledge with respect to the discussed topics.The interviews were conducted in four companies, all of which manufacture complex, high-tech products, combining software and hardware. They all operate globally in multi-site environment, including global challenges and global customer requests. Also, different local laws and regulations are considered in their product design and manufacturing. These companies are all large companies (see company definition by EU Commission, 2005). However, Company A is a subsidiary of a consortium, and thus conclusions considering the entire group cannot be drawn. This subsidiary is equivalent to a medium size company when considered separately from the group. Company specific characteristics, relevant to this study are presented in Table I.\n4 Results and analysis: 4.1 PDM system frame\n5 Conclusions: PDM is a relatively new academic research area, and as a consequence the literature is somewhat scarce on practical solutions, including descriptions on how data ownerships are defined, how PD are maintained, what are the relevant process solutions. PDM/PLM is seen to be one of the important solutions for developing operational efficiency, especially for companies with complex manufactured products, potentially including add-on services offered to customers. Many companies are currently developing their tools and processes to better manage and process product related data. PD and its efficient handling is becoming an important asset for business development.The purpose of this paper is to study the current PD management practices and related challenges in four case companies. The overall target of PDM activities in the studied companies are similar - to ensure the correctness of data and its availability to all personnel. Data quality is seen to be number one in priority and is attempted to assure when defining data ownership. Companies typically define data ownership based on business responsibilities, often making the person creating a piece of data also a data owner in that case. Companies with a long business history also have special PD teams assuring data quality and accuracy, having the final responsibility over PD. PDM practices are typically planned to fit for organisational culture and the nature of business, practices thus varying between companies. Companies typically have information systems to aid data handling. It can be noted that large companies trust special PDM applications to organise their PDM practices in a centralised manner. In addition, several other applications are used, while the practices are still fairly primitive, for example, e-mail contacts to suppliers and utilising Excel Sheets for data management during design. Data maintenance is seen as an integral element of PDM processes, however, mostly experienced as extremely laborious. All data cannot be processed automatically, and especially in large companies this manual work requires a lot of resources just because the quantity of data to be maintained. Seamless application integration is difficult, a deficiency that is causing lot of manual work and administration.PDM related challenges faced by high-tech companies are numerous. Every company has its own difficulties reflecting their business and organisational status. Regardless of company background, the development of current PDM/PLM systems is a key activity for developing business efficiency, excluding the one of a kind prototype provider (Company A). Root causes behind the PDM development activities are various - reorganisation, new business without defined processes, or a desire for better operational efficiency. The main challenge typically, however, is to get the personnel to understand PD coherently and to use standardised processes to prevent incomplete data in system. Personnel using the systems are one of the vital aspects for any effective PDM system. Should personnel not understand the process adequately, they do not work accordingly, potentially ruining the entire PDM system. Also, obtaining a harmonised product structure is a challenge in non-mature organisations. Rules for product variation, or chancing unstable structure, will cause additional work in data processing and maintenance. PDM/PLM technologies utilised in companies are seen immature, not adequately supporting all the required functionalities, such as product configurations.PDM/PLM related issues are not simple to study in practice. The field is broad, and has different layers, such as product item, platform or product family levels, to consider. However, in literature these layers are usually discussed all together, even when the management practices are different. Managers need to pay attention on how PDM, and even PLM, practices still emphasise data management during product design and development, ignoring the fact that PLC data are not optimally utilised.The purpose of this study was to obtain understanding over current PD management practices in high-tech companies, together with related challenges. PDM is a topical, increasingly important research area. This study was not intended to be all-inclusive, but rather to obtain potential development ideas. A wider set of interviews might have provided a somewhat different view to the obtained one.Potential topics for further research include clarifying the implementation of PDM/PLM solutions in different business situations. This type of information might help PDM/PLM applications, or consultation providers to notice the different needs arising from company specific characteristics. It is also important to notice how the current business trends, such as globalisation, or company mergers, affect PDM. The impact of numerous different tools on PDM, and information integration are also worth further study.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to provide tangible examples of product data management (PDM) practices in large high-tech companies, and to highlight current challenges.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - This paper is a qualitative interview study. First, a PDM system frame was defined to aid analyses. Second, an interview study was carried out in four companies to clarify the practical realisation of PDM, and the current challenges. The interviewees are experts in the field of PDM, currently holding significant related posts in their companies.\nFindings: - Overall, PDM activities are similar in all companies, however, there is some diversity in the realisation of these practices. PDM related challenges identified in this study are various, strongly influenced by company background and current organisational state.\nResearch limitations/implications: - This paper includes interviews in four companies with different backgrounds, and a workshop, providing a good view on topical issues in the field of PDM. The obtained results could vary to some degree, should the sample size be larger, or especially should the products of the studied companies be less complex.\nPractical implications: - This paper provides managers and PDM system developers' with a better understanding over the issues that are affecting PDM solution development and on major system requirements, together with relevant insight on current challenges.\nOriginality/value: - The existing literature is relatively scarce in describing the practicalities of PDM. The obtained results highlight the significance of company background influencing the selection of PDM solutions.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Rwanda's innovation challenges and policies - lessons for Africa	[ "Africa", "Innovation", "Government policy", "National cultures" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: The paper outlines the S&T and innovation policy challenges that Rwanda is experiencing in building a knowledge-based economy and draws some more general lessons for African countries.\nAn exceptional recovery and economic growth [...]: Following the horrible genocide of 1994 - in which almost 1 million people were killed in three months - Rwanda has been able to rebuild very efficiently its society and economy and it has experienced a growth rate of about 11 percent a year since more than a decade, making it one of the best economic performers of Africa. It is praised as one of the most competitive countries of Sub-Saharan Africa. Total GDP is about $8 billion while GDP per capita is about $700. The main positive factors explaining the economic performance of the country include, according to the World Economic Forum, the quality of institutions (ranked 17th, in 2015), a low level of corruption, a high level of security, the efficiency of the labor market and the level of primary education.\n[...] Made possible by efficient government policies: First thing, efficient measures have been taken to facilitate reconciliation among the population. Three types of actions can be mentioned here: in the field of justice, some 7,000 local tribunals[3] have been established and worked throughout the country to judge the people responsible of the genocide; in the field of social support, everybody (including top-level personalities such as ministers) have been obliged to dedicate one day a month (the last Saturday) to community works; and for fighting risks of famine, each family has been given a cow for milk and other productions. These measures inspired by traditional, ancestral customs were very efficient for rebuilding the social tissue.\nLimits of the efforts accomplished so far: The overall knowledge economy effort and investment are impressive, but the road is still long to benefit of their fruits. As shown by several indicators - see Tables I and II in the annex:\nDoing more and better: These considerations show the need for a well-articulated strategy with multiple and complementary objectives: developing by all means the industry and services, as source of jobs and income; improving the productivity in the agriculture sector, while supporting its growth with an efficient exploitation of its outputs through the development of the agro-food industry, acting as a \"pull driver\"; improving significantly the use of technology in the economy as a whole.\nEnlarging innovation policy: Actions are needed on all policy areas that determine the technological and entrepreneurial capabilities of the economy and society as a whole.\nConclusion: The case of Rwanda seems, indeed, important to be considered for the future of African countries, wishing to embark in a knowledge and innovation road. It shows the needs for efficient and sustained reforms of the overall governance system and business climate; this is a prerequisite for success. From this viewpoint, many parts of the African continent remain plagued with poor governance and business conditions, although some progress as a whole has been observed over time.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to outline the S&T and innovation policy challenges that Rwanda is experiencing in building a knowledge-based economy and draw some more general lessons for African countries.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The approach is based on methodological framework of country reviews used by international organizations in the field of science, technology and innovation policies.\nFindings: The paper presents government policies that have been decisive for the good performance of the country in rebuilding its economy and society since the genocide (1994). It highlights the policy measures that have been taken in the fields of education, information and communication technologies, industry, science and so on with a view to put the country on a knowledge-driven development process. It pinpoints the need for more proactive policies to stimulate the diffusion of new technologies and innovation throughout the economy and the different sectors, including agriculture which employs still 80 percent of the population.\nResearch limitations/implications: The paper is based on a short field mission (conducted for an international organization) and the collection of published data, in focusing on important messages that should be given to the government, without an in-depth empirical and detailed research.\nPractical implications: The paper is a kind of summary of a 80-page report to be published in the course of 2017. It is expected that the analysis will be clear enough to stimulate appropriate action by the Government of Rwanda.\nSocial implications: There is no direct social implications, but one may expect that the ideas if adopted by the government will help improving the living conditions in the country.\nOriginality/value: Such country reviews performed by international organizations are unique. They provide key insights on the innovation climate and policy of the nation that is studied, while they offer useful perspectives for countries at similar level of development.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Hospitality employees' citizenship behavior: the moderating role of cultural values	[ "OCB", "Self-efficacy", "Reciprocity", "Cultural values", "Moderating effect" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The hospitality industry faces an increasingly competitive environment because of the economic downturn that began in 2007-2008. Compared to other industries, such as agriculture, manufacturing and electronics (which have evolved to become more industrialized), the hospitality industry heavily depends on employees' work attitudes and behaviors, which are vital to achieving an organization's objectives, as well as the efficient maintenance of its competitive advantages and nonfinancial performance (Karatepe et al., 2006). Because of this significant role of employees, hospitality managers have encouraged them to go extra mile regarding regular job functions, especially as it relates to colleagues, loyalty to the organization and prevention of unexpected incidents (Ma and Qu, 2011). Thus, motivating service employees to surpass expectations has increasingly attracted scholarly attention in the hospitality industry (Ma et al., 2013). As a result, organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) has garnered more attention (Ma and Qu, 2011).\nLiterature review: Self-efficacy\nResearch hypotheses: Cho et al. (2006) found that hospitality enterprises instituting \"the norm of reciprocity\" through pre-employment tests and incentive plans were more likely to experience lower employee turnover rates. Bowen and Ostroff (2004) also discussed that when employees have \"the norm of reciprocity\", they are likely to understand managerial purposes better, and act accordingly. The reason is likely that the norm of reciprocity is used by employees to make sense of organizational procedures and goals, attributing motives and causes, including their relationship with the organization. In addition, management's goals are more clearly comprehended when employees adopt \"the norm of reciprocity\" over time (Bowen and Ostroff, 2004).\nMethods: Sample and data collection\nResults: Sample characteristics\nDiscussion and conclusions: Conclusions\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: This study aims to examine the impact of self-efficacy and reciprocity in predicting the organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) of hospitality employees and the moderating role of cultural values in the hypothesized relationship.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The proposed model of this study has been tested on the basis of the responses from 432 full-time employees who work at hospitality fields in South Korea. This study has conducted frequency, reliability, confirmatory factor, correlation analyses and structural equation modeling (SEM).\nFindings: The empirical results indicate not only that self-efficacy significantly influenced reciprocity, consideration, civic virtue and sportsmanship but also that reciprocity had positive influences on the same virtues as well as conscientiousness. The moderating role of cultural values has also been investigated resulting in significant differences in six of the nine cultural values measured (i.e. power distance, uncertainty avoidance, collectivism I and II, assertiveness and gender egalitarianism).\nPractical implications: From a practical perspective, the findings of this study yield several strategies relevant to hospitality employee development and training. Especially, the management in hospitality organizations needs to look at multicultural management and leadership styles within their own particular context.\nOriginality/value: Findings of this study suggest that both self-efficacy and reciprocity are important determinants of OCBs, and indicate the fundamental embeddedness of employment relations within the wider cultural value setting in non-Western contexts.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Guest editorial	[ "Organizational change", "Contradiction", "Dynamics", "Discourse" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nContradiction, discourse and the dynamics of organizational change: In recent years, there has been a growing interest for exploring concepts such as contradiction (Seo and Creed, 2002), dialectics (Benson, 1977; Van de Ven and Poole, 1995), paradox (Lewis, 2000) and conflict (Hargrave and Van de Ven, 2006), in organization studies. However, there are still few empirical studies that examine the relationship between contradiction, dialectics and organizational change (Demers, 2007). The four articles in the special themed section of the current issue of the Journal of Organizational Change Management, each in their own way, define contradiction and related concepts and study their impact on organizational change dynamics, focusing particularly on discursive activity.One common element in all these studies is their view of contradictions as institutionally anchored. For instance, Chahrazad Abdallah, Jean-Louis Denis and Ann Langley, as well as Kimberly Stoltzfus, Cynthia Stohl and David R. Seibold, referring to Seo and Creed (2002), conceive contradictions as grounded in multiple and divergent institutional arrangements that generate paradoxes (Stoltzfus et al.), tensions and conflicts (Abdallah et al.). The two other papers by Yrjo Engestrom and Annalisa Sannino and by Hannele Kerosuo draw on cultural-historical activity theory (Engestrom, 1987), which is becoming increasingly popular in organizational studies of change (Blackler et al., 1999; Jarzabkowski, 2003; Groleau et al., n.d.). They define these institutional contradictions as socio-historically rooted and giving rise to tensions manifested in double binds (Kerosuo), as well as dilemmas and conflicts (Engestrom and Sannino).Furthermore, all authors, either conceptually or empirically, present contradictions as drivers of organizational change. For activity theorists, drawing on Marxist dialectics, the latent, socio-historically grounded, primary contradiction as it becomes manifest in an organizational context, can trigger organizational change. In the interventionist tradition characterizing most activity theory studies, Engestrom and Sannino and Kerosuo present cases where organizational change is a sequence of interventions leading to the temporary resolution of contradiction. Abdallah et al., for their part, empirically describe three cases where contradictions drive organizational change by generating a discourse aimed at transcending the contradiction. Finally, Stoltzfus et al. describe how contradictions influence the dynamics in the context of a planned change initiative to improve information sharing among government agencies.It is also interesting to note that, in all articles, discourse plays an important role either as a manifestation of contradiction and/or as a way to manage contradiction. For example, Engestrom and Sannino argue that especially in deliberate organizational change efforts contradictions can be productively assessed through their discursive manifestations. They develop a methodological framework that makes it possible to study, through a set of linguistic cues, manifestations of contradictions as dilemmas, double binds, conflicts and critical conflicts. Kerosuo, for her part, empirically studies conversations to analyze the transition from individual experiences of contradiction, defined as double binds, to collective change which temporarily dissolves the contradiction. The last two studies examine how contradiction is managed discursively. For instance, Abdallah et al. discuss the management of contradiction through discourses of transcendence, showing that mechanisms such as quasi-resolution of conflict, strategic ambiguity and groupthink, which favor the acceptance of the discourse, also generate dynamics that will lead to further contradiction. The other study by Stoltzfus et al. shows that institutional contradictions manifested in paradoxes can be managed through communication strategies of selection or separation that give rise to new paradoxes.Finally, the vision that emerges from all four papers, whether they are based in interventions or relate how actors themselves deal with contradiction, is one of change as a continuous, but contested, process where contradiction always reappears to drive a further cycle of evolution. This special themed section suggests that future research could further explore cycles of organizational change focusing both on the manifestations of contradictions and the various strategies used to manage them.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to introduce this special themed section which explores the relationship between contradiction and organizational change.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - This paper analyzes the four papers included in this special themed section, drawing links between the different texts.\nFindings: - A review of the papers shows that they contribute to our understanding of the dynamics of organizational change by focusing on how contradictions manifest themselves and how they are managed in various change contexts.\nOriginality/value: - This introduction provides readers of the themed section with an overview of the four papers.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Digitalization and school leadership: on the complexity of leading for digitalization in school	[ "Principals", "School leadership", "Information and communication technology (ICT)" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: In recent years, the Swedish Government and municipalities have invested heavily in the digitalization of schools, e.g., 1:1, laptops and information and communication technology (ICT) systems (Gronlund, 2014; Hakansson Lindqvist, 2015a; Tallvid, 2015). Despite these strong efforts, the impact on teaching and learning continues to be somewhat vague (National Agency for Education, 2016). Every three years, the National Agency for Education evaluates the implementation and use of digital technologies and digital competencies in Swedish schools. In the report from 2016 results have shown that investments and access to digital technologies have increased, however, pedagogical development and digital competencies appear to have fallen behind (National Agency for Education, 2016; Swedish Schools Inspectorate, 2012).\nLeading in the midst of digitalization: There has been a rapid growth of digital technologies in today's knowledge society (Selwyn and Facer, 2014). In many schools, the implementation of digital technologies has been in the form of 1:1, i.e., one student one laptop initiatives, in which teachers and students use laptop computers for teaching and learning (Balanskat et al., 2013; Zheng et al., 2016). Positive outcomes such as increased student engagement (Bebell and O'Dwyer, 2010; Penuel, 2006) and more possibilities for students in their schoolwork (Lei and Zhao, 2008) are reported. However, as Weston and Bain (2010) argue, improved outcomes related to the implementation of technology will not come about by themselves. In this process, the teacher is important (Bebell and O'Dwyer, 2010) as well as the school leader (Dexter, 2008). Concerns about school leaders' abilities concerning preparation (Afshari et al., 2012; Schiller, 2003) as well as the lack of leadership (Flanagan and Jacobsen, 2003) have been expressed. Dexter (2008) means for example that the most important issue in the digitalization in schools is to be informed and to have effective school leaders. Further, Freeman et al. (2017) acknowledge the importance of school leaders in sustaining innovation and new innovations.\nMethod: As the focus of this study is on school leaders' understanding of digitalization and the competencies needed for leading such work, data were gathered from both learning reflections inspired by Moon's (2006) idea of learning journals and semi-structured interviews (Kvale, 2007). The learning reflections aimed to give school leaders the opportunity to reflect on aspects related to digitalization and the interviews to further deepen insight into these understandings. In this study, the learning reflections were mainly used to create a broad and comprehensive picture on how school leaders understand and conceptualize digitalization in school and understand what competencies are needed for driving what school leaders understand as digitalization. The learning reflections were based on two broad open-ended questions, concerning what is meant by digitalization for them in their profession as school leaders and what PD they felt would support their work in leading for digitalization. The learning reflections were conducted in January 2018 with 32 school leaders at the end of the Swedish National Principal Programme for school leaders.\nResults: In this section, the school leaders' understanding of digitalization and the digital competencies needed in leading for digitalization are according to Dexter's (2008) four categories: setting the direction, developing people, developing the organization, and developing teaching and learning. The results are summarized in Table I.\nDiscussion and conclusion: In returning to the research questions, the first question was directed toward gaining insight into how school leaders understand what is meant by digitalization in their profession as school leaders. As school leaders set the direction for digitalization, it appears that the role of the school leader appears to become more complex (cf. Pettersson, 2018a, b). As noted by the school leaders in this study, there are many areas and levels at which the school leader has the responsibility to drive development and lead for digitalization. School leaders' work in this area involves, for example, initiating, implementing, maintaining, documenting and leading for digitalization for themselves, teachers, parents and students as well as for the schools as organizations. Another interesting understanding is the accessibility to technology that according to these school leaders appears to be a strong but challenging condition for supporting the organization in its developmental work (cf. Dexter, 2008; Starkey et al., 2017). This an interesting finding when considering the otherwise good accessibility to technology that has been reported in Sweden (National Agency for Education, 2013). This challenge could also appear to be of even more importance in schools and municipalities in which students do not have access to computers at home. Other important aspects involve support teachers' and students' development of new teaching and learning methods (Ottestad, 2013), providing more efficient administration and driving school development. In other words, there are a large number of complex tasks on several different levels (Pettersson, 2018a, b).\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Digitalization has permeated society and schools. In this process, focus has turned to the importance of school leaders in their leadership for digitalization. The purpose of this paper is to explore how school leaders understand digitalization and the digital competencies needed in leading for digitalization in Swedish schools.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Open questions from reflective learning journals (n=32) and interviews (n=8) conducted with school leaders were used to explore how school leaders understand digitalization and the digital competencies needed in leading for digitalization.\nFindings: The findings show that school leaders see digitalization as a wide and complex concept including technical, pedagogical, administrational and organizational challenges at all levels of the school organization.\nPractical implications: It appears that the role of the school leader, as a complex task, has become more complex as a result of digitalization. How time, resources and professional development are made available to support school leaders in their work with leadership for digitalization in order to support teachers' and students' learning.\nOriginality/value: This paper contributes to the area of school leadership and digitalization. The research contribution is of interest for school leaders and school organizers striving to implement and advance digitalization in schools. This also concerns the prioritization of digitalization as one of many important areas in schools as organizations.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
How do principals practise leadership for social justice in diverse school settings? A Hong Kong case study	[ "Diversity", "Leadership", "Ethnic minority", "Chinese principals", "Migrant students", "Social-justice issues" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Principals today face new contextual changes with more complex effects on school communities. Student populations have become more diverse, comprising not only local students but also students from migrant families, with different languages, abilities, ethnicities, cultures and religious beliefs (e.g. Devine, 2013; Richardson and Sauers, 2014). New threats to social justice have emerged as a result of this growing diversity, and historical issues of inequality continue to impede student learning, participation and development (Chiu and Walker, 2007). In response to the increasing diversity of the student population, principals in different education settings implement different leadership practices to address social-justice issues. These practices are contextually specific (Hallinger, 2016).\nLeadership for social justice in schools in Chinese society: Education in Hong Kong, as in many other societies, has faced many changes as a result of reforms implemented on a massive scale in the last 15 years (Cheng and Walker, 2008; Fullan, 2009). The education system has been restructured, a new curriculum has been developed and the standardised public examination has been revised. These changes have been addressed in studies of educational leadership and management in the context of Hong Kong's education reforms (Fok, 2004; Yeung, 2012). A systematic review of the studies (Szeto et al., 2015) has been conducted with the findings, which have generally focussed on instructional (e.g. Chan, 2014), transformational (e.g. Yu et al., 2002), strategic (e.g. Pang and Pisapia, 2012), distributed/shared (e.g. Walker and Ko, 2011), curriculum-based (e.g. Law et al., 2010) and authentic (e.g. Begley and Wong, 2001) leadership. Principals' leadership for social justice has received far less research attention than that reported in studies conducted in other societies (e.g. Berkovich, 2014; Gross, 2008; Lugg and Shoho, 2006; Shields, 2010). Yet in times of change, principals seek to implement leadership practices that respond effectively to pragmatic issues such as threats to social justice. Despite the emergence of new threats to social justice as students' backgrounds and educational needs become more diverse, we still know little about the leadership for social justice enacted by principals in individual education settings. Taking Hong Kong's education system as a case study, with paid attention to contextual changes at multiple levels, the following two questions are asked:\nLiterature review: The concept of leadership for social justice in schools has received attention from scholars worldwide (e.g. Barnett and Stevenson, 2014; Capper et al., 2006). However, the findings of these studies are increasingly subject to debate as schools become more and more diverse (Bates, 2006; Riehl, 2000). Some studies have explored leaders' preparation for enacting social justice for equitable change to produce a new social order in schools and in broader societal contexts (e.g. Berkovich, 2014; Jean-Marie et al., 2009; Lugg and Shoho, 2006; McMahon, 2007). Others have conceptualised leadership practices for social justice as directed towards equality and wider participation in various school settings (Capper et al., 2006; Chiu and Walker, 2007; Marshall, 2004; Shields, 2010). However, principals may interpret and enact leadership for social justice differently in different education settings.\nMethod: We adopted a qualitative approach (Denzin and Lincoln, 2003), conducting a cross-case study of two principals' school leadership practices. This research design enabled us to gain detailed insights into critical events, the challenges facing the participants and the actions taken to address threats in context (Yin, 2014). The qualitative inquiry was implemented in the primary schools the participating principals led and managed (Creswell, 2012). The principals' efforts to turn their schools around were compared using the key themes of leadership for social justice in schools proposed in the literature review. Next, we comparatively analysed the effects of contextual changes on the traditional hierarchy of organisation and instruction in the two schools, with particular attention paid to how the two principals addressed threats to equality and equity arising from the diversity of the student population (Angelle et al., 2015; Devine, 2013).\nFindings: In this section, we report the findings in response to the research questions. First, we provide clear evidence of the effects of contextual changes on schools with highly diverse student populations. We identify the threats to equality and equity emerging from the increasing diversity of students in the school community. This answers the first question. Next, the principals are shown to have different leadership practices to address these social-justice issues. Therefore, insights into the principals' practice of leadership for social justice in schools are presented in answer to the second question.\nDiscussion: This paper aims to contextualise leadership for social justice with reference to two principals' responses to the effects of contextual changes on their schools at stake. First, we adopted the key themes to frame leadership for social justice with reference to principals' values stances on addressing difference and fostering equality and equity in the school community. Second, we show that the principals reoriented their leadership strategies to innovatively address these issues. Third, the principals' actions were reshaped by interactions with different layers of contextual change, leading to school transformation. Next, we discuss research on leadership for social justice in response to specific contextual changes.\nImplications and conclusion: To conclude this paper, we note the implications of this empirical study for further research on leadership for social justice in schools. First, the key themes that frame leadership arise from differences related to the equality and equity of diverse students' participation and learning development. Principals' values stances on social-justice issues and effects of variation in student diversity on leadership are intertwined with those of the traditional school mechanisms and hierarchy of practices as arising from system design and the deep-seated perception of academic success as most accurately measured by standardised tests (e.g. Bates, 2006; Chiu and Walker, 2007; Law et al., 2003). The social-justice issues highlighted in relation to diversity, equality and equity are becoming more complicated over time due to the interplay between contextual changes and deep-seated practices in individual education settings. Further research in this area is needed.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Empirical research on leadership for social justice is in progress in many parts of the world. The purpose of this paper is to explore principals' school-leadership journeys in response to social-justice issues caused by specific contextual changes at times of uncertainty. It seeks to answer the following key questions: What social-justice issues do principals identify as arising from their schools' transformation due to contextual changes? How do principals practise leadership for social justice in response to these contextual changes at different levels?\nDesign/methodology/approach: This paper is based on qualitative data from a cross-case study of two principals' school-leadership journeys. The authors pay particular attention to the understanding of leadership for social justice grounded in principals' efforts to foster equality in learning development for a diverse student population.\nFindings: Timely adverse conditions may be required to foster leadership for social justice in schools. The principals reacted to contextual changes at several levels, planning and implementing innovative and flexible interventions to ensure equality in students' learning development. These findings contribute to international accounts of educational leadership.\nResearch limitations/implications: This study of leadership for social justice in schools is contextually specific. Therefore, more empirical comparisons of school leadership are required in future studies, as principals' practices vary between education settings.\nOriginality/value: This paper offers insights into the evolution of leadership for social justice in schools in response to contextual changes. Principals' leadership strategies can be reoriented and their actions reshaped to overcome threats to social justice in schools. Accordingly, although leadership for social justice in school communities is culturally and pedagogically inclusive, it is also socially distinctive.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Virtual team working: making it happen	[ "Virtual work", "Team working", "Team management", "Conferencing" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nOverview: One of the toughest leadership challenges is how to convert a collection of individuals into a team that is both capable and committed to achieving their goals.Now let's augment the challenge. Let's have this collection of individuals scattered across locations, countries, even continents, and still expect them to collaborate, work effectively towards a common purpose and deliver to tight deadlines.This article explores the assumptions made about technology and the people-impact of virtual working, with some tips on how to get to grips with the special challenges and opportunities afforded and the implications for training and development.\nOur virtual world: On the surface, technology has provided the business world with a panacea. It counts for us, calculates for us, carries our image across space and time, creates presentations, carries out analyses and provides countless other support activities that have helped push the boundaries of human capability faster in the last 100 years than at any other time in the history of mankind. We have gone from tribe member to technologist in the evolutionary blink of an eye. No problem here then, all the news is good.Wrong. Whilst there is nothing wrong with technology per se, what we are seeing is quite literally the human imagination running wild. From the moment Benjamin Franklin flew his kite to \"download\" electricity from a storm over Philadelphia, mankind it seems was destined to become first obsessed and then heavily reliant on one form of technology or another. Now there's a thing - we used to be heavily reliant on each other. We worked together, lived together and socialised together. Now we work across different offices, floors, buildings, businesses and even continents. The big question today is not \"Am I in a virtual team?\" so much as \"How virtual am I?\".So the virtual team crept up on businesses almost unnoticed, lost amid the plethora of electronic documentation that flies from desk to desk, room to room, region to region and nation to nation. And the reality of the workplace has been replaced with the virtual workspace; the concept of work share, replaced by the concept of mind share.\nVirtual reality: Virtual team members soon discovered that working to co-located team principles did not work. However advanced the technological tools provided, effective team working was hard to accomplish. Common assumptions regarding an institutionalised workplace no longer held true; first thing in the morning could mean anything; unknown \"foreign\" public holidays lay in wait to hijack conference calls and cross-cultural misunderstanding lurked in hidden corners waiting to pounce. Who and how to trust also became an issue, compounded by the unease felt by teams who don't know each other at all. Complete teams rarely got together; instead, elite sub-groups met in capitals around the world orchestrated by the virtual team leader who, by nature of this process, often alienated the rest of the team.\nWhy bother?: With the appropriate insight, skills and support there is no reason why a virtual team cannot work just as effectively as a co-located team. But why bother?Global knowledge\nThe right development: So what do virtual leaders and teams need to help them fulfil their virtual role? Although not exhaustive, this checklist of basic abilities and insights is a good place to start. Remember as the relationships are mainly taking place through technology channels the person's ability to use these channels effectively comes under closer scrutiny than if the person had face-to-face opportunities as well:basic ability and comfort with the technology provided;ability to effectively contribute to audio conferences and video conferences;ability to influence from a distance;ability to start up and maintain virtual relationships;ability to work independently;the self-awareness to understand their impact on others, not just know their intent;ability to prepare for and manage effective meetings by phone;ability to manage core processes virtually - issues management, problem solving, decision-making;ability to be experienced as human from a distance; andinsights and ability to work across cultures.\nSome tips to offer your virtual leaders and teams: The right people\nTo close: It can be seen then that whilst technology may not be the panacea thought by some, it is not the demon seen by others - it simply is. It is the human element that brings it to life and defines its use and its impact on the world. With a little care it can be turned into the most amazing enabler for co creation and collaboration. With a very little carelessness, it can create total disconnect.Lindsay McKenna Limited is an International Business with a clear focus: putting the people, passion and pragmatism back into change management and high performing teamwork. Lindsay McKenna has published books on change and teamwork and in less than a decade her business has gone truly global. Lindsay McKenna also funds and is a director of a South African not-for-profit conservation company, providing her business with invaluable \"lessons from the wild\" with commercial profits keeping those teachers in the wild.Lindsay McKenna provide specialist virtual skills development for complete virtual teams, virtual team members and leaders as well as providing facilitated support as part of audio and video conference calls.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The paper seeks to discuss virtual working, technology utilisation and how technology can be used to enhance human interaction rather than replace it. It is often the fabric of virtual human relationships that remains sadly neglected. This viewpoint paper aims to stimulate a more comprehensive debate about how to work effectively with and through others in our virtual world.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Working closely with global corporations, the author studied both permanent and project-based virtual teams. Through observation and diagnostics, a comparison of the effectiveness of these teams was made against that of traditional co-located teams.\nFindings: - Many businesses attempt to treat virtual working in the same way as co-located working. The human impact and implications of virtual working are not fully understood or dealt with. The cultural retention of practices and policies that are relevant to co-located traditional work but often counter-productive for virtual working can result in tensions, conflicts and the ultimate disengagement of the workforce.\nPractical implications: - This paper offers a sample of the pragmatic tips and approaches the author's organizations brings to its clients. The most practical outcome of reading this paper is the recognition that virtual working has some subtle and key differences that need to be understood and managed by all those involved.\nOriginality/value: - This paper is intended to be thought-provoking for executive leaders, leaders, human resource professionals, change management agents and - most importantly - members of virtual teams.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Perceptions of leader transformational ability: The role of leader speech and follower self-esteem	[ "Transformational leadership", "Charisma", "Personality", "Leaders", "Language", "Self esteem" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nTheoretical foundations: Charismatic and transformational leadership\nHypotheses: Based on the above review, some research hypotheses are presented, along with the rationale relating to them.Self-esteem\nMethods: Participants and research design\nResults: A Multivariate Analysis of Covariance (MANCOVA) procedure was conducted with speech content and leadership style serving as factors and the sub-scales of the MLQ (Attributed charisma, idealized influence, inspiration, intellectual stimulation, individualized consideration, contingent reward, management by exception - active, management by exception - passive, laissez faire) acting as dependent variables and self-esteem as a covariate. Reliability measures were calculated for all the sub-scales used in this study and the results were acceptable (Table I).The multivariate tests summarized in Table II indicate that there is a significant relationship (p<0.001) between the covariate self-esteem and the combined dependent variables. Univariate analysis indicates significant relationships between all of the dependent variables (except intellectual stimulation and management by exception-active) and the covariate self-esteem. Correlations between self-esteem and the different measures (Table III) indicate positive relationships between self-esteem and transformational leadership measures thus leading to the rejection of H1. A relationship was indeed established but, contrary to expectations, high - as opposed to low - self-esteem individuals assigned higher transformational qualities to leaders.Multivariate analysis also indicates that there is a significant main effect for speech content (p<0.001) on the combined dependent variables (Table IV). The univariate analysis indicates that contributions to this effect were made by attributed charisma, inspiration, intellectual stimulation, contingent reward, management by exception - active, and management by exception - passive. No significant contributions were found for the idealized influence, individualized consideration, and laissez-faire measures. The results of this study provide support for H2 vis-a-vis attributed transformational qualities as the main effect of speech was significant for most measures.The results also indicate that the interaction effect of leader style and leader speech content was significant (p<0.001) - Table V. In addition, there were significant univariate contributions for six of the dependent variables (attributed charisma, idealized influence, inspiration, intellectual stimulation, individualized consideration, contingent reward). There were no significant effects for management by exception - active, management by exception - passive, and laissez-faire measures. The MANCOVA procedure leads to the conclusion that the treatments, controlled for the effect of self-esteem, lead to significantly different attributions of transformational qualities.Post hoc procedures\nDiscussion: It should be added that some may question the issue of using students as surrogates for potential followers in a job environment. While relying on student samples could pose potential weaknesses (Moskowitz, 1971), they have been extensively utilized in prior research. Wyld and Jones (1997) indicate that student demographics seem to overcome earlier objections to their use as they possess similar traits to the population of interest. They contend that students - as a survey group - are increasingly approximating practicing managers. Greenberg (1987, p. 158) argues \"that student and non-student samples may be equally useful sources of information about the processes underlying organizational phenomena\". The student respondents in this study were business students and the scenarios developed were business scenarios that students are commonly expected to experience soon after graduation. Accordingly, the results obtained could suggest as to how typically will business people behave in business situations given their personalities and the context within which they are working.Based on the results of this study, it can be argued that effective speech can help to create an image of trustworthiness and credibility. Respondents who were exposed to an inspirational speech attributed more transformational abilities to the leader. These respondents felt that they were inspired more and that they were intellectually stimulated. When the leader's behavior was described as being non-transformational, the inspirational speech had a sizable impact. Due to the effect of speech, attributions of charisma were still assigned unto the leader whose behavior was not described as being transformational. This indicates that the inspirational message was most effective when the leader was not perceived as exhibiting transformational behaviors in the profile given. What this essentially means is that for leaders who display a lot of heroic behaviors, their speech does not necessarily add significantly to their perceived charisma and other transformational abilities. However, for those who do not display such behavior, the speech does indeed add to their perceived transformational abilities.The role of self-esteem in the charismatic relationship has been discussed primarily in the sociological literature, which analyzed cults and similar groups. The premise has been that such groups usually revolve around a charismatic leader who is able to attract low self-esteem individuals. This assumption is sometimes generalized to all kinds of relationships. It is important to note that there are important differences between various contexts. Based on the results of this study, a distinction could be made between \"social charisma\" and \"business charisma.\" Social charisma is mostly dominant in religious and political arenas. Business charisma is the charisma one finds in business settings. The emergence of the charismatic phenomenon becomes dependent on things that go beyond the traits or behaviors of the leader. This study has shown that what is being said is important; but the context of what is being said becomes - at least - as important.Followers in social contexts include, among others, those low self-esteem individuals who yearn for a leader to direct them into a better world. In some cases, especially in personalized charismatic relationships, low self-esteem individuals may be actively sought and recruited. Many social movements can tolerate, sometimes encourage, the existence of such individuals. The very existence and continuation of the charismatic relationships in such movements may depend on the degree that these followers stay within that movement.In the business arena, however, this is not necessarily true. The business setting cannot normally tolerate such a relationship with low self-esteem followers, since many may be wholly or partially unproductive. Business organizations depend upon effective results, both in the short and the long term. As a consequence, individuals who cannot perform their required tasks are normally forced, one way or another, out of the group. The role of leadership in these situations is to produce momentum, motivation, and enthusiasm for the organization's goals. Thus, it is suggested here that followers of transformational business leaders are much more likely to possess moderate to high levels of self-esteem. Organizational researchers need to be alert to instances where business settings differ from other social settings. That is, followers in business environments do not necessarily hold the same attributes as followers of other social movements. Self-esteem represents one such follower attribute which is likely to differ across various settings. More research is evidently needed to delineate other distinctions between business and social charisma.\nImplications for practice: The last few years have witnessed an increasing awareness of the importance of leadership and the possibilities of teaching it. Delineating the exact process of learning is not an easy task since leadership theorists have been more involved in constructing theories of leadership rather than techniques of leadership (Wright and Taylor, 1985). Conger (1989) describes how skills-training programs may be implemented focusing on building visionary, communication, trust-building, and empowerment skills. Special attention, relevant to this study, could be given to transformational communication skills. This is important as subordinates will respond most favorably to what they perceive to be honest and authentic dialogue that reflects the true feeling of the leader. The secret sometimes in a leadership situation could be related to leader's ability to foster an impression of trustworthiness.This study has been mainly concerned with words and their impact on persuasion. This is a very specific skill, albeit an important one, that could be used very effectively if found in the leader's repertoire. The use of appropriate speech is a very influential asset for the transformational leader. Leaders are continuously faced with opportunities to sell their ideas and their vision to their employees, clientele, and other stakeholders. In some cases, as the results of this study would suggest, leaders with strong inspirational messages are more likely to gain the attention and trust of their listeners. An inspirational message would deliver the leader's message more effectively. This act of trusting and admiring the organizational leader could also lead to trust in, and commitment to, the organization.Effective leadership builds on inspirational messages but does not solely depend on it. It is true that organizations may benefit from inculcating communication training programs into their training agenda for the purpose of elevating their trainees to a higher level of leadership capability. Skills building should, however, be part of a much larger leadership program that not only helps participants to acquire new skills, but teaches trainees new ways of thinking and new ways of approaching problems. Even a perfect program in communication skills will not single-handedly produce influential leaders. A proper choice of words in communicating with others is fundamental, yet it is not sufficient - on its own - in building trust or elevating organizational performance.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to assess the role of speech on transformational leadership attributions and the role of follower self-esteem in fostering the relationship between followers and their leaders.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Survey research was used testing specific relationships. A 2-by-2 experimental design was conducted including treatments of leader speech and attributes with follower self-esteem acting as a covariate.\nFindings: - Significant relationships between most attributions of transformational leadership and follower self-esteem were found. Inspirational leader speeches were found to lead to higher levels of attributed transformational abilities.\nResearch limitations/implications: - It is suggested that there are contextual differences between different types of transformational relationships. Researchers are invited to distinguish between different types of charisma (social charisma vs business charisma).\nPractical implications: - Although the use of appropriate speech is an influential asset for the transformational leader, effective leadership does not solely depend on it. Organizations may benefit from inculcating communication training programs into their training agenda towards elevating their trainees to a higher level of leadership capability.\nOriginality/value: - Leadership research has been heavily dominated by an overriding focus on leader attributes. This study concentrates on a specific leader impression management behavior (speech) and inculcates a follower variable (self-esteem) into the equation towards a better understanding of the leadership phenomenon.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Scholarly communication through institutional repositories: proposing a practical model	[ "Knowledge sharing", "Knowledge management", "Organizations", "Open access", "Scholarly communication", "Organizational repositories" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The main idea of an institutional repository (IR) is to organize the output and digital content as well as educational and archival materials in universities and academic institutions. Institutional repositories are becoming a new method of academic scholarly communication and dissemination, and are considered as an ideal vehicle for making the work of an institution more visible (Kamraninia and Abrizah, 2010). IRs have emerged since 2002 when major research-intensive universities in the USA and the UK launched their own IR systems. An IR is the set of services offered by an organization to manage, disseminate and facilitate access to the electronic documents created by that organization. With the popularization of personal computers, all organizations, including archives, libraries, documentation centers, and also universities began a process of change characterized mainly by the transition from paper to electronic format. The scientific data deluge requires us to think of new science collaborations, multidisciplinary approaches and communication models, as the growth of data has been far beyond the capacity of current preservation models and strategies and will have profound effects on scientific infrastructure (Hey and Trefethen, 2003). Unsurprisingly therefore, the evolution of IRs in recent years has shown a rise in the number and type of digital objects deposited. To identify the intellectual capital and facilitate knowledge sharing and management among the faculty and research staff at institutions, the creation of digital IRs is becoming a necessity. IRs are essential technologies for capturing the structural intellectual capital and knowledge sharing in academic and research institutions, especially in developing countries.\nMethodology: The present paper follows three phases. In the first phase, the authors made an extensive study of published literature on IR and scholarly communication regarding their empirical applications. The search began by reviewing relevant articles from journals, textbooks, government publications, conference papers and research papers to capture comprehensive understanding on IRs, scholarly communication and OA. In the second phase, grounded on the information garnered from the literature review, a conceptual model for scholarly communication through IRs was developed to facilitate knowledge sharing. In the third phase, the proposed model was developed and finalized toward its maturity.\nReview of literature: History of institutional repositories\nScholarly communication and institutional repository: Improvements in computing and network technologies, digital data capture techniques and powerful data mining techniques enable research practices that are highly collaborative, network-based and data-intensive. These dramatic changes in the nature of scholarly research require corresponding fundamental changes in scholarly communication. Scholars deserve an innately digital scholarly communication system that is able to capture the digital scholarly record, make it accessible and preserve it over time (Sompel et al., 2004). It is noteworthy to point out that \"archiving\" is the only function of scholarly communication that, in the paper-based system, is implemented by many parties at the same time. With this exception, the paper-based nature of scholarly communication does not provide either the flexibility for the functions of scholarly communication to be fulfilled by separate parties or for the same function of scholarly communication to be implemented in different ways by different parties for the same unit of communication. The \"institutional repository\" movement is leading to the creation of many new hubs for scholarly content. Universities, libraries, research institutions and scholarly societies are using these systems to register, disseminate and preserve documents, datasets and other media as valuable scholarly assets (Lynch, 2003). As Henry (2003) observed, opportunities abound in the world of twenty-first-century publishing, and the discussion on transforming scholarly communication must move beyond the debate of subscription-based vs OA publication.\nRole of libraries and librarians in institutional repository development: Libraries are uniquely positioned to manage the IR development and sustainability because of their existing information infrastructure and professional expertise (Palmer et al., 2008). A central component to library's new approach is to train their librarians on the features, benefits, mechanics and context of their repository services, so they in turn can leverage their existing relationships with faculty to encourage and facilitate content submission to the repository (Carlson, 2012). The fact that authors submit their works directly to a collection has revolutionized the concept of collection development. However, it presents a new challenge for librarians because acquisition, a key element of the collection management process, is placed in the hands of the university community through the act of self-archiving (Allard et al., 2005). Librarians are great believers in standards, and while building digital repositories, they have dutifully followed the standards for scanning, metadata creation, harvesting and Web services, among others (Arlitsch and O'Brien, 2014). This collaborative collection development simply transforms the responsibilities of the librarian because of the fact that someone must serve as the manager of the collection and someone must deal with the issues of preservation (Allard et al., 2005). So, librarians must be prepared for this new role. Self-archiving refers to the act of populating the IR with content, where the authors deposit their works in the IR and provide metadata to accompany the full-text document. This will assure future access and enhance the chance for preservation. This may imply lack of librarians' active participation in the early stages of IR development. Hence, librarians may need to attempt to bold how their knowledge and skills benefit the IR effort (Allard et al., 2005).\nA practical model for scholarly communication through institutional repositories or open access institutional repositories: The development of different repositories (IRs, organizational repositories or digital ones) has largely taken place at different organizations, but any organization can adapt its content. The IR archives the institutional product so that it is recognized as a showcase to maintain the institution's reputation and prestige. As can be found from the study, the proposed model consists of three main separate layers: one is repositories at the core of model; the second layer is KM and KM systems and libraries; and the librarians and collection managers are located in the outer layer. Different people in various organizations are transmitted around these three layers and this transmission constitutes knowledge sharing and scholarly communication (Figure 2). All people in this process including authors, faculty members, students, researchers and information providers on the one hand play as submitters of information and on the other play as end users and retriever of archived information. And finally, all of these people, technology and process make a practical scholarly community for sharing knowledge inter- or intra-organizations.\nConclusion and recommendation: The digital era has brought about changes to the research needs and expectations, with an increasing array of choices of information resources. We have also seen changes in how scholarly communications are carried out, notably OA and the IR. To identify the intellectual capital and facilitate knowledge sharing and management among the faculty and research staff at institutions, the creation of digital IRs is becoming a necessity. Digital repositories are emerging technologies for knowledge sharing and management in institutions. It is found that the librarians are leading the IR development and implementation, serving on planning and advisory committees, pilot-testing software, recruiting content and identifying early adopters (Rieh et al., 2007). Literatures illustrate that submission of intellectual works by authors depends on the culture of scholarly communication within the institutions or universities. Reference and subject librarians are familiar with different library culture and environments, so they are the best option to encourage authors to submit their work into an IR. As a collaborating enterprise, IRs collect and preserve the intellectual output of a laboratory, department, university or other entity. The incentives and commitments to change the process of scholarly communication are serving as strong motivators. Despite the promising potential for IRs to improve scholarly communication, this mode of knowledge sharing is not yet widespread in the developing countries when compared to the developed countries. The importance of IRs, particularly OAIRs, in the developing world is essential. A majority of developing countries characterized by economies in transition often faced with serious problems of limited access to scholarly works mainly caused by continually rising costs of scientific journal subscription and tight budget of academic libraries. The OA initiative emerges from scholarly communication dilemma in which traditional scholarly communication system has economic barriers to disseminate scholarly outputs. It is expensive and can only be accessed exclusively by people who subscribe through an individual or institutional subscription. By means of OAIR, a new alternative to share scholarly works to a wider audience will be prepared, and the article published in OAIR will have more chance to be seen by many scholars because it will not be limited only to colleagues who have access to journal subscription; it may be cited many more times and therefore, might have a larger impact in the field of scholarship.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Recognizing that the nature of research and scholarly communication is changing rapidly, an institutional repository (IR) is a tool for collecting, storing, accessing and disseminating scholarly communication within and without the institutions. The primary reason for establishing an IR is to increase the visibility of the institution's research output by making it an open access with regard to copyright issues. This paper aims to propose a conceptualmodel for scholarly communication through IRs to provide an opportunity to integrate and facilitate knowledge sharing so as to enrich knowledge content and enhance global access.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This paper proceeds in three phases. In the first phase, the published literature on IRs and scholarly communication has been reviewed critically considering their empirical applications. Next, based on the understanding gained from the previous stage, a conceptual model for scholarly communication through IRs has been proposed. In the third phase, the proposed model has been developed and finalized toward its maturity.\nFindings: Based on the literature, the authors have developed a conceptual model for understanding the factors that characterize not only the design but also the development of IRs practically. An IR appears theoretically sound, but it is a difficult task in practice because of some complexities. This paper attempts to set a theoretical model for IRs as a foundation to address the gap in the current literature for researchers, experts and librarians who create, maintain and use IRs, though it does not claim to be comprehensive.\nOriginality/value: A few attempts have been made to investigate scholarly communication through IRs, but this is the one of its first kind that provides a theoretical model for it. It serves as a useful starting point for those interested in knowledge management and IRs.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Diverse perspectives on inclusion: Exploring the experiences of individuals in heterogeneous groups	[ "Diversification", "Ethnic minorities", "Social groups" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: \"Work unit diversity is one of the fundamental challenges facing modern organizations\" (Klein and Harrison, 2007, p. 26). The western workplace is becoming more diverse, and social psychologists have a growing interest in understanding how this change influences team-based work within the organization (Christian et al., 2006; Van Veelen et al., 2013). Much of the diversity research is focused on the outcomes of work group (or team) diversity, which often offers mixed results, with some research revealing positive effects and others indicating negative or null effects of diversity (Bell et al., 2011; Cox et al., 1991; DeGrassi et al., 2012; McLeod et al., 1996; Oliveira and Scherbaum, 2015; Ruiz-Jimenez and del Mar Fuentes-Fuentes, 2016; Van Oudenhoven-van der Zee et al., 2009; Vos and van der Zee, 2011; Watson et al., 1993; Webber and Donahue, 2001). Furthermore, the focus of diversity research is largely on the outcomes of unit-level diversity, and there is relatively little research that seeks to understand the individual-level outcomes for persons working in diverse groups. Recent research suggests that an unbalanced attention of research on unit-level performance, as opposed to social processes that occur in diverse groups, may contribute to the equivocal findings surrounding the effectiveness of diversity in work groups (King et al., 2009). Thus, the focus of the current research is to better understand the experiences of individuals, specifically, racial and ethnic minorities, working in heterogeneous (i.e. diverse) groups.\nTheoretical rationale: There are many benefits to working in diverse groups when there is interdependence and inclusion among group members (Aronson, 1978; Novak et al., 2011; Sherif, 1954). However, inclusion is not automatic, and there may be tension that arises when diverse groups are first formed and members have little information about other members. In such cases, people tend to use stereotypes to help determine how to behave and interact with others (Fiske and Neuberg, 1990). The stereotypes used are often based on visible surface-level characteristics such as race or gender (Harrison et al., 1998). When working with racially diverse groups, relational demography theory (Tsui et al., 1992) proposes that perceived demographic similarity results in positive relationships whereas dissimilarity results in friction. Diversity perceptions within a group can negatively affect subgroup relations (Dieckmann et al., 2016). Research reveals support for rational demography theory. Phillips et al. (2006) found surface-level homogenous groups felt more similar to each other than diverse groups, even after learning about deep-level similarities prior to a task. In addition, an examination of a manufacturing organization found that racial dissimilarity was related to lower perceptions of inclusion (Pelled, Ledford and Albers Mohrman, 1999). Specifically, individuals reported less decision making influence, less access to sensitive information and less job security when working in racially diverse groups. Previous research also reveals that individuals who work in demographically diverse (e.g. age, gender, race) groups report decreased optimism about career advancement and less likelihood of engaging in organizational citizenship behavior (Chattopadhyay, 1999; Elfenbein and O'Reilly, 2007). Given previous research suggesting that individuals are likely to have less positive experiences when working in heterogeneous than homogeneous groups, it is important that research explores the key factors that influence such experiences and examines whether certain racioethnic groups are particularly at risk. Much of the previous research identifies why inequality exists, but not potential solutions to the problem (Motel, 2016). The current research seeks to understand why, how, and which racioethnic groups experience working in diverse groups in order to further understanding of building inclusion.\nMethod: Participants\nResults: In each of the following analyses, we used the attitudes toward diversity scale as a covariate because it was significantly correlated with the outcomes of interest (see Becker, 2005). We conducted a series of repeated measures analysis of variance for each of the dependent variables to examine our hypotheses. For all analyses, time served as a within-subjects variable and racioethnicity served as a between-subjects variable. For H1-H4 we examined the main effects of racioethnicity at Time 1 and for H5 we examined the interaction of time with racioethnicity.\nDiscussion: The current study addresses a limitation of previous research by examining the experiences of racioethnic minorities working in racially heterogeneous groups. Specifically, this study advances our understanding of social psychology by examining the extent to which there are differences in perceptions of inclusion that vary as a function of one's racioethnic background. Results revealed both racioethnic similarities and differences in the experiences of inclusion. In sum, our findings suggest that racioethnicity may have an impact on the extent to which individuals feel included by and participate in organizations.\nLimitations and future research: As with all research, the current study is not without limitations. Our conceptualization of racioethnicity is one potential limitation of the current study. The current research does not take into account the complexity of race and ethnicity or examine whether or not individuals belong to multiple racioethnicities (Jenkins, 1994). Another potential limitation is our focus on racioethnicity without considering other types of demographic diversity. Recent research examines demographic faultlines to better understand the cumulative impacts of various forms of diversity on individual and group level experiences (Thatcher et al., 2003). However, for practical purposes, the current research focused exclusively on racioethnicity as a first step to examining broader differences. The way in which we manipulated and defined group heterogeneity is a potential limitation as groups were constructed such that there was no racioethnic majority. However, in reality, individuals are likely to work in an organization in which there is a clear racioethnic majority group. Moreover, it is possible that such numerical majorities may differ within an organization. For instance, an individual may experience higher levels of demographic diversity that consists of a racioethnic minority group when in entry and/or lower levels within an organization (Maume, 1999). However, a different racioethnic group majority may emerge at middle and higher levels in the organization. These differences likely have implications for employees as they navigate various levels within an organization, particularly for those from traditionally marginalized racioethnic groups, which are less likely to be represented at higher levels in many corporate organizations in the USA (Jones, 2017). Thus, future research is needed to examine the generalizability of our results for situations where racioethnic majorities exist. In addition, future research might examine the extent to which the differences just discussed have an influence on experiences within an organization. Specifically, are there differences in the experiences of individuals in groups that are homogenous (e.g. all the same race) compared to heterogeneous (i.e. no clear racioethnic majority) groups? What is the role of factors such as group size, leader race-ethnicity, leadership style, tenure/level in organization, hetereogeneity of group, or industry on group effectiveness and performance? Future studies might consider the effects of both individual and group level differences that might emerge.\nConclusion: This study contributes to the literature by examining the experience of inclusion as a function of one's racioethnicity. Findings suggest that there are no racioethnic differences in satisfaction, which is encouraging for organizations, as the workforce is becoming increasingly diverse. However, and interestingly, there are racioethnic differences in information sharing and conflict both of which may have important implications for how groups are formed and develop over time. In sum, results reveal that diverse individuals share similarities while simultaneously experiencing differences in heterogonous groups, suggesting that minority groups may differentially experience inclusion.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the extent to which racioethnicity influences perceptions of inclusion (i.e. information sharing, collective efficacy, satisfaction and relationship conflict) when working in racially heterogeneous groups.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Individuals were placed in groups in order to participate in ethical-decision making tasks.\nFindings: Results reveal that individuals representing varied racioethnic groups are in general satisfied working in racially heterogeneous groups. However, reports of relationship conflict and information sharing varied as a function of racioethnicity.\nOriginality/value: The authors discuss possible rationales for differences in how racioethnic groups perceive and experience group processes over time as well as practical implications for social psychology and diversity in teams.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Communities of practice, knowledge acquisition and innovation: a case study of science-based SMEs	[ "Communities of practice", "Innovation", "Knowledge acquisition", "Thematic template analysis" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The research project upon which this paper is based is concerned to understand whether, and if so, how, science-based SMEs engage with CoPs in order to acquire new knowledge and whether any innovations are generated through such engagement. The project addresses a number of specific questions relating to CoPs in science-based SMEs:\n2. Communities of practice: In knowledge management (KM) terms, a community of practice is a group of people informally bound together by shared expertise and a passion for a joint enterprise (Wenger and Snyder, 2000). The initial theoretical formulation of CoPs (Lave and Wenger, 1991) focused on the way in which individuals learn, and argued that learning is socially situated, that is, it arises from and within the context, activity, and culture in which it is developed and used. CoP theory has been adapted by knowledge management theorists and used to highlight its value in relation to increasing firms' absorptive capacity, i.e. the ability to recognize the value of new, external information, assimilate it, and apply it to commercial advantage (Cohen and Levinthal, 1990), improve learning (Autio et al., 2008) and innovation (Assmakopoulos, 2007; Scarbrough et al., 2004).\n3. Methodology: The research project used the critical case sampling technique to identify and select cases relevant to the research questions (Patton, 2002). This helped to generate the four science-based SMEs, access to which was negotiated and agreed between key gatekeepers in these organizations and one of the authors. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 21 individuals employed in technical (i.e. scientists and engineers) and commercial roles (i.e. operations, finance and purchasing). The interviews lasted for between 40 and 80 minutes and were audio-recorded with the permission of the interviewee, and subsequently transcribed verbatim. The names of the organizations and interviewees have been anonymized for confidentiality reasons. Template analysis (see Crabtree and Miller, 1999; King, 2004) was used to thematically analyze the resultant data. This deploys hierarchical coding, beginning with broad a priori themes, moving to sequentially narrower, more defined themes as the analysis progresses. This method was chosen because it is in sympathy with the adopted social constructionist epistemology, and was used, inter alia, to explore relationships, the meanings attributed to actions, and the various perspectives and orientations of the interviewees.\n4. Findings and discussion: The findings are presented and discussed below in relation to the four research questions.\n5. Conclusions: 5.1 Findings\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Recent research into communities of practice (CoPs) has focused on large organizations, suggesting they can be constructed for the purposes of knowledge acquisition and innovation. The present study found that, for science-based SMEs, CoPs are more likely to emerge unplanned to support incremental innovation in the form of problem-solving activities. This paper aims to discuss these points.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Deploying a social constructionist research methodology, thematic template analysis was used to analyze 25 in-depth interviews conducted with a range of employees in six science-based SMEs.\nFindings: Both intra and inter-organizational CoPs were leveraged for a variety of purposes, including knowledge acquisition and the enhancement of the organizations' ability to generate innovative solutions.\nResearch limitations/implications: Whilst there is no claim for the representativeness of the sample in relation to the wider population of science-based firms, the paper offers new material and theorizing in a domain which has been dominated to date by a focus upon large organizations and a managerialist orientation.\nPractical implications: A contextualized framework for the construction of CoPs in science-based SMEs has been developed from the findings of this study.\nOriginality/value: The role of CoPs in science-based SMEs and the factors that influence their success or failure have been neglected to date, and thus have received little attention in the literature. Yet CoPs, as we found, can contribute to knowledge acquisition and innovation.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Emotional reframing as a mediator of the relationships between transformational school leadership and teachers' motivation and commitment	[ "Affective organizational commitment", "Transformational leadership", "Autonomous motivation", "Emotional reframing" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Post-bureaucratic governance in modern education systems, particularly in western countries, challenges school leaders in their attempts to promote schooling, and drives them to embrace socio-emotional leadership behaviors with the aim of promoting organizational success (Bush, 2014). One of the most noted leadership models that combines task and social-emotional-oriented behaviors is transformational leadership (Yukl, 1999). Transformational leadership has been identified as a highly effective coping strategy of principals in the current policy environment of schooling that pushes for school change (Hallinger, 2003). Transformational leadership is said to be specifically designed to create and facilitate organizational change (Derue et al., 2011, p. 16).\nTheoretical framework and hypotheses: Transformational leadership and followers' emotional reframing by a leader\nMethod: Participants and procedure\nResults: Means, standard deviations, and bivariate correlations are shown in Table II. At the individual level, teachers' emotional reframing was positively correlated with their autonomous motivation (r=0.18, p<0.01) and with affective organizational commitment (r=0.39, p<0.01). The correlations found provided some preliminary support for the hypothesized relations.\nDiscussion: The present study examined the role of emotional reframing as a mediator of the effect of transformational school leadership behaviors on teachers' work-related outcomes: autonomous motivation and affective organizational commitment. The findings support the hypothesized model. First, we found that teachers' emotional reframing fully mediated the cross-level effect of transformational school leadership on teachers' autonomous motivation. Second, we found that emotional reframing partially mediated the relationship between transformational school leadership and teachers' affective organizational commitment. Third, we found that teachers' emotional reframing and autonomous motivation partially mediated the relationship between transformational school leadership and teachers' affective organizational commitment.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Empirical evidence links transformational school leadership to teachers' autonomous motivation and affective organizational commitment. Little empirical research, however, has focused on the emotional mechanisms behind these relations. Following the argument in the literature that transformational leadership can transform followers' emotions, the purpose of this paper is to examine whether teacher's experience of emotional reframing by principal mediates the relationships between transformational school leadership and these work-related outcomes (i.e. teachers' motivation and commitment).\nDesign/methodology/approach: Questionnaires were used to collect information from 639 primary school teachers nested in 69 randomly sampled schools. The data were analyzed using multilevel path analysis software.\nFindings: The results indicated that the effect of transformational school leadership behaviors on teachers' autonomous motivation was fully mediated by emotional reframing, and that the effect of transformational school leadership on affective organizational commitment was partially mediated by it. The authors further found an indirect relationship of transformational school leadership with affective organizational commitment through emotional reframing and autonomous motivation.\nOriginality/value: The present study makes a unique contribution to the literature by confirming that teachers' sense of emotional reframing is a key affective mechanism by which school leaders influence teachers' motivation and commitment.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Student perceptions of the benefits of drama projects in university EFL: Three case studies in Korea	[ "English teaching", "Attitude change", "Drama projects", "Holistic learning", "Process drama", "University EFL" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Advocates for the use of literature as learning content in the English Language Teaching (ELT) classroom (Hismanoglu, 2005; Lazar, 1993; Rai, 2012) cite the benefits of authenticity, cultural enrichment, language enrichment, personal involvement (Collie and Slater, 1987, pp. 3-5) and increased motivation (Duff and Maley, 2007; Mitsingas, 2015). Drama possesses an additional feature (performance) of particular relevance in the English as a Foreign Language (EFL) context, as it promotes spoken and written skills and facilitates aural, visual, experiential and tactile learning styles (Kao and O'Neill, 1998). Other benefits include cognitive, affective, social and linguistic learning (Maley and Duff, 2005; Phillips, 2003, Winston, 2011), as well as \"the core concept of drama in education - making personal meaning and sense of universal, abstract, social, moral, and ethical concepts through the concrete experience of the drama\" (Norman, 1981, p. 50). Belliveau and Kim (2013, p. 6) consider drama in the language classroom to be \"ultimately indispensable\", because it \"encourages adaptability, fluency and communicative competence\", while Dervishaj (2009) cites Hoetker's (1969, p. 54) findings that:\n2. Literature review: Following the drama-based teacher resources of Maley and Duff (1982), Di Pietro (1987) and Wessels (1987), Kao and O'Neill (1998) brought a rigorous perspective to the use of EFL drama through their detailed analysis of process dramas in the university setting in Taiwan. Their study offered \"a deeper understanding of how and why drama works to enhance second language learning as well as acknowledging the constraints that operated in this particular social and cultural context\" (Stinson and Winston, 2011, p. 481). This seminal work paved the way for a number of studies (Podlozny, 2000; Phillips, 2003; Maley and Duff, 2005; Fleming, 2006; Tschurtschenthale, 2013), supporting the use of drama as an effective language-learning tool. Gill (2013, p. 30) described the development of vocabulary and grammar \"through the enacted situations\", along with the social benefits of \"more animated paralanguage\" (p. 30) and Piazzoli (2011, p. 563) emphasized the importance of \"'the safe space of drama': a safe physical, cognitive and emotional space to express ideas in a foreign language\". Ashton-Hay (2005) claimed that drama engages all learning styles and multiple intelligences:\n3. Methods: The research in the three case studies followed an action research approach, triangulating written and oral student feedback, questionnaires, surveys and interviews to identify positive attitudinal and affective change. Data were collected from pre/post-course questionnaires, semi-structured interviews and students' evaluations. These were then triangulated to identify trends in participant perceptions.\n4. Results: 4.1 Case Study 1\n5. Conclusion: The main goal of this study was to address calls for practical research into drama in the language classroom, such as those made by Liu (2002, p. 70):\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this study is to address the situation that although the theoretical benefits of using drama projects in the Teaching of English as a Foreign Language (TEFL) have been described in a number of studies, researchers have identified a lack of literature on their practical use, particularly in terms of different institutional settings, teaching styles, learning styles and proficiency levels. This paper therefore describes three case studies in universities in Korea, showing that the use of drama projects can be successfully used in different teaching situations and is an effective means of promoting meaningful language learning in students often demotivated by traditional methods and the test-driven classroom.\nDesign/methodology/approach: In these adult-learner EFL settings, a process approach to drama projects aimed to promote meaningful language acquisition and holistic learning in students of different proficiencies and majors. Drama projects were used as: syllabus supplementation by an individual teacher in a Korean-mediated English program (Case Study 1); core content on an English-mediated pre-service teacher training course (Case Study 2); and syllabus content on a Freshman English program taught by 25 native-speaking instructors (Case Study 3). Data were collected from pre/post-course questionnaires, semi-structured interviews and students' evaluations. These were then triangulated to identify trends in participant perceptions.\nFindings: Results indicated positive attitude change and promotion of cognition, positive affect and social skills in all three case studies, confirming earlier research findings and showing that the drama project is a viable and effective educational tool for the foreign language teacher, from individual syllabus supplementation to incorporation into a language program curriculum. Rather than resisting the innovation presented by drama projects, the adult learners involved welcomed the opportunities for creativity, autonomy, group work and performance.\nOriginality/value: The practical confirmation of the theoretical benefits of EFL drama projects across individual and institutional settings indicates the potential value of including them in university language programs and teacher-training EFL curricula, enabling and encouraging language teachers to promote holistic, meaningful language learning.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
A methodology for analyzing shipyard supply chains and supplier selection	[ "Supply chain", "Suppliers", "Best practices", "Shipyard" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Supplier relationships have been extensively studied in the literature focusing on different, problems, approaches, models and applications (Anfindsen et al., 2012; Lockamy, 2011). Application of supply chain management methods and strategies in the modern business world could not leave the shipyard industry indifferent. The high levels of complexity present in the manufacturing and assembly processes require respective levels of synchronization not only between the suppliers and the shipyards but also in the processes that take place within the shipyard itself. Studies have shown that shipyards have begun to realize that their competitiveness is dependent on the improvement of the coordination between shipyards and their suppliers (Fleischer et al., 1999; Chryssolouris et al., 2004) and customers (Celik et al., 2009; Guneri et al., 2009). Characteristic is the case of the American shipyards, which have realized the importance of application of enhanced supply chain management techniques in the improvement of their productivity (US Department of Commerce, 2001) since the early 1990s significant productivity problems had been spotted (Carson and Lamp, 1990).\n2. Understanding and documenting the shipyard supply chain processes: An overview of the main processes that take place in a shipyard supply chain is presented in Figure 1, based on the interviews with the higher management of the two Greek shipyards. As seen, the first step is the preliminary design of the vessel, which takes place upon request by a shipping management company. At this stage the vessel specifications are described and an initial estimate on the construction cost is provided based on at the time available information on steel and other basic material and equipment prices.\n3. Documenting the shipyard supply chain best practices: Many different broad supply chain strategies are available in the supply chain management literature (Naylor et al., 1999; Fisher, 1997). Here a more focused to the supplier selection approach is taken differentiating from the literature. From the discussions with the higher management of the two biggest shipyards in Greece the nine most commonly used practices related to supplier selection and cooperation are presented here (see also Table I). These are:\n4. Supplier selection and associated risk analysis: Moving forward from the documentation of the business processes and the best practices used in the shipyard industry, the next step is the examination of the supplier selection processes used and the evaluation of suppliers based on the associated risks. As already mentioned, for the purposes of this paper Kraljic's (1983) matrix is used for this analysis (Table III). Prior to the analysis, a brief presentation of Kraljic's methodology is given.\n5. Conclusions: The shipyard industry is characterized by the complexity of operations and processes that take place, which makes the need for close cooperation, both upstream and downstream the supply chain, imperative in order to meet the needs of different customers. This paper tackles the problem of shipyard supply chain management aiming at the identification of the processes and best practices, which take place at the shipyard industry and are essential for the upstream and downstream coordination of the shipyard supply chain.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to focus on shipyard supply chains in order to identify the processes that take place and evaluate the risks associated with suppliers.\nDesign/methodology/approach: For this analysis two methodologies are applied. The first is the understand, document, simplify, optimize, where the first two steps are used for analysing the processes and the documentation of the best practices, which take place in the daily operations. The second tool is Kraljic's matrix, which is applied for the identification of supplier selection and associated risks.\nFindings: The analysis shows that strategic co-operations between shipyards suppliers are essential for improved supply chain performance since supplier improvement in terms of lead times and product quality are achieved. It is also seen that the shipyard supply chain performance can be improved by adjusting the best practices to the needs dictated each time by the project's specifications.\nPractical implications: The findings provide valuable insights for practitioners, as well as academicians, policy makers and also integrate supplier selection under the supply chain. Managers can acquire reliable information about those suppliers who exhibit best practice.\nOriginality/value: A number of key processes and best practices have been identified, which are essential for the upstream and downstream coordination of the shipyard supply chain. The present work is an approach to evaluating the risks associated with the shipyard's suppliers and assists in benchmarking their risk profile.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Leadership style and workplace hostility: Do passive leaders foster increased hostility and sexual harassment?	[ "Gender", "Sexual harassment", "Passive leadership", "Workplace aggression", "Hostility" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Complaints about sexual harassment in workplace have declined in recent years but are still prevalent, with over 50 per cent of women and 30 per cent of males experiencing some form of sexual harassment. Sexual harassment not only affects the victim but can also impact the company in terms of morale, absenteeism, and staff turnover.\nInvestigating leadership, hostility, and sexual harassment: Lee (2018) investigated hostility and sexual harassment in the workplace, focusing on passive leadership. Five hypotheses were investigated:\nResults: Passive leadership and observed hostility were positively related.\nPreventing workplace hostility and sexual harassment: While some leaders may be good in some areas, organizations should monitor them if they are weak in other areas (passive with regards to employee behaviors). Training programs should be encouraged to teach leaders to encourage civility and respect among employees and to be vigilant and proactive against hostility and bullying. Human resource departments should clarify acceptable company behaviors during the recruitment procedure and also put in place a zero-tolerance policy against sexual harassment. Appropriate rewards (for reporting) and procedures (for punishing unacceptable behavior) should also be put in place, so that employees' perception of the company is one that does not allow for hostility or sexual harassment to take place. Maintaining a balanced gender composition would also be advantageous for reducing sexual harassment.\nComment: The review is based on \"Passive leadership and sexual harassment: roles of observed hostility and workplace gender ratio\" by Lee, J. published in Personnel Review.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: This paper aims to review the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoint practical implications from cutting-edge research and case studies.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This briefing is prepared by an independent writer who adds their own impartial comments and places the articles in context.\nFindings: Sexual harassment is a sub-type of workplace aggression and is more frequent in organizations which tolerate hostility and incivility. It is also found that a passive leadership style is more permissive of hostile behaviors, which in turn means more tolerant of sexual harassment. Both men and women are more likely to experience sexual harassment under a passive leader; however, this is stronger for women working in a male-dominated workplace. Companies wishing to reduce hostility and sexual harassment should look to foster proactive leaders and encourage civil behaviors, as well as a zero-tolerance policy.\nPractical implications: The paper provides strategic insights and practical thinking that have influenced some of the world's leading organizations.\nOriginality/value: The briefing saves busy executives and researchers hours of reading time by selecting only the very best, most pertinent information and presenting it in a condensed and easy-to-digest format.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Stakeholder pressure in sustainable supply chain management: A systematic review	[ "Literature review", "Triple bottom line", "Supply management", "Sustainability", "Social responsibility", "Green purchasing", "Green logistics", "Stakeholder pressure" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Sustainability has emerged as an important issue affecting firms and society. Globalization and the rapid development of third world economies are putting significantly increased pressure on the earth's natural resources. Increased transparency and the free flow of information have enabled faster awareness of what is happening around the globe with businesses and their suppliers and customers. Business and societal stakeholders (e.g. governments, consumers, activists, environmentalists, employees, etc.) are demanding that businesses uphold a higher standard. These demands create pressures on companies to provide not only economic benefits but to also address environmental and social concerns, also known as triple bottom line (TBL) or corporate social responsibility (CSR).\nMethodology: This investigation follows a systematic review approach, as prescribed in Denyer and Tranfield (2009) and Rousseau et al. (2008). In this type of review, the investigator \"locates existing studies, selects and evaluates contributions, analyses and synthesizes data, and reports the evidence in such a way that allows reasonably clear conclusions to be reached about what is and is not known,\" (Denyer and Tranfield, 2009, p. 671). This type of review is transparent in the processes employed, inclusive but quality conscious in article selection, explanatory in the synthesis of the descriptive data, and heuristic in that a good but not perfect understanding of the literature results. Importantly, a systematic review is positioned relative to a clearly articulated research question that serves as an aid in establishing the focus. This section describes the use of these methodological principles here, and specifically addresses article selection, coding, and the resulting quantitative and qualitative analyses.\nResults of analysis: In this section, we report on the quantitative findings pertaining to the key concepts in the review: Stakeholders, sustainability focus, supply chain decision, and theory. A descriptive analysis of the data for these categories is reported in Table II and described in this section.\nA model of stakeholder pressure and SSCM: This systematic literature review clearly shows that the influence of stakeholders on firms and their supply chains is complex. Table II lists the wide variety of primary and secondary stakeholders that create pressure on firms for sustainability in the supply chain, and the literature identifies numerous mechanisms for doing so. These mechanisms include: regulatory pressure from the government, customer requirements, consumer pressure (Carter and Dresner, 2001; Bjorklund, 2011), successful competitors (Sarkis et al., 2010), investor pressure, employee commitment, owner/manager values (Walker et al., 2008), supplier collaboration initiatives, and attention from NGOs (Hall and Matos, 2010).\nConclusions and future research: In this systematic review of the stakeholder-focussed SSCM literature, we concentrated on the pressure and influence of stakeholders in SSCM. We used three primary dimensions for framing this literature: stakeholders, sustainability focus, and supply chain decision context, and used it to gain insight into how stakeholders influence sustainability in the supply chain. To date, the empirical evidence provided by the literature provides an incomplete picture. Stakeholders certainly can and do pressure firms in SSCM, sometimes with the effect of encouraging, and other times discouraging, sustainability practices. Whether or not the firm makes changes as a result of pressure presents a rich framework for future research. Furthermore, a set of pointed research questions results from a gap analysis of the descriptive data reported in this study. This section summarizes the findings of this systematic literature review, and identifies future research opportunities in this promising area.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to summarize and analyze what is known regarding the ways in which stakeholder pressure may influence supply chain sustainability. The authors extend this understanding to develop a number of research questions and propositions for future investigation on this topic.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The authors used a systematic review process to study the empirical evidence pertaining to how a stakeholder perspective helps to understand sustainability in the supply chain management domain.\nFindings: The review has three main findings: stakeholder pressure on sustainability in supply chain management may result in sustainability awareness, adoption of sustainability goals, and/or implementation of sustainability practices; different types of stakeholders have dissimilar influence in the sustainable supply chain decision areas; different stakeholders appears to be more or less influential depending on whether the sustainability issue is environmental or social.\nOriginality/value: This synthesis contributes to the literature by developing insight into the processes by which stakeholder pressure influences SSCM decisions.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Sensory optimization of nutritionally enriched strawberry yogurt	[ "Flaxseed", "Eggplant", "Green banana", "Nutritional enrichment", "Oatmeal" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: In the last few decades, consumer perceptions have changed. Consumers are increasingly more concerned about a healthy life style, and because of this, they are more worried about the nutritional quality of food (Siro et al., 2008; Rajasekaran and Kalaivani, 2013). Nowadays, foods are not intended to only satisfy hunger and pleasure, but to provide several nutrients and to prevent nutrition-related diseases, improving consumer well-being (Siro et al., 2008; Rajasekaran and Kalaivani, 2013). In this context, the intensifying interest in healthy food is orienting the food markets toward a new category of products: functional and enriched foods (Perina et al., 2015). They are defined as food, or food ingredients, that promote health benefits beyond just nourishment (Dwyer, 2007). Because of this, food industries are focusing on the preferences and needs of the population, developing and/or optimizing products and services that meet the consumer's expectations.\nMaterial e-methods: Samples\nResults and discussion: Ideal content of different flours in strawberry yogurt\nConclusion: The optimal contents of flours to be added to strawberry yogurt are as follows: 1.275 percent golden flaxseed, 1.093 percent green banana, 1.075 percent eggplant, and 3.420 percent oatmeal. Among the flours that can potentially be added in strawberry yogurt, golden flaxseed flour stood out, showing a sensory acceptance and purchase intention similar to that of a traditional product. The use of eggplant flour in strawberry yogurt also proved to be interesting in view of the sensory acceptance achieved. This work will aid future studies, supporting the optimization of functional products and contributing toward product variety in the market.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: People are increasingly concerned about food and health and are seeking enriched products. One way to add nutritional value to yogurt consists of the addition of nutritional flour. However, it is necessary to optimize formulations that meet the consumers' expectations. Thus, the purpose of this paper is to aim at sensory optimization of a strawberry yogurt enriched with different flours.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The optimal concentrations of each flour were defined using the Just-about-right-scale test. Then, an acceptance test was used to assess the samples at optimal concentrations.\nFindings: It was observed that the strawberry yogurt should include 1.275 percent golden flaxseed flour, 1.093 percent green banana flour, 1.075 percent eggplant flour and 3.420 percent oatmeal flour. All formulations had good acceptability and the yogurt added with the addition of golden flax flour and the traditional product received similar sensory acceptance. Thus, it is possible to add nutritional value to strawberry yogurt by maintaining its sensory quality.\nResearch limitations/implications: More detailed studies on the shelf-life of yogurt are necessary to enable the incorporation of flours into yogurt as heat, light and oxygen can reduce the beneficial effects of flours. Therefore, researchers should test the proposed propositions further.\nPractical implications: Optimization of an enriched yogurt is a good alternative to provide a product that meets consumers' expectations, besides adding value to the product. However, there are technological challenges when adding functional components in foods. Thus, this study aimed at sensory optimization of a strawberry yogurt enriched with different flours.\nSocial implications: The authors aimed to provide a healthy product to the market as well as contribute toward product variety in the market.\nOriginality/value: There are few studies in respect to the sensory aspects of enriched yogurts. Therefore, this work will aid future studies, supporting the optimization of functional products and contributing toward product variety in the market.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Do financial crises erode potential output? A cross-country analysis of industrial and emerging economies	[ "Financial crises", "Inflation", "Hyperinflation", "Phillips curve", "Potential output", "E3", "E30", "E31" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Financial crises lead to relevant changes in credit volume and asset prices, severe disruptions in financial intermediation, balance sheet problems of firms and households, and the need for large-scale government intervention. The macroeconomic implications of crises are typically harsh, with large output losses and other macroeconomic variables typically experimenting significant declines[1],[2].\n2. Data: Our data are quarterly and the sample periods differ depending on the country. We select 26 countries: 16 industrial and 10 emerging. Our data source is the International Financial Statistics of the International Monetary Fund. Our measure of inflation is headline CPI inflation. We also use as exogenous the following variables: growth of real seasonally adjusted GDP and GDP gap, which is the difference between seasonally adjusted real GDP and potential GDP, obtained through Hodrick-Prescott filtering and growth of a commodity index, oil or CRB[7].\n3. Empirical analysis: Empirical studies have documented the various phases of financial crises, from initial, small-scale financial disruptions to large-scale global crises. They have described how asset prices and credit growth can remain depressed for a long time and how crises can have long-lasting consequences for the real economy.\n4. Conclusion: This paper sheds light on the widely debated issue of whether financial crises constitute adverse supply shocks that lead to impairment in an economy's productive potential. We investigate whether inflationary pressures tend to be stronger in the aftermath of financial crises compared to non-crisis economic downturns.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to analyze empirically if financial crises have decreased potential output for a selected group of economies.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The authors estimate different country-specific stylized Phillips curves to verify if inflationary pressures were stronger on the recovery periods after financial crises, relative to the recovery periods after recessions.\nFindings: The results, in general, do not show any clear empirical evidence that financial crises erode potential output. Moreover, there are no apparent differences in terms of the effects of financial crises over potential output between emerging and industrial economies.\nResearch limitations/implications: This paper sheds light on the widely debated issue of whether financial crises constitute adverse supply shocks that lead to impairment in an economy's productive potential. In interpreting the results, the authors must first recognize that all of them are based on the reduced-form relationships. Thus, they are about correlations and not necessarily about true structural relationships.\nPractical implications: The study is very important for policy makers and specially Central Banks worldwide.\nSocial implications: The loss of potential output is a very serious economic and social phenomenon. This paper sheds light on the debate if financial crisis lead to losses of potential output.\nOriginality/value: The paper is original in using more Phillips curves and because it studies also the behavior of emerging economies.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Capturing, structuring and maintaining knowledge: a social software approach	[ "Knowledge management", "Worldwide web" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: This paper addresses the general challenge of economically capturing the knowledge of an organization's experts such that it becomes structured, accessible and maintainable by others. In particular, it is a response to impending generational workforce changes. Baby boomers will be leaving the workforce in ever-increasing numbers over the next 5-10 years (DeLong, 2004). They will take with them a substantial volume of tacit knowledge, operational heuristics, stories and organizational history. At the same time, there is a need to assimilate new employees who are used to information on demand and new forms of media and information packaging. Furthermore, static capture of the boomers' knowledge is inadequate. Not only is it inevitably incomplete and imperfect, best practice changes over time - the knowledge of experts must be continually updated and enhanced.The data for this paper were gathered during a project for the capture of knowledge in a medium-sized organization which was experiencing rapid growth at the same time as losing its key experts to retirement and the competition. Expertise is defined usually by proficiency scaling (for example from novice to master) and identified through seniority, task effectiveness, years of experience, reputation or by being the \"go-to\" person (Hoffman and Hanes, 2003). In this organization, experts with such attributes were generally deemed to be authoritative retainers. The project was defined by executives in terms of managing the risk of knowledge loss and the primary focus was upon capture and presentation of the knowledge of experts, moving it, as it were, from one retainer to another. The focus of the paper is therefore on the knowledge capture component, although we report upon our efforts to embed the initial knowledge capture into an ongoing knowledge lifecycle of sharing and maintenance.First, therefore, we used cheap and familiar technologies: digital camera, audio recording, low cost editor, a freeware Wiki and an internet transcription service. We then structured the knowledge capture using interviews, according to the experts' expressions of key concepts and their linkages. After transcription and editing, we stored the captured knowledge in a Wiki in video and text pages. The video format particularly engaged younger employees, but the text could be corrected and enhanced over time through Wiki editing and tagging. The participant experts found the process very satisfying and non-invasive, with low demands on their time. The users, particularly the younger ones, found the contents very useful and the technology familiar and straightforward. The knowledge capture methodology itself was trailed by non-technicians and found to be simple to use and worthwhile.Being an outcome of participatory action research, this paper is mainly practical, offering a contribution to methodology for knowledge capture and maintenance rather than theory. However, it does identify some ideas, which may be useful for further research and subsequent extension to theory. Choices made in refining the methodology were often contingent upon certain organizational preferences and personal idiosyncrasies: there are quite possibly divergent social institutions in different organizations, which will determine what will work in knowledge capture and maintenance. User-driven content and \"a semantic web\" can both emerge in the methodology we developed, but there are many areas where some organizations may decide to limit either of these to a few administrators or specialists.\nThe need for knowledge capture: The knowledge management literature has produced many analytical models, which represent the processes that constitute a \"knowledge management lifecycle\". Whilst there may be important differences in the emphases of these models, they generally express the simple need to capture, store, structure, share, and maintain useful knowledge, in order to make it more usable and accessible throughout organizations. The attraction of digital information technologies is that they provide many tools, which promise to support several, possibly all, of these processes.Demographic and economic factors have increased the focus upon the primary knowledge management process, that of knowledge capture (DeLong, 2004). As baby boomers head for retirement, there are fears that organizations are losing a key generative asset, limiting their capability to make effective decisions, solve problems and continue the relentless cycle of competition, innovation and adaptation (Court et al., 2007). Wheels will be reinvented, lessons will be forgotten and mistakes repeated at great cost. This is already posing a problem, as some of those boomers with adequate wealth seek to retire. The effects of this knowledge loss vary between industries and type of role played by the employee. It is expected that the oil and gas and healthcare industries for example will be more affected than manufacturing and technology. There is greatest concern at the senior management level, but firms are also worried about losing middle manager expertise as well as specialist knowledge (Bucks Consulting, 2007).At the other end of their careers, younger people are entering the workforce to take up the jobs of the boomers (Basso, 2008). In contrast to baby boomers, their children and grandchildren have been confronted with the personal computer and, from the early nineties, with the internet (Tapscott, 1998). Since the widespread affordability of broadband, features of the Internet such as interactive chat, video streaming, search engines, vast numbers of web sites, news, culture and sport subscription have become commonplace and changed information behavior (Rigby, 2008; Seely Brown, 2002). Practical objectives are achieved on-line: banking, booking holidays, submitting university assignments or observing surfing conditions. Increasingly, young people moving from university and higher education institutes do so having had ubiquitous access to computing, to smart mobile devices and internet broadband (Solomon and Schrum, 2007). The provision of these facilities has given them a level of expectation about what constitutes an acceptable level of service and connectivity, in their education and in their leisure time. It is anticipated that this generation will expect and demand similar tools at the workplace and will indeed be able to use them to improve organizational performance by working at internet speed (Morello et al., 2007). The mode of delivery of knowledge, in particular to the younger generation, needs to be considered in the light of their preferences for \"bite sized\", relevant chunks, and multi-media presentation.Therefore, inter-generational knowledge transfer of what is largely tacit knowledge has become necessary. Liebowitz et al. (2007) found several biases, such as loyalty, trust and wanting to make a contribution, that influence the effectiveness of this knowledge transfer. Further, capturing knowledge from experts under any circumstances is complicated and problematic. People may not wish to give up their intellectual capital, experts are often unable to give clear, rule-based explanations for their judgments, and they may have a perceptual bias or selective recall about problem situations. Yet tacit knowledge constitutes the vast majority of an organization's knowledge (Kim, 1998), and is critical in strategic decision making (Brockmann and Anthony, 2002) and innovation (Yamin and Otto, 2004).The informal and social dimensions of knowing are what make the formal, rule driven processes embedded in ERP systems for example, workable (Orlikowski, 2002; Lee et al., 2007). The growing realization in companies that competitive advantage and high performance are due to their people, not just products, strategies or procedures, is reflected in the growing literature on tacit and collaborative knowledge flows (Harman and Koohang, 2006; Flavian and Guinaliu, 2006; Nissen, 2006).Problems and issues in knowledge capture\nMethodology: The project was approached as action research, or reflective learning in action. Action research seeks to produce useful outcomes by planning and initiating interventions to resolve certain problem situations, and seeking to improve their outcomes through adjustments and adaptations to the original plan (Kemmis and McTaggart, 2000; Baskerville, 2001). The practical objective is to achieve a direct and beneficial outcome, but also to heighten the awareness of participants regarding the methods applied and provide a deeper understanding of the phenomena involved. Vygotsky described this approach, with reference to learning and cognition as \"the search for method\" (Vygotsky, 1978):The search for method becomes one of the most important problems of the entire enterprise of understanding the uniquely human forms of psychological activity. In this case, the method is simultaneously prerequisite and product, the tool and the result of the study (Vygotsky, 1978, p. 251).Our epistemological stance is constructivist - being largely socially determined, people from different groups and backgrounds ascribe different meanings and interpretations to events (Berger and Luckmann, 1967; Giddens, 1984). Accordingly, whilst context-dependence and variability render the search for transferable \"critical success factors\" and universal solutions a chimera, there may be rules of thumb and patterns which emerge as useful for other people in similar circumstances.The case study organization approached the researcher with a request to propose a solution to the problem, which in this case was the scarcity of specialists and experienced staff in a number of key areas, combined with the threat of their possible imminent departure through retirement or attrition. As these experts were scarce and highly utilized, the challenge was to develop an efficient, low-impact method for capturing their knowledge for future workers (and workers in other locations) to use. The result of the project was a knowledge capture methodology that could be independently performed by business users of the Wiki system. Our understanding of the conversion between tacit and explicit knowledge, and the notion of a \"knowledge management lifecycle\" helped us develop a model upon which we could base a solution. The technological component of our solution appears also to address a third dimension of knowledge capture and sharing, namely that it is emergent, contingent and a permanent \"work in progress\".Data collection\nThe case study: The case study organization employs about 6,000 people and is engaged in supplying raw and processed construction materials mainly to the Chinese and Japanese markets. It was undergoing rapid expansion and it had been brought to the attention of senior management that this growth was at risk through the exposure of losing key organizational specialists through retirement and general attrition.There are a number of possible strategies to ameliorate this kind of risk to organizations: phased retirement, job redefinition, mixed-age teams, mentoring and flexible \"at call\" working arrangements for example. These approaches either pass the knowledge on to others or make the tacit knowledge of the expert available through more flexible working arrangements. Indeed, it is likely that the concept of retirement will undergo change as a nexus of corporate knowledge loss, personal financial need, and the boomers' refusal to simply bow out coalesce. But the approach decided upon by senior management in this organization was knowledge capture: to use technology to capture the key expertise of senior specialists.What happened along the way\nThe knowledge capture method: At the conclusion of the project, the final data capture methodology was published on the enterprise Wiki and a support process for editing content was established. Whilst the interviewing was no longer initiated and performed by a central service function, various departments have used the camera and facilities to interview staff for a number of purposes including post-project review, exit interviews, and even to record internal presentations. Owing to space limitations, we are unable to describe the methodology in detail, but it consisted of the following four steps:1. Develop an overall strategy for knowledge capture.2. Prepare the knowledge capture interview.3. Conduct the interview.4. Process and load the knowledge capture.\nDiscussion and lessons learned: It is risky to generalize lessons learned and insights gained in participatory action research into collections of \"must do\" steps or \"critical success factors\". First, the range of case data and absence of environmental controls usually render the results statistically insignificant. Second, the lessons may not be relevant or applicable in other cases due to the complex dynamics and openness of social systems. Nevertheless, interesting heuristics and even surprises can be judged on their merits by the theoretician or practitioner as being worthy of further attention.Doing what fits the organization and its people\nConclusion: The methodology described in this paper was developed based upon a theoretical understanding of knowledge types (tacit and explicit), the need to convert from one to the other, and the knowledge processes which constitute the knowledge lifecycle (capture, structure, share, update and so on). The solution also considered the insight that many knowledge requirements and interactions cannot be determined in advance and that knowledge is in fact a permanent \"work in progress\". Several new insights were gained and a workable knowledge capture methodology was achieved, indeed one that can be executed by non-technologists. Above all, the knowledge capture and update activity can be integrated into everyday life in organizations through the use of simple, usable technologies, rather than being part of a \"knowledge management\" or \"expert systems' project\" staffed by specialists.But reflections on the actual adoption and sustainability of these methods and tools reveal that methodological and functional capability is not enough. The expertise capture methodology was effective, economical and simple - but was only implemented as long as there was a senior management directive (and funding) to do so. The high rate of viewing of videos and pages indicates an interest in the content, but the maintenance of the captured knowledge in the Wiki was desultory, suggesting again that ease of use and (perhaps even) usefulness are not enough. The embedding of interactive, socially-shared validation and maintenance of such knowledge repositories into organizational routine requires explicit management attention. But where management has a naive view of knowledge, and think of it in narrow terms of \"capture\" and \"display\", then it is probably unlikely that they will attend to or fund the more intensive and sophisticated processes around knowledge creation and sharing. This is where a theoretical model, such as that in Figure 1 might be useful: it draws attention to the fact that to succeed practically, all phases of the knowledge lifecycle require attention and support (Alavi and Leidner, 2001).There are limitations to this study however. The lifecycle model developed in this paper using the theory of knowledge processes and the conversion between tacit and explicit knowledge shows us that knowledge capture is only one phase in the lifecycle. It also shows us the limitations of even an effective knowledge capture methodology and simple, powerful tools like Wikis. Further research is required to ascertain the factors, which influence the capability and motivation of staff to update this knowledge after initial capture. The quality of the knowledge within this model over time requires investigation. Managerial acceptance of this open form of construct and content maintenance is also crucial, and many leaders and CIO's express doubts about the reliability of the information and the potential for risks to emerge when incorrect information is posted. The evolution of the \"semantic web\" within the Web 2.0 products in organizations may contradict some organizations' need for a centralized, controlled vocabulary. There is also work to be done on assessing the ongoing costs and benefits as well as the ability of employees to \"self-manage\" this process in the absence of specialist monitoring or managerial protocols. The use of these systems by younger people also requires observation to ascertain whether the assumed preference of this generation for such tools will withstand the reluctance of corporations and personnel to take the risk of open dialogue and personal publication.However, this research does demonstrate that a simple, contingent, incremental approach using contemporary, cheap and accessible tools can play an important role in capturing knowledge and introducing the outcomes into the possibility of an ongoing sequence of sharing, updating and organizing.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - Knowledge capture from experts is important when that knowledge is of value, scarce, and threatened by loss, as is the case with the expected departure of \"baby boomers\" from the workforce. This paper seeks to provide a theoretically grounded, practical methodology for initial knowledge capture and ongoing maintenance of this knowledge using \"Web 2.0\" technologies.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The paper used a participatory action research project in which a methodology was developed for the capture of knowledge from experts in an organization experiencing both knowledge loss and rapid growth. The methodology used simple, affordable technologies such as digital cameras and digital editors, Wikis with a \"semantic web\" and social tagging.\nFindings: - The paper was able to integrate an initial knowledge capture into an ongoing cycle of knowledge organizing, sharing and maintenance. It was found that, whilst it is an economical and appropriate solution to problems of knowledge loss and knowledge sharing, sustainability of the information capture and its validation and ongoing maintenance by others require explicit management attention.\nResearch limitations/implications: - This methodology provides a process model for investigating the conversion of tacit to explicit knowledge and the effectiveness of knowledge capture methods for inter-generational knowledge in particular, but knowledge capture from experts in general.\nPractical implications: - The knowledge capture methodology derived in this project can be used by managers and practitioners to address knowledge loss and under-utilization.\nOriginality/value: - The methodology is original and based on a process model of tacit-explicit knowledge conversion. It uses cheap accessible tools, integrates an initial capture into an ongoing lifecycle, and uses modern, lightweight Web 2.0 tools and concepts.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Antecedents of farmers' willingness to participate in short food supply chains	[ "Food products", "Short food supply chains", "Competences", "Alternative food network", "Motivations", "Greece" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Short agrifood supply chains represent an alternative networking approach not only pertaining to the distribution of agricultural products, but also aimed at promoting new production and consumption patterns, serving thus as a vehicle for bridging the gap between farmers and consumers. The recent interest in short food supply systems emerged as the evolution of a line of thought underlying the negative environmental externalities generated by conventional food supply schemes (Banks and Bristow, 1999) and the limited control farmers exercise over these chains (van der Ploeg and Frouws, 1999). Focusing from the outset on the agrifood products, and drawing from the social science literature (Hinrichs, 2003; Renting et al., 2003), today the relevant research considers SFSCs mainly through a sociological lens, emphasising the ways and processes through which short agrifood chains gradually produce social value (Chiffoleau, 2017; Nazzaro et al., 2017) by enhancing collaborative action (Ortolani et al., 2014), rebuilding trust between consumers and producers (Banwell et al., 2016), linking different sectors of economic activity (Tanasa, 2014) and promoting food democracy (Chiffoleau et al., 2016).\nSFSCs conceptualised: The term \"short supply chains\" entered the scientific lexicon in the late 1990s (Marsden et al., 2000), as a response to industrial food distribution networks which are characterised by a large number of intermediaries (Watts et al., 2005). Instead of \"long\" supply chains, which traditionally give prominence to the - produced, distributed and purchased - product (Lee, 2002; Stevens, 1989), SFSCs emphasise on the quality of producer-consumer relationship, having thus the potential to re-socialise food (Sonnino and Marsden, 2006). Hence, in SFSCs the focus is shifted from the product to the producer (Oosterveer and Sonnenfeld, 2012) and from the action of buying to the praxis of creating civic collaborations (Galli and Brunori, 2013; Renting et al., 2012).\nPutting short supply chains into a social context: Short supply chains are based on an alternative form of social organisation, which is influenced by group norms. Starting from the simplest versions of SFSCs (i.e. a producer who directly sells food products to only one buyer) to the most complex types of chains (where groups of farmers collaboratively produce and distribute goods to consumers who do not belong to the same community), all SFSCs rely on the collaboration among individuals or within and between groups. At the other end of the spectrum, social cohesion (Smith et al., 2016), cooperation (Weiss et al., 2016), trust (Heiss et al., 2015) and collectivity (Pinna, 2017) are not only outcomes but also important preconditions for the sustainability of these alternative food networks.\nCompetencies: do they play a role?: Competencies are behaviour-oriented or task-oriented capabilities (Mulder et al., 2009), which help the individual to succeed as a professional and as a person as well (Mulder, 2017). Notably, competencies are important predictors not only of job performance (Kraimer et al., 2011), but also of job involvement (Kong, 2013) and job satisfaction (Ha and Choi, 2010), while they also stimulate work engagement (Akkermans et al., 2013). Furthermore, according to Chalofsky (2003), a crucial prerequisite for viewing a work as meaningful is the existence of a balance between one's competencies and the demands of her/his job.\nOverview of the present study: As we noted earlier, willingness to participate in SFSCs may be stimulated by social and personal factors. From a sociological point of view, it is well known that when strong forces tie together community members, social engagement is wider and more inclusive (Coleman, 1988). Hence, the first aim of the current study was to examine if attitudinal and emotional responses produced through farmers' interaction with their social environments can function as mechanisms motivating participation in SFSCs. In this study, we anticipated that a farmer's citizenship behaviour would be a predictor of her/his willingness to engage in SFSCs. Nonetheless, citizenship behaviour reflects a person's predisposition towards the community. On the other hand, the manner in which the community treats individuals may also affect their tendency to unite in common projects. Hence, we also examined the influence of community acceptance on farmers' willingness to participate in SFSCs.\nMethod: Participants\nResults: The summary statistics for the variables used in the analysis are presented in Table I. Bivariate analyses indicated no significant relationships between the variables referring to participants' demographics or between demographics and characteristics of farm enterprises. An interesting finding is that the size of cultivated land is negatively correlated with the subscales identification (r=-0.23, p<0.01) and altruism (r=-0.22, p<0.01), showing that small-scale farmers display stronger in-group identification and express higher levels of altruism than holders of larger farms. Furthermore, correlational analysis revealed a negative association between farm size and Cooperation competencies (r=-0.26, p<0.01) suggesting that owners of larger farm enterprises have limited abilities to efficiently cooperate with others.\nDiscussion and conclusions: The aim of the present study was to unravel the factors which affect farmers' willingness to participate in SFSCs. To this end, we performed two different sets of analyses: one centred at the social factors that enhance or repress willingness and a second focused on the individual level, examining whether and how farmers' perceptions on their competencies and skills determine this willingness. In doing so, the current research was one of the first efforts to systematically investigate how different forces, operating inside (competencies, citizenship behaviour) as well as outside the person (social influences), shape farmer's intent to collaborate for the development of alternative food networks.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Despite the increasing consumers' intent to support short food networks, the expansion of short food supply chains (SFSCs) remains limited. The purpose of this paper is to identify potential antecedents of farmers' willingness to participate in SFSCs.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Using data from a sample of Greek farmers the authors examined whether farmers' citizenship behaviour, the levels of their perceived competencies and the degree to which they feel accepted by their communities affect their willingness to engage in SFSCs.\nFindings: Results indicate that producers' citizenship behaviour does indeed have a positive impact on willingness to participate in SFSCs, whereas their perceptions of the acceptance they enjoy within their communities also significantly predict this willingness. On the contrary, self-perceived lack of communication and collaboration competencies diminishes this willingness.\nOriginality/value: To the best of our knowledge, this study is one of the first attempts to explore the role of farmers' competencies in their willingness to participate in SFSCs. In addition, by integrating concepts derived from multiple disciplines, our work adds new factors in the wide spectrum of forces that impel or suppress farmers' willingness to take part in alternative food distribution networks.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Technology in problem-based learning: helpful or hindrance?	[ "Active learning", "Problem-based learning", "Active learning classroom", "Technology" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Many post-secondary institutions have configured their learning spaces to accommodate the traditional lecture format as it is seen as the most efficient mechanism to deliver large amounts of complex information to students (i.e. large lecture halls with parallel row seating facing the instructor at a podium, and/or blackboard) (Lumpkin et al., 2015). It is particularly cost-effective for large courses (Park and Choi, 2014). However, these benefits are out-weighed because passive student learning commonly occurs in these spaces (Petersen and Gorman, 2014). Studies have shown that students in this learning environment tend to be less engaged in the course material than students who are involved in active learning (Krause and Coates, 2008; Lutz and Culver, 2010; Zhao and Kuh, 2004). Active learning is based on the constructivist theory where \"knowledge is mainly constructed by means of collaborative interactions,\" which are centered on the student rather than the instructor (Yew et al., 2011, p. 450). Students are required to participate in activities that make them think about what they are doing (Yew et al., 2011). They learn practical applications to course material to develop critical thinking skills that are transferable beyond the course (Lumpkin et al., 2015). Active learning has been attributed to increased student engagement and independent self-directed thinking where students take control of their learning process (Felder and Brent, 1996; Pittman and Edmond, 2016).\nActive learning classrooms (ALCs): Active learning classrooms (ALCs) are learning spaces that have been specifically designed to support active learning techniques. The layout of the ALC centers on student groups at round tables placed throughout the room rather than rows of students facing the instructor. This design encourages collaborative small group learning activities that increases student interaction with each other and with the instructor (Chiu, 2016; Pundak and Rozner, 2008). These activities can be conducted in traditional classroom spaces; however, the ALC design encourages student interactions where the instructor acts more as a facilitator than a lecturer. Park and Choi (2014) found that the positional layout of the ALC increased overall student engagement vs traditional classroom designs. They found that in traditional lecture halls, the highest achieving students tended to sit at the front of the class and did not generally share their knowledge with their peers (Park and Choi, 2014). The design of the ALC also helps instructors transform their teaching from a traditional lecture style to that of a group facilitator because the student focus is decentralized (Petersen and Gorman, 2014). In many institutions, these ALCs have been equipped with different technologies to further teaching innovation and effectiveness (Chiu and Cheng, 2017; Dori, 2007; Dori and Belcher, 2005; Pate, 2016). Technologically enhanced ALCs are promoted as teaching spaces that support increased student interactions, self-efficacy and conceptual understanding of the course material over traditional classroom models (Chiu and Cheng, 2017; Cotner et al., 2013; Dori and Belcher, 2005; Gaffney et al., 2008).\nProblem-based learning (PBL): PBL is a student-centered active learning method that develops critical thinking through problem solving (Loyens et al., 2015). It is based on small group collaborative investigations of practical case scenarios that are guided by an instructor to encourage problem-solving skills that are transferable across disciplines (Klegeris and Hurren, 2011; Murray and Summerlee, 2007; Prosser and Sze, 2014). In this teaching approach, students take responsibility for the direction of their learning, as instructors become the facilitators of learning rather than the purveyors of information for passive learners (Barrows, 1986, 1996). The problems are practical, open-ended, real-life situations where students integrate previous knowledge while researching the information that they deem necessary to reach a solution to the problem. The open-ended nature of the problems means that students establish the direction to achieve the learning outcomes of the course (Klegeris and Hurren, 2011). Proponents of PBL have suggested that the independent learning of the group means that students develop life-long learning skills such as critical thinking through problem solving that are useful in any discipline and continue into the work place after graduation (Smith and Cardaciotto, 2011; Tiwari et al., 2006; Maudsley and Strivens, 2000). Through this active learning technique, students become collaborative, self-directed learners while developing intrinsic motivation (Douglass and Morris, 2014; Hmelo-Silver, 2004; Loyens et al., 2008; Radovan and Makovec, 2015).\nIntrinsic motivation: The constructivist theory assumes that students will develop intrinsic motivation through active learning (Loyens et al., 2006). According to Ryan and Deci (2000, p. 71), in their self-determination theory, intrinsic motivation is \"the inherent tendency to seek out novelty and challenges, to extend and exercise one's capacities, to explore, and to learn.\" They suggest that intrinsic motivation is a characteristic human quality but it must be maintained and enhanced through supportive mechanisms (Ryan and Deci, 2000). These mechanisms are an autonomous learning environment, a student's perception of competence and relatedness where students feel a sense of security from the instructor's invested interest in their success (Deci and Ryan, 1985; Radovan and Makovec, 2015). Intrinsic motivation is increased when a student perceives himself/herself to be competent in a particular task. This competence is reinforced by autonomous instructional support where students are allowed to determine the direction of their learning (Herman, 2012). This contrasts with a more controlled learning environment where students are given information and expected to meet specific evaluative milestones that are set by an external source (i.e. the instructor or institution). Due to the passive nature of the controlled classroom, students tend to lose initiative and have less effective learning (Douglass and Morris, 2014; Guiffrida et al., 2013). This involves extrinsic motivation because task completion is linked to an extrinsic reward (e.g. evaluations, grades). Student engagement in an activity is for an independent outcome vs intrinsic motivation where the activity itself is the internalized reward (Radovan and Makovec, 2015).\nMethod: This study took place in a third-year undergraduate course in Human Osteology in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Toronto Mississauga (UTM). This university is a suburban campus of a large tri-campus research intensive post-secondary institution. UTM has approximately 14,000 undergraduate students and 600 graduate students. Human Osteology is a core program requirement for specialists in Forensic Anthropology program and a recommended course for the Biological Anthropology Specialist program.\nResults: In the PBL survey, at the end of the course, students specifically commented on the effect of technology on their motivation toward PBL (please refer to Table I). Overwhelmingly (88.1 percent), the students appreciated the interactive exercises with the anatomical specimens under the overhead camera. Similarly, the majority of students felt that the round tables (64.3 percent) and the whiteboards (54.8 percent) increased group interaction. The majority of students (52.4 percent) felt that the projection of the discussion board during the PBL sessions was a hindrance to their motivation toward PBL, and only 17 percent felt that it was a valuable learning tool. Students commented that the projection of the discussion board was an unwanted intrusion into their discussion. Many students felt intimidated because they felt that writing a comment during brainstorming would be \"judged\" by the facilitator. They thought that the discussion board projection was not an accurate reflection of their contribution to the PBL discussion. In their peer evaluations, some students commented that they felt that certain students dominated or manipulated the discussion board to misrepresent their own ideas. They in effect \"stole\" ideas of other students to increase the perception that they were leading the discussion. Students stated that they preferred meeting their PBL groups outside of the ALC where they could discuss methods without students outside of their group seeing their discussion.\nDiscussion: The integration of PBL and technology commonly involves the adaptation of PBL as an active learning strategy to increase autonomous, collaborative, critical thinking skills in distance learners (Blackburn, 2017; Brodie, 2009; Chen, 2016; Gibbings et al., 2015). In this course, the technology was adopted to enhance the PBL process in an ALC environment. Most of the studies outlining the first scenario have noted a positive impact on student engagement for the course material (Blackburn, 2017; Brodie, 2009; Chen, 2016; Chhabra and Sharma, 2013). However, El-Magboub et al. (2016) found that students preferred face-to-face discussions vs online discussion boards in their study of student engagement toward PBL in a blended course in pharmacy. Student interactions as well as student-instructor interactions were significantly less in online discussion boards vs face-to-face PBL sessions. Interestingly, Watson and Sutton (2012) found that students felt that more learning occurred in asynchronous discussion boards vs synchronous discussion boards that simulated in-class discussions. The mixed results of the present study may reflect the hybrid nature of the course implementation. Students were using the technology while they were in a face-to-face situation. The technology acted as a barrier in open communication between the PBL group members.\nConclusion: Gebre et al. (2014) discuss the importance of the intermingling of the activity with the learning goals, social context, materials, and the learning delivery. This study illustrated the importance of considering students' conceptions of learning and the learning environment along with the limitations of the technology in achieving learning outcomes. PBL is based on successful group collaboration and proper communication is key. A real-time online discussion board monitored by a facilitator introduced perceived communication limitations for the students and undermined their feelings of autonomy, competence, and relatedness in their intrinsic motivation toward the PBL learning process.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between student motivation and technology in the implementation of problem-based learning (PBL) in a technologically enhanced active learning classroom (ALC).\nDesign/methodology/approach: PBL was implemented in an undergraduate course in human osteology (n=49) at a large Canadian University. Numerous activities using the ALC technology were conducted to engage students in self-directed active learning. Students wrote critical self-reflections at the beginning of the course and with each PBL report. They completed a survey at the end of the course using a Likert scale that included written comments on their motivation toward different uses of technology.\nFindings: Students generally had high motivation toward PBL at the end of the course. Their evaluation of the technology to support PBL was dependent on the activity. Students (88 percent) appreciated the use of an overhead camera to visualize anatomical elements, and short problem-solving exercises using the whiteboard but they negatively evaluated the real-time projection of PBL sessions through a discussion board (52 percent). Almost half of the class (43 percent) felt that technology was a hindrance to their learning process in PBL.\nOriginality/value: This study demonstrates the complex relationship between student motivation toward active learning, the learning environment, and technology. Instructors and students influence the learning environment through their conceptions of effective teaching. According to this framework, technology should be implemented not only according to the teaching method, but consider teaching conceptions and the learning environment.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Conflicts and management styles in the Sri Lankan commercial building sector	[ "Management", "Case study", "Construction" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The construction industry inherits several unique characteristics such as complexity, high human diversity and lengthy process of construction due to which the conflicts will occur (Jaffar et al., 2011). However, having conflicts will not always barricade the project success (Ohbuchi and Suzuki, 2003). Conflicts can generate constructive outcomes as well as destructive outcomes (Tjosvold, 2006). Constructive conflicts often make path to creative thinking and innovation (Gorse, 2003). On the other hand, destructive conflicts will reduce the trust and respect over each other; resulting numerous adverse effects on the performance and productivity (Femi, 2014). As per the Oxford Dictionary (2017), the management is defined as \"the process of dealing with or controlling things or people.\" Thus, conflict management can be defined as the process of dealing with or controlling conflicts in such a way that they will not cause any negative effect on the project success. It is obvious that through a proper management, the constructive conflicts can be utilized to enhance the productivity of the project while eliminating the destructive conflicts (Tjosvold, 2006).\n2. Conflict types and their sources: A number of researchers introduced different categorizations of conflicts. Among them, the most discussed categorization is task conflicts, relationship conflicts and process conflicts (Chou and Yeh, 2007; DeChurch et al., 2007; Desivilya et al., 2010; Huan and Yazdanifard, 2012; Jehn and Chatman, 2000; Senaratne and Udawatta, 2013; Simons and Peterson, 2000). Task conflicts occur due to the disagreements raised between people working in the same group regarding the content of the decisions they make (Simons and Peterson, 2000). The execution of work-related conflicts such as resource allocation, agreeing on rates, variation procedures and policies and judgment on quality can be identified as task conflicts (Dreu et al., 2001). The task conflicts occur mainly due to people having different ideas, viewpoints and opinions (Huan and Yazdanifard, 2012). Relationship conflicts occur due to the disagreements of people who work together (Chou and Yeh, 2007). The main sources of relationship conflicts are tension, hostility and annoyance among the individuals inside the group (DeChurch et al., 2007). Process conflicts occur due to the disagreements regarding the working strategies and delegation of duties and authority which are more related to the contractual documentation (Jehn and Chatman, 2000). The main sources of process conflicts are poor communication, avoiding rules and regulations, issues regarding working methods, issues regarding workload distribution and issues regarding scheduling (Senaratne and Udawatta, 2013).\n3. Conflict management theories: A number of conflict management theories are put forward considering the Managerial Grid of Blake and Mouton (DeChurch et al., 2007). The two dimensions used by Blake and Mouton are slightly changed in the other theories yet the ultimate concept given with regard to conflict management is almost the same (Lee, 2008). Some of these other theories are Mary Parker Follett Model (1940), Hall's Win-Lose approach (1969), Thomas Kilmann Conflict Mode Instrument (1977) and Devito Model (1995) (Atteya, 2012; Giritli et al., 2009; Lee, 2008; Ozkalp et al., 2009; Vu and Carmichael, 2009; Zhang et al., 2015). Mary Parker Follett Model (1940) suggested that the conflicts occur due to the differences in thoughts and ideas of individuals, thus these differences can be used to manage the conflicts (Giritli et al., 2009). Accordingly, Follett introduced five conflict management styles, namely; evasion, suppression, domination, compromise and integration (Al-Sedairy, 1994). Hall believed that conflicts can be well managed by considering two dimensions; concern for personal goals and concern for relationships (Vu and Carmichael, 2009). Accordingly, he introduced approaches based on winning and losing (Atteya, 2012). Thomas Kilmann Conflict Mode Instrument (1977) suggested that conflicts can be well managed by considering assertiveness and cooperativeness and introduced five conflict management styles, namely; competing, collaborating, avoiding, compromising and accommodating (Trippe and Baumoel, 2015). Devito Model (1995) argued that the conflicts can be effectively managed through five stages; identifying the conflict, examining the possible solutions, testing the solution, evaluating the solution and accepting or rejecting the solution (Giritli et al., 2009).\n4. Dual concern theory: Dual concern theory is introduced by Pruitt and Rubin (1986) (Chou and Yeh, 2007; Dreu et al., 2001; Gorse, 2003) based on the Managerial Grid introduced by Blake and Mouton (DeChurch et al., 2007). According to the dual concern theory, the way two parties willingly behave or forced to behave in a conflict situation can be used to manage the conflicts (Lee, 2008). The theory suggested that based on the high or low concern given to achieve self-desires and the desires of the other party, the conflicts can be properly managed (Desivilya et al., 2010). There are five conflict management styles, namely; integrating (problem solving), obliging, dominating (forcing), avoiding and compromising (Chou and Yeh, 2007). The dual concern model is clearly demonstrated by Rahim (2002) as shown in Figure 1.\n5. Research methods and process: Naoum (2007) and Ellis and Levy (2009) emphasized that the most appropriate method for conducting an in-depth analysis of a person, a group of persons, an organization or a particular project is case studies. Accordingly, it is recognized that conducting case studies for data collection would be more appropriate for this study due to the requirement of carrying out an in-depth analysis. According to Yin (2009), the best method of data collection for researches which require a proper understanding of a prevailing situation is conducting a multiple case study. Hence, four cases are selected from the Sri Lankan commercial building industry among which, two are private projects and the other two are the public projects. They are the largest and highly recognized construction companies, consultancy firms and client organizations involved in Sri Lankan commercial building sector. Their recognition in the field is summarized in Table I. An in-depth analysis is conducted in order to understand how these companies are solving the conflicts while maintaining their reputation, demand and integrity. The collected knowledge from these companies will be beneficial for the medium scale and small scale construction stakeholders to understand how they should proceed in conflict situations in a highly professional manner. A systematic and comprehensive knowledge will be invaluable to such stakeholders since they cannot afford the expensive and time consuming dispute resolution procedure.\n6. Conflict types and sources: The study identified 15 common conflict situations in the Sri Lankan commercial building industry. They are categorized into four main conflict types. The categorization is further elaborated in Table III with the common sources for having particular conflict situations.\n7. Conflict management: The findings revealed that every project has its own conflict management procedure with different magnitudes. The stakeholders who took part in meetings revealed that conflict management is crucial for the successful completion of the project and to avoid expensive and time consuming dispute resolution procedure. Further to them, conflict management is not eliminating the conflict yet dealing with it in such a way that it will not generate harmful effects. This is in line with the findings of Popovic and Hocenski (2009) since they introduced the principle of conflict management as handling the conflict in such a way that it will not generate harmful effects. Similarly, Jaffar et al. (2011) stated that it is more effective and practical to manage the conflicts rather than trying to resolve it by wasting time, money and energy since conflicts are inevitable due to the complexity, lengthy time of construction and multi-disciplinary involvement.\n8. Discussion: The study focused on whether the magnitude of the project and its complexity has any impact on having conflicts. Accordingly, the magnitude of the project has a direct relationship with the tendency of having conflicts. The main reasons for such relationship can be identified as lengthy process of construction, involvement of more parties, high workload, enormous documentation, high human diversity and limited resources. This is in line with the findings of Jaffar et al. (2011) and Alzahrani and Emsley (2012) as they emphasized the conflicts are increasing in an alarming rate due to the construction of high rise buildings with lot of facilities, new technology and advanced services.\n9. Conclusion and recommendations: Conflicts are natural and inevitable in the Sri Lankan commercial building industry. According to the findings of this study, there are 15 conflict situations that can be commonly seen in the Sri Lankan commercial building sector which can be categorized into four main conflict types, namely; payment issues, relationship conflicts, documentation-related conflicts and execution of works-related conflicts. The study focused on the sources of these conflict situations and found out that some of the most common sources of the aforementioned 15 conflict situations are financial issues of the parties, selection of underpriced bids, unprofessional behavior, poor communication, poor coordination, bad history, poor documentation, supremacy of professionals, high work load, disagreement of parties, design errors, less experience, unavailability of resources and negligence.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to understand the prevailing conflict management styles in Sri Lankan commercial building industry from the main stakeholders' perspective. The dual concern theory is applied to this study as a theory foundation.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The Sri Lankan commercial building industry is currently experiencing a construction boom after 30 years of civil war. Creating a dispute free environment through well conflict management is one of the main ways to keep the continuous demand and development of construction. However, the Sri Lankan construction sector is arranged in such a way that they directly approach the dispute resolution rather than avoiding the dispute initially through proper conflict management. Four cases are selected for this study with the intention of conducting meetings with three main stakeholders of each case who represented client, consultants and contractors, respectively.\nFindings: The research findings reveal that compromising is the most common conflict management style used by the industry. Forcing style obtained the second place in the ranking whereas obliging and avoiding received third and fourth places.\nOriginality/value: This study is conducted to provide a full picture of conflicts faced by the Sri Lankan commercial building industry and their proper management so that the future projects will use this information to diminish the destructive effects of conflict situations and provide a real value for money.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Value orientations: a case study of north Indian manufacturing managers	[ "Business ethics", "Asset valuation", "Culture (sociology)", "Behaviour", "India" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: The issues of business ethics have become increasingly important in the globalised business environment where comparative advantage and competitive edge are central to business decision-making. In a highly diverse and intensely competitive environment managers are faced with difficult situations and often have to take tough decisions, which are not only right, fair, and proper (Hosmer, 1991) but also effective (Hosmer, 2000). \"Ethical problems in management are complex as they have extended consequences, multiple alternatives, mixed outcomes, uncertain occurrences and personal implications. Ethical problems in management are also pervasive because managers make decisions, and take actions that will affect other people\", says Hosmer (1991, p. 15). Unethical behaviour by individuals can cost the organizations, stakeholders and society billions of dollars, not withstanding the social cost of such actions. When faced with issues that have ethical dimensions and there are ever increasing expectations to act ethically of both, the individuals and businesses (Ford and Richardson, 1994; Trevino, 1986). In order for them to act ethically they are expected to have a well-developed moral imagination (Werhane, 1998). It is important to understand personal orientations because of their role in shaping the perception of situations, problems faced by individuals and the consequent behaviours. This study was designed to examine the ethical orientations of of managers in large manufacturing entrprises in Punjab, India.\nEthical ideology and Forsyth's taxonomy of ethical positions: Ethical ideology (or personal moral philosophy) can be explained as a set of beliefs, values and attitudes espoused by an individual and that it influences an individual's reasoning about moral issues is well accepted (Forsyth and Nye, 1990; Forsyth, 1992; Fritzsche and Becker, 1984; Hunt and Vitell, 1986; Fraedrich and Farrell, 1992a, b). It is proposed to explain differences in individual ethical judgments (Schlenker and Forsyth, 1977; Forsyth, 1980, 1992) and decision-making when faced with difficult situations and ethical dilemmas. This relationship between personal moral philosophy and judgments of ethical dilemmas is well supported by empirical research (for example Forsyth, 1980, 1981, 1985; Forsyth and Berger, 1982; Forsyth and Pope, 1984; Singh and Forsyth, 1989; Barnett et al., 1994).Schlenker and Forsyth (1977) suggest that individual variations in personal moral philosophies can be described by taking into account the degree to which an individual is idealistic and relativistic and that these variations are a function of: idealism in the evaluation of actions and consequences; and rejection of universal moral rules in favour of relativism (Forsyth and Berger, 1982). Idealism is defined as the extent to which an individual believes that ethically correct actions will consistently produce desirable outcomes (Forsyth, 1980). Relativism on the other hand, is described as the extent to which individuals accept or reject universal moral rules or principles as the basis for ethical decisions (Forsyth, 1980). Individuals can be high or low on both idealism and relativism.To describe the two extremes, highly idealistic individuals idealistically assume that desirable consequences can always be obtained with the \"right\" action and those with less idealistic orientation admit that undesirable consequences will often be mixed with desirable ones (Forsyth, 1980). Highly idealistic individuals take the view that an ethical action must not harm others but less idealistic individuals would accept harm to be mixed with good.According to Forsyth's typology individuals who are classified as high or low in idealism and relativism fall into one of the four ethical ideologies: situationism, absolutism, subjectivism or exceptionism. Situationists and absolutists score high in idealism and subjectivists and exceptionists being low in idealism. Situationists would have extremely high scores on both idealism and relativism because of their desire to achieve positive consequences (high idealism) combined with their rejection of moral rules (high relativitism).Absolutists prefer actions that yield positive consequences (high idealism) through conformity to moral absolutes (low relativism). Subjectivists like situationists are skeptical of moral principles (high relativism) and believe that in many cases it is not possible to avoid negative behaviours (low idealism). They base their judgment on personal feelings about the action and the situation. Exceptionists are low both in relativism and idealism. They believe that conformity to moral absolutes in making judgments is desirable but exceptions to these principles are permissible.Each one of the four typologies draws from a specific school of thought in philosophy. The high relativism groups, situationists and subjectivists endorse an ideology related to ethical skepticism (Forsyth, 1980). Skepticists believe that morality can be viewed in different ways and that all kinds of skepticism seek to criticize those who attempt to present ethical skepticism in one way or another. This typology also suggests that relativists can be either high or low in idealism, a distinction that carries over to moral philosophy as well. For example the situationists' approach that each situation must be examined individually, is consistent with ethical egoism, a skeptical ethical philosophy that takes a pragmatic approach to evaluating action. This is also consistent with Fletcher's (1973, p. 186) situational ethics according to which, morality should focus on contextual appropriateness and not the good or the right but the fitting with the actions based on agape' or love of others. Similarly, the subjectivists reject the idea of universal ethical principles and believe moral decisions are based on individualistic judgments and negative consequences do not necessarily make any action immoral.On the non-relativistic/low relativistic side of the typology, absolutists tend to agree with statements that are consistent with a general approach to moral philosophy known as deontology (Forsyth, 1980, p. 176). This ethical philosophy rejects the use of consequences of an action as basis for moral evaluation and appeals to natural law or rationality to determine ethical judgments. In deontological ethical philosophy, acts are judged as moral or immoral through their comparison with some universal moral rules that are absolute. The deontological philosopher Kant argued that a moral principle allows no exceptions regardless of consequences. Although no ethical ideology adopted by individuals may possess all the characteristics of a purely deontological approach, the absolutists emphasize on maintaining consistency with moral principles to obtain desired goals that is similar to deontological philosophy (Forsyth, 1980). The exceptionists' approach is more compatible with teleological ethical philosophy (Forsyth, 1980). The teleological approach proposes that the morality of an action depends upon the consequences produced by it. One is ethically bound to act in a way that produces good for the greatest number, represented by the utilitarian concept of greatest good for the greatest number.\nLiterature review: The search for literature on espoused ethical ideologies held by managers in India revealed sparse empirical research in the area. There have been a few studies on the values held by managers in India such as England's (1975), in which Indian managers were a part of the larger study of personal value systems and the impact of values on behaviour, along with managers from the USA, Japan, Korea and Australia. The Indian sample in this study constituted of 623 managers from private sector enterprises in India, of which about 60 percent were employed in manufacturing companies with almost equal distribution of small, medium and large organizations (England, 1975, p. 91). Though England used a different typology for values, the study found that Indian managers had high degree of moralistic orientation where as managers from the USA, Japan and Korea indicated large elements of pragmatism (England, 1975, p. 10). Moralistically oriented described as \"those who characterize the concepts they view as high in importance as right. Their evaluation of importance is based on concerns of right or wrong and suggests a moral, ethical or normative value orientation\", (England, 1975, p. 19). More recently Mellahi (2001) conducted a comparative study of values held by MBA graduates from five different countries including India. The study found that Indian managers put more emphasis on \"doing the right thing\" than \"doing things right\". Chatterjee and Pearson (2000) studied the changing work goals of senior Indian managers who were undertaking management development courses conducted by a particular management institute in India. Their data indicated a shift away from social vision in the work values of these managers. This is an interesting finding bearing in mind that India is traditionally a collectivist society (Chatterjee and Pearson, 2000, p. 652) and in contradiction with the findings of studies by Krishna (1999) and Katiay and Rekhi (1994) that managers in India are increasingly adhering to traditional Indian collectivist values and practices. Chockalingam and Deshpande (1998) conducted a study of 150 middle level managers in two or three organizations located in South India (the study does not indicate the exact number of the organizations or the type of organizations studied) in which they examined demographic differences in perceived ethicality of various business practices on a five-point Likert scale. The study found significant gender, age and educational differences.A number of studies in this area have focused on values and ethical behaviour of marketing managers. This can be attributed to the widespread belief that marketing managers encounter more situations that result in decisions with ethical impact (Randall and Gibson, 1990, p. 463). Singhapakdi et al.'s (1994) comparative study of Thai and US marketers found that Thai marketers were situationists with higher idealism and relativism scores as compared to the American marketers. Monappa's (1977) study of the ethical attitudes of Indian managers indicated that 73 percent of the managers tended to ignore ethics in their daily practice. Malhotra (1985) reported \"value erosion\" among Indian managers. For Chakraborty (1997, p. 1529) the economic liberalization has ushered in an era of unethical business practices, \"An ethical depression began to break loose as an ethical cyclone with economic liberalization adopted by India in 1991\". The scores released by the Transparency International India and ORG-Marg Research Pvt. Ltd (2002) ranked India at number 69, in the list of 90 countries (www.transparency.de/documents/cpi/2000/cpi2000.html). This rank has slipped down to 71 in 2003. The perception of India being overall corrupt country, reported value erosion among managers in India, empirical evidence that personal ideologies influence ethical reasoning, that personal and business ethics coexist in the behaviour of managers within the organisations (Mauro et al., 1999, p. 28) and scarce empirical research in the area prompted the idea of this study. This study contributes both in academic and practical contexts. In the academic context, it adds to the work done by various researchers into ethical beliefs and values of managers in various cultural contexts. The emergence of India along with China, as a fast growing economy having its own comparative advantages has captured the interest of international business community in the country. The author is of the belief that at present time, this study is the largest study of personal ethical orientations of practicing managers in the manufacturing sector in Punjab, India. Manufacturing remains a significant element in transitional economies such as India. In the practical context an understanding of the value orientations of managers is valuable information for business representatives from other cultural contexts when working with their Indian counterparts. It is also a useful input in establishing organisational strategies for management development and training for expatriate assignments and leadership roles.\nMethodology: The present study was designed to examine the ethical positions held by the managers using Forsyth's EPQ. It was conducted by the author in year 2000, on a sample of managers from large scale manufacturing enterprises situated in the north Indian state of Punjab.Sampling\nAnalysis and discussion: Demographic profile of the sample population\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - It is argued that ethical ideology espoused by an individual provides the framework within which individuals contemplate the issues and determine the right way to behave. This paper aims to report the findings of a study designed to examine the ethical orientations of managers.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - This study was conducted on a sample of 175 managers and was drawn from 12 large manufacturing organizations in the state of Punjab, India, using Forsyth's ethics position questionnaire.\nFindings: - It was found that the large majority of managers were situationists and only a small percentage were absolutists.\nResearch limitations/implications: - The sample in this study is restricted to large manufacturing enterprises only and reports espoused values only.\nPractical implications: - An understanding of the value orientations of managers is valuable for business representatives from other cultural contexts when working with their Indian counterparts. It is also a useful input in establishing organisational strategies for management development and training for expatriate assignments and leadership roles.\nOriginality/value: - The author is of the belief that, at the present time, this is the largest study of personal ethical orientations of practising managers in the manufacturing sector in Punjab, India. It adds to the work done by various researchers into ethical beliefs and values of managers in various cultural contexts.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
JD-R model on psychological well-being and the moderating effect of job discrimination in the model: Findings from the MIDUS	[ "Optimism", "Psychological well-being", "Personal resources" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Among the different kinds of discrimination, ageism is one that anyone can experience and suffer from. As the American workforce grows older, age discrimination at work is becoming an increasingly critical topic. Ageism is institutionalized and persists as a tacit influence in the workplace, even though no significant relationship between aging and task performance or creativity has been found (Wiener and Keller, 2011). Nevertheless, stereotypes about aged workers are mostly negative (Wiener and Keller, 2011). For example, managers are prejudiced toward aged employees (Chiu et al., 2001), and aged employees receive more negative evaluations than younger workers do (Kulik et al., 2000). Furthermore, aged workers who perform poorly are more likely than younger workers to be demoted, while low-performing younger workers are more likely than older workers to be encouraged to attend training (Rupp et al., 2006). Most discrimination studies that consider ageism, however, remain limited to general prejudice (Nelson, 2011) or concentrate on employees' general physical and mental health (Bostwick et al., 2014). Few studies have described the effects of job discrimination at work on work-related psychological outcomes (Wiener and Keller, 2011).\nLiterature review: Conceptualization of psychological well-being\nThe relationships between psychological well-being and job demands and job/Personal resources: According to the JD-R model, the combination of high job resources and low job demands improves performance (Bakker and Demerouti, 2007) and predicts employee well-being regardless of occupation (Bakker and Leiter, 2010). Karasek's (1979) JDC model supports the idea that low job demands and high job control enhance psychological well-being. Based on Karasek's model, Pelfrene et al. (2002) demonstrated empirically that job control (skill discretion and decision authority) and social support alleviate the adverse effects of high strain on psychological well-being. Jonge et al. (2001) found that job characteristics such as job demands and organizational support also influence psychological well-being. Many researchers have agreed that there is a positive relationship between social support and well-being (Kong et al., 2013). Pisanti et al.'s (2011) study empirically showed that low job demands, high skill discretion and high supervisor support were relatively stable predictors of well-being. Therefore, this study proposes the following hypotheses based on those studies comprising the rationale for the JD-R model:\nThe relationship between psychological well-being and job discrimination: Mistreatment resulting from discrimination undermines employees' psychological well-being (Schmitt et al., 2014). Extensive research (Pascoe and Smart Richman, 2009; Schmitt et al., 2014) has shown that there is a negative relationship between discrimination and psychological well-being. For example, Pascoe and Smart Richman's (2009) meta-analysis reviewed 134 studies published between 1986 and 2007, while Schmitt et al.'s (2014) meta-analysis examined 328 correlational and 54 experimental studies published before 2012. The results of both meta-analyses showed that there is negative relationship between discrimination and psychological well-being. This negative relationship was found in both cross-sectional and longitudinal research and across a broad range of well-being measurements, regardless of the type of discrimination investigated (Schmitt el al., 2014). I thus propose the following:\nThe role of job discrimination in the JD-R model: Lazarus and Folkman (1984) and Noh and Kaspar (2003) reported that job resources may mitigate job discrimination. Dubbelt et al. (2016), on the other hand, empirically showed that gender discrimination had a negative effect on the job demands and job resources of women. The relationship between discrimination and job resources is different in these two studies, but it seems clear that the two variables are closely related. Volpone and Avery (2013) operationally defined perceived sex/race/age discrimination as a job demand, which implies that job discrimination is a job-related variable that needs to be addressed within the context of the JD-R model. Although it did not rely on the JD-R model, Bayl-Smith and Griffin's (2014) study showed that perceived age discrimination negatively affected work engagement, which is the outcome variable of job demands and resources. Therefore, this study assumes that job discrimination, as a negative moderator in the JD-R model, could worsen employees' psychological well-being as one of the causes of a loss spiral. I, thus, propose the following:\nMethod: Sample\nMeasures: Psychological well-being\nResults: Testing validity and reliability\nDiscussion: The first research question sought to examine the effects of job demands, job resources and personal resources on psychological well-being. The findings of this study support previous studies' results that skill discretion, as a component of work characteristics, improves psychological well-being (Pisanti et al., 2011; Van Veldhoven et al., 2005). Unexpectedly, however, the results of this study indicated that the effect of decision authority on psychological well-being was not significant. Although skill discretion and decision authority are components of decision latitudes in the JDC model (Karasek, 1979), the two variables have been found to produce different results, as in the present study. For example, skill discretion has been found to have an adverse effect on depression, anxiety, emotional exhaustion, while decision authority has not (Griffin et al., 2007; Rafferty et al., 2001). This aspect has enabled scholars to separate the two variables (Van der Doef and Maes, 1999). As skill discretion refers to an employee's opportunity to utilize specific job skills in the while working (Hausser et al., 2010), decisions depend on individual ability and the range of the decisions' impact is limited to certain tasks. As decision authority includes task-related decisions like timing and method control (Hausser et al., 2010) as well as the task itself, the range of the decisions' impact is wider than that of skill discretion. Therefore, the results suggest that the extent of autonomy in task-related decisions could act as a burden on employees.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this study was to investigate the moderating effect of chronic job discrimination on the relationships among job demands, job resources, personal resources and psychological well-being among aged workers.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This study used \"National Survey of Midlife Development in the United States (MIDUS Refresher)\" data collected from 862 aged workers in the United States from 2011-2014. A moderated multiple regression analysis was adopted.\nFindings: The results of the multiple regression analysis show that skill discretion, self-esteem, optimism and active coping had positive effects on psychological well-being, while chronic job discrimination had a negative effect on psychological well-being. Co-worker support, supervisor support, job demands and decision-making authority were not significant. Among the interaction terms, the moderating effect between optimism and chronic job discrimination was significant.\nOriginality/value: Based on the results, this study offers implications for understanding the effects of job discrimination in the workplace among aged workers and their perceived psychological well-being, in the context of job demands and resources (JD-R) model.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Congruency as a mediator in an IKEA retail setting: Products, services and store image in relation to sensory cues	[ "Retailing", "Mediator", "Congruency", "Sensory cues" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Although congruency in retailing research has proven to be very important in determining consumer attitudes and behaviour, it has only been rather vaguely discussed in the literature so far (e.g. Hulten, 2015; Mattila and Wirtz, 2001; Mitchell et al., 1995; Morrin and Chebat, 2005; Spangenberg et al., 2006). Studies investigating sensory cues in retail contexts, usually determine the appropriate and congruent cues in pre-tests (e.g. Mitchell et al., 1995; Bosmans, 2006), but seldom involve consumer preferences when establishing congruency between products, services, store image and sensory cues.\nConceptual framework: In recent years, there has been an increasing amount of research on sensory cues, from a sensory perspective, in which cues are categorized under the five senses regarding consumers' mental processes and behaviour (Hulten, 2012; Krishna, 2012). These mental processes and behavioural outcomes have, in many cases, been investigated in the context of retail settings, products, services and store image (e.g. Baker et al., 1994, 2002; Spence et al., 2014; Turley and Milliman, 2000).\nMethod: In relation to the exploratory research conducted in this study, focus group discussions (FGDs) were employed. The study adopts Calder (1977) phenomenological approach and the measurements in this present study were operationalized according to a semi-structured scheme, following the guidelines of Kardorff et al. (2004), to ensure validity.\nFindings and discussions: The analysis yielded three main themes from the focus groups, which are explained below, exemplified and linked to each other. In order to do so, the findings are analysed, compared and discussed.\nConclusions: This study assessed consumer preferences about congruent sensory cues in relation to products, service and store image in a retail setting.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to analyse and discuss how sensory cues are preferred in relation to products, service and store image in a retail context and why retailers should consider the importance of congruence in a retail setting.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Four qualitative focus group discussions were conducted, following a semi-structured interview guide. A total of 24 participants discussed how and why a lighting department in an IKEA store in Sweden could be regarded as more appealing than the traditional layout.\nFindings: The findings indicate that congruency works as a mediator between a retail setting, sensory cues, products, service and store image. Consumers prefer, compare and categorize sensory cues in relation to the specific product in the department, the service offered by the firm and the store image.\nOriginality/value: A model is developed that conceptualizes congruency as a mediator in a retail setting, which provides an opportunity to further explore external influences on congruency in retail settings, both conceptually and empirically.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Managerial process improvement: a lean approach to eliminating medication delivery	[ "Clinical effectiveness", "Improvement models", "Accountability", "Business process re-engineering/patient focused care", "Continuous quality improvement", "Employee involvement" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Healthcare staff try each day to control medical errors in their institution. Healthcare managers have been unsuccessful in removing obstacles to better care and have failed to provide effective tools and processes to eliminate medication errors. Statistics reveal that nearly 100,000 patients die each year from medical errors (Thompson et al., 2003). The Food and Drug Administration reveal that 1.3 million people are injured annually due to medical errors (Food and Drugs Administration, 2010). While another study conducted over a five-year period revealed that the most common medication errors were inaccurate doses, incorrect drug or a wrong administration route (Phillips et al., 2001). Barker et al. (2002) further suggest that medication errors occur in one out of every five doses administered to patients in a typical hospital. Given the intricacies involved in delivering medicines, which usually involve bringing people together from different healthcare departments, coupled with collecting data that flow from multiple streams in a typical healthcare setting and maintaining high performance levels at all times, is an arduous responsibility. To increase patient safety, healthcare organizations such as hospitals have to put into practice a systematic approach that will eliminate medication errors during patient care. But to execute such an approach, healthcare administrators will have to find a way to close the gap that exists in the medication processes that engages an unknown hospital employees and often times from multiple organizational units. However, closing or even narrowing the gap is not a simple undertaking. The current healthcare system has become more complex and difficult to manage. In recent advancements, healthcare organization boundaries have become blurred. Patient centered care has increased the burden on hospital staff because it compels providers to seamlessly join together and collaborate with other providers and their patients seek medical services (Minkman et al., 2007). This requires a comprehensive approach that will address all an organization's key elements while being economical. Performance management techniques developed outside healthcare were adopted and used to facilitate quality improvement in a healthcare setting (i.e. TQM/CQI, Six Sigma, Balanced Score Card, etc.). Although these efforts have improved quality, they have not eliminated all hospital medication errors (Institute of Medicine, 2001). We argue for adopting production process improvement (PPI) approach to enrich performance, care quality, motivation and individual accountability. The PPI model unifies human performance improvement (HPI) and the time tested Toyota Production System (TPS). Our focus is to present a model that encompasses both methods' most essential aspects to optimize production processes and human performance to eliminate medication errors. We show by creating a highly defined and specific production process system that is both systematic and explicit, may have the greatest probability to substantially eradicate medication errors. Our intent is to show that by adopting PPI, healthcare staff will significantly accelerate human performance and process efficiencies by transforming the organization into a learning one.\nStrategic similarities between the HPI model and TPS: TPS, which was developed by Toyota Corporation about six decades ago, is based on lean manufacturing, which is an operating control design. One important aspect of lean production is achieving zero defects when it was first developed by Shigeo Shingo in 1986 (Furman, 2005). It is a process that is incessantly improved to increase production in proportion to value added time, money and effort. This endeavor is achieved by reducing waste, increasing overall quality and price and delivery time by continuously improving workflow processes through advancing human capacity (Ganti, 2004). The essential benefits are speed, value, awareness, efficiency and reduced costs. With TPS, the emphasis is on the internal or external customer and its goal is to deliver to customer exactly what they need when they need it, every time, defect-free, in a safe environment at the lowest cost without waste (Thompson et al., 2003). According to Spear and Bowen (1999), TPS practitioners achieve their goals by building a scientific community. Unlike traditional quality improvement initiatives, where management directs the change; in TPS it is the healthcare frontline employees and teams that drive the improvement process (Olive and Brown, 2009). One study shows that Toyota managers do not advance command and control type environment as one would expect in company operations. The TPS approach promotes collaboration between staff and managers to engage one other to experiment and enhance productivity, efficiency, quality and finding a problems' root cause (Spear and Bowen, 1999). The TPS philosophy emphasizes and promotes worker autonomy by empowering the worker to independently test and research new ideas to achieve higher productivity. While this system leads to higher morale and satisfaction in nursing; the TPS model highlights that in certain work processes, a highly defined method followed by all people leads to better job outcome and satisfaction (Mazur and Chen, 2008). The model stresses that when a process is strictly defined and problems arise then one should not deviate from the defined method to find an alternative solution to manage the problem. Instead, the problem should be identified and promptly reported to remove the root cause(s) that produced the problem (Thompson et al., 2003).\nPPI model: The PPI goal is to measure a procedure's production process to continuously improve and modify its course to increase productivity, along with quality and eliminate errors. The PPI model philosophy involves incorporating the HPI and TPS key features. Since, the ultimate goals are to increase human performance, eliminate productivity obstacles and increase quality by creating an environment that supports performance, merging the two models into a single system will optimize results.\nCombining two models: Whereas the HPI model was constructed on Gilbert's behavioral engineering principles and focuses on modifying human behavior and aligning the employee with the organization, TPS emphasizes building highly specific systems designed through experiments and tests, carried out by frontline workers and modified as needed to meet customer demands and needs (Thompson et al., 2003). By combining two models, hospital administrators can create a system where certain processes are explicated (i.e. delivering medicine to patient), while providing a process flowchart that incorporates Gilbert's behavior modification techniques.\nMapping a process flowchart: The most important process mapping and flowcharting rationale is visually representing process activities. A process flowchart gives staff a glimpse of the work design and can be applied to any organizational level. These maps depict the inputs, outputs, controls and resources for all processes (Martin, 2008). Based on needs, managers can design a process that involves many steps, encompassing multiple organizational units and people, and a process that involves particular employees (Martin, 2008). Designing a process flowchart becomes systematic because it establishes the unified relationship between organizational systems. It signifies knowing in advance that interventions applied to one unit are likely to affect other areas (Rothwell et al., 2007).\nThe PPI model: The TPS-administered organization's unique feature is that work processes are defined and specified before work begins. It includes workflow details by carefully delegating duties and responsibilities to people involved in the process. It defines what tasks will be performed and by whom, it explicitly defines the people involved, sequence, timing, location, communication method and how tasks will be executed and by whom (Thompson et al., 2003; Spear and Bowen, 1999).\nLinking TPS to a healthcare organization: To determine medication errors' main causes, a quantitative study was conducted in one community hospital with 1,000 employees. The study found that ambiguous connections and the many to one connections was the primary reason for medical errors (Mazur and Chen, 2008). Moreover, qualitative data analysis established that 100 percent of the nurses and technicians indicated that productivity pressures caused most stress (Mazur and Chen, 2008). In all, 70 percent of the nurses reported that poor regard for safety procedures was an influential factor to poor performance (Mazur and Chen, 2008). Not knowing who performs what task in the connection channel, supplemented by weak feedback from the pharmacy, in acknowledging the order and failing to confirm medication delivery, was a major hurdle encountered while working with connections. This resulted in the productivity pressure that caused medication errors (Mazur and Chen, 2008). The combined factors that caused medication errors were: vague processes; undefined procedures; absent resources; imprecise timing; ambiguous outcome; and lacking specific communication channels. Most importantly, mounting inconsistency and indirect connections in the medication delivery process caused medication errors (Mazur and Chen, 2008). Based on research findings, the researchers implemented the TPS methods to remove productivity barriers. Distributing medication was transformed according to TPS process improvement rules. The root cause was traced to the pharmacy department, revealing that sequence, timing, outcome and resources were unspecific, resulting in medication errors. After carefully designing and implementing TPS procedures, the hospital eliminated delivering expired medications to the medical units. Such changes saved the pharmacy over $30,000 annually; just by reducing expired medications from its section while simultaneously improving nursing performance and patient safety (Mazur and Chen, 2008).\nDiscussion: In each medication delivery phase, it is essential that all personnel adhere to strict processes to reduce errors. Unlike an automotive assembly line, which does not often change, in healthcare, change is constant and daily routines are unpredictable. It becomes even more important to develop specific process controls to reduce controllable variances that guarantee regulatory compliance, patient safety, staff satisfaction and improved outcomes. To eliminate medication errors, hospital administrators must simplify and standardize the process by which all staff obtain and deliver medicine to patients. The workflow process should follow a specific sequence, timing, task content, the right people and shortest established routes during the whole patient-care process. Additionally, all connections in the medication delivery must be clear and unmistakable; all communicators must be able to provide feedback to confirm receipt and when the order is fulfilled. Lastly, for this system to succeed, managers must actively promote the model and become active leaders for advancing procedural compliance. If properly implemented then this model eliminates inaccuracies that often produce medication errors during the care process.\nConclusion: Research clearly demonstrates that weak and vague processes cause medical errors, which means that causes may not be related to people's attitude, poor skills or knowledge that hampers performance; rather, its the system under which healthcare staff are compelled to work. Healthcare practitioners can hone their ability to predict, structure, design and tackle problems that are plaguing healthcare organizations. Specific approaches in the medication delivery process can be defined and mapped, which involves key personnel in the process, allowing them the flexibility to design, experiment and control service delivery. We examined the causes related to medication errors and propose the PPI model to enhance medical care. The PPI model merges the TPS and HPI methods that incorporate the combined system's key features. The PPI model provides a visual representation needed to design and implement a robust system that has the potential to eliminate medication errors in hospitals. It provides managers with detailed understanding and provides visual aids to design a production process to improve human performance and procedural improvement. Applying our concepts and tools, healthcare managers can devise a process that can target specific root causes that are common in healthcare.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Statistical evidence shows that medication errors are a major cause of injuries that concerns all health care oganizations. Despite all the efforts to improve the quality of care, the lack of understanding and inability of management to design a robust system that will strategically target those factors is a major cause of distress. The paper aims to discuss these issues.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Achieving optimum organizational performance requires two key variables; work process factors and human performance factors. The approach is that healthcare administrators must take in account both variables in designing a strategy to reduce medication errors. However, strategies that will combat such phenomena require that managers and administrators understand the key factors that are causing medication delivery errors.\nFindings: The authors recommend that healthcare organizations implement the Toyota Production System (TPS) combined with human performance improvement (HPI) methodologies to eliminate medication delivery errors in hospitals.\nOriginality/value: Despite all the efforts to improve the quality of care, there continues to be a lack of understanding and the ability of management to design a robust system that will strategically target those factors associated with medication errors. This paper proposes a solution to an ambiguous workflow process using the TPS combined with the HPI system.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Enhancing client-agency relationship quality in the advertising industry - an application of project management	[ "Project management", "Relationship management", "Agency relationship" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The client-advertising agency relationship is an area where relationship management is highly relevant and easily applicable because of the ongoing and highly interactive nature of the service provision (Keegan et al., 2017). The advertising industry is facing challenges making an investigation of the precursors to client loyalty in the current context timely. In addition, the advertising industry has reached maturity with low barriers to entry for new entrants (Levin et al., 2016). Agencies are operating in a fragmented and challenging media environment with clients seeking maximum return on the investment. This, in turn, has led many advertising agencies to reconsider their business models as well as service offerings.\n2. Literature review: 2.1 Agency performance (service quality)\n3. Research design: The method is discussed in two parts. The first details the data collection procedures and the second presents a discussion of the measures.\n4. Analysis and results: 4.1 Measurement model\n5. Discussion of findings: The study provides evidence for B2B relationship continuance in a professional service context from three key areas: service quality, relationship marketing and project management. Service quality including creative competence, project management processes and project outcomes helps develop social ties between the two organisations - client and its agency. On the other hand, value perceptions are formed through an evaluation of all the agency's offerings, including creative competence as well as the results of the project. Working with their agency on the development of the creative for a campaign provides the client with an opportunity to cognitively assess the agency's performance and affectively engage in the working relationship subsequently resulting in economic benefits, which in turn leads to superior relationship quality (Briggs et al., 2016; Levin et al., 2016).\n6. Implications: According to Yuksel (2007), \"it is a fact of corporate life that firms now and again change their advertising agencies\" (p. 33). This study has identified several issues that can reduce a client's propensity to seek alternate providers and these are discussed in the following section.\n7. Limitations and future research directions: Agency-client relationship develops over time and through a series of interactions and projects between the client and the service provider. Thus, it is difficult to model the precursors of relationship quality based on cross-sectional rather than longitudinal data. For example, Johnson et al. (2006) found that the drivers of loyalty vary over time, with performance assessments being more important initially and being superseded by attitudes over time. Hence, a longitudinal study would provide a dynamic perspective which cannot be achieved through a cross-sectional study. The current study only represents the views of clients and lacks recognition of the interdependent aspect of the client-advertising agency relationship. The account manager's role in establishing, developing and maintaining the relationship between the agency and the client is crucial. It is where the day-to-day relationship exists. It is therefore recommended that future studies consider dyadic pairings, rather than considering the client's, supplier's or service provider's perspectives and views independently. Using dyads rather than individual random samples facilitate investigation of the interdependence of the relationship. Furthermore, the impact of company size could be studied, both from the client and agency perspectives. The sample size limited segmentation of the data set, however, the size of the client company, as well as the size of the agency, may influence the relationship. Although the final model presented provides a holistic framework for the client-agency relationship, it may not be easily transferable or generalisable to other services or industries. As Drennan and McColl-Kennedy (2003) point out, businesses across service sectors need to be regarded independently and autonomously rather than assuming a 'one size fits all' model can be applied.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: This paper aims to determine the dimensions of service quality of advertising agencies and their effects on relationship quality between an advertising agency and their clients through the social and economic exchange.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The intention was to target firms which use the services of an advertising or marketing solutions agency; hence, participants were recruited from a business database service providing details for key decision makers in Australia and New Zealand. An online survey was used in this study.\nFindings: Creative competence, project management processes and project outcome influenced relationship quality through value and interpersonal relationships. However, only creativity had a significant direct relationship with relationship quality.\nPractical implications: Although creativity plays a major role in relationship development, agencies must have efficient and effective project management processes in place to ensure successful project completion within timeline and budget to be able to maintain ongoing relationships with their clients.\nOriginality/value: The research draws upon literature from three key disciplines, service quality, relationship marketing and project management, to address the gaps in the current literature related to customer relationship management in the B2B client-agency context.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Information search by applying VDL-based iconic tags: an experimental study	[ "Search user interfaces", "Information searches", "Comparative tests", "Visual structure", "Icon", "Tag" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Search user interface emphasizes on how to provide visual access to information content and structure (Sutcliffe et al., 2000). Its attraction characteristic can guide user's information search behavior and plays a navigation role in search process (Hearst, 2009). Social tags are one of useful components for search user interface design (Shiri, 2009). Tags signify the summarized information content, which is meaningful to information searching (Zhang et al., 2014). By understanding the tags provided by experts or other users, target tagged information or a group of texts with semantically related topics could be more easily found. However, the most common tag format, textual tags, may cause problems in tag-based information searching. These problems result either from different choices of words (languages) or from the diversity of users' information goals (Hendahewa and Shah, 2015). This increased variety of vocabularies and languages causes the connections between textual tags and the documents marked by these tags to become increasingly less distinctive, which could influence information-searching effectiveness.\nLiterature background: Tag-based information searching\nExperimental methods: To address the three research questions mentioned in introduction, an information searching experiment was designed and conducted. To provide complete demonstration, two typical searching modes were involved in our study: information searching without a specific target and information searching with a specific target (Lu et al., 2014). Information searching without a specific target means that user browse information based on a given organization and understands the global topic distribution, while information searching with a specific target means user finds required information from a given corpus (Jiang et al., 2015).\nResults: Five domain experts in the field of sustainable development were invited to complete the searching tasks both in sub-test 1 and sub-test 2 before the experiment. They were invited to use textual tags (to save time instructing in the use of VDL-based iconic tags) to provide answers to each search question. After the pre-test, they had a discussion if any conflict occurred within their answers. Finally, they confirmed a complete answer list for both searching tests. We applied this list to evaluate the search results of each testee. All the users finished the entire testing process in the required 100 min. Thus, the following results were extracted from all 72 participant samples.\nDiscussion: According to the statistical analysis stated above, the user in VDL-based iconic tag group identified better the implicit organization of information texts, which narrowed user's search and helped finding potential tagged information. Meanwhile, compared to the textual tag group, user in VDL-based iconic tag group discovered more accurately and quickly the search target by graphical signification of summarized text information from tags. Both in two searching cases, users in VDL-based iconic tag group were proved to perform better by applying tags in information searching revealed in search accuracy and in search speed. The demonstration of information searching experiment could answer to the three research questions mentioned in the beginning of the paper and lead to the following implications.\nConclusion: The study presented in this paper is deep research on VDL-based iconic tags with a special focus on how these tags help in information searching. Experimental results and the discussion demonstrated that VDL-based iconic tags could improve information searching processes not only in specific targets without cases but also in specific targets with cases. This study's research findings imply that VDL-based iconic tags could help users in quicker and more accurate information searching compared to textual tags. This advantage originates from the visual representation of the tag's structure and the symbolic signification of the tag's meaning, which, in turn, improves the understanding of tagged text.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Visual Distinctive Language (VDL)-based iconic tags are structured visual information annotation. They explicate the content and organization of tagged information by graphical and symbolic features in order to improve the vocabulary problems of textual tags. The purpose of this paper is to investigate how these special icons help in tagged-based user information searching.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A two-stage experiment was designed and conducted so as to follow and quantify the searching process in specific searching target case and no specific searching target case when using VDL-based iconic tags.\nFindings: The experimental results manifested that VDL-based iconic tags enhanced the role of tag in information searching. They could make user better understand tag clusters, which, in turn, provide global structure of involved topics. Also, VDL-based iconic tags helped user to find out searching target more quickly with higher accuracy by taking advantages of visual representation of tag categories and symbolic signification of tag content.\nOriginality/value: This study is one of the first to verify how structured icons work in information searching and how user's graphical cognition impacts on tag-based information searching process. The research findings are dedicated to the theory of VDL-based iconic tags, as well as to a new visualization method for search user interface design.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Future sustainable supply chains: what should companies scan?	[ "Supply chain management", "Sustainable development" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1 Sustainable supply chains: the need for grasping the environment: Originally dubbed \"eco development\" (at the Stockholm 1972 International Conference), the concept of \"sustainable development\" was finally defined in the IUCN,1980 World Conservation Strategy report (1980) and acknowledged in Rio de Janeiro earth summit or \"The United Nations Conference on Environment and Development\" (UNCED) held in Rio de Janeiro from 3 to 14 June 1992 as \"a development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs\". While different trends exist, the most widespread one supports the triple bottom line approach combining environmental friendliness, social responsibility and economic development. Academic and corporate interest in sustainable development has been growing and the recent worldwide financial and energy crises are likely to reinforce the weight of sustainable development within public and corporate strategic objectives.The last decades have shown great changes in logistics, operation management and supply chain management (SCM) in companies, and today's organizations are still reorganizing and streamlining their supply chains so as to better face strategic challenges. Considering the development of complex worldwide production/distribution networks and of global commodity/value chains (Bairns, 2005), sustainable development issues involve not only firms but entire supply chains as well. Most experts are convinced that sustainable development requirements will have a strong impact on logistics, operations management and SCM, and that \"all industries will be challenged to reorganize their supply chains\" (Vachon and Mao, 2008, p. 1552). This would suggest that the unit that will be dealt with in future strategic re-engineering will not be the individual firm but the network of collaborating companies, and that great changes will have to be made regarding supply chain processes and SCM.SCM is a pulled-oriented approach in charge of practically linking demand and supply. SCM has many meanings and has given rise to research at many levels (Mentzer et al., 2001). In accordance with an extended supply chain approach recently recommended by Linton et al. (2007), we refer to SCM as an integrative philosophy to manage total flows as cooperatively as possible, from the earliest raw materials suppliers to the ultimate customers, and beyond, namely the disposal and recycling processes, too. Thus, like Chen and Paulraj (2004, p. 121), we consider that \"the business world is composed of a network of interdependent relationships developed and fostered through strategic collaboration with to the goal of deriving mutual benefits\". In line with the typology of Larson et al. (2007, p. 4), we adopt the unionist perspective, in which \"SCM subsumes many traditional business functional areas, including purchasing, logistics, operations, and marketing\". Since this perspective \"espouses a multiple function SCM concept\" (Larson et al., 2007, p. 6), we subscribe to a broad and deep SCM perspective. In line with these conceptual bases, we view supply chains in their highest degree of complexity as defined by Mentzer et al. (2001, p. 4): the \"ultimate supply chain\" that \"includes all the organizations involved in all the upstream and downstream flows of products, services, finances, and information from the initial supplier to the ultimate customer\".The growing concern about sustainable development has an increasingly greater impact upon supply chains and SCM. As stated by Linton et al. (2007, p. 1078):[...] sustainability also must integrate issues and flows that extend beyond the core of SCM: product design, manufacturing by-products, by-products produced during product use, product life extension, product end-of-life, and recovery processes at end-of-life.Beyond these requirements, sustainable supply chains are considered to be a strategic lever for firms. Researchers in SCM explore the links between sustainability-related competencies and competitive positions in highly competitive industries (Flint and Golicic, 2009). They urge firms to strategically undertake sustainable SCM in order to achieve higher economic performance (Carter and Rogers, 2008), or to find new areas of competitive advantage (Markley and Davis, 2007). Consequently, in their recent literature review dedicated to sustainable SCM, Seuring and Muller (2008, p. 1699) point out that \"operations, purchasing and supply chain managers have seen the integration of environmental and social issues [...] into their daily tasks\". They also conclude that, \"the focal company quite often has to take a longer part of the supply chain into account\", and must have \"information on the environmental and social performance at the single productions stages\" of its suppliers (Seuring and Muller, 2008, p. 1703). Focal firms are thus expected to take a wider environmental perspective, particularly those wanting \"to prepare for the uncharted road, especially if they want to be pioneers or early adopters\" of sustainable operations and SCM (Kleindorfer et al., 2005, p. 490).Sustainable development issues exert pressures upon companies, encouraging them to redesign their supply chains. These issues are complex (many intertwined factors are to be considered), hence modern organizations will have to get to grips with their environments, especially when they are both involved in embedded supply chains and intent upon tackling sustainable development issues. Therefore, companies need to scan their environment, but what should they scan? As is the case with SCM, we take a broad and deep approach of the environment: in this paper, the word stands for the whole surrounding context of the firm and of its supply chains, hence not limited to its ecological dimension. In line with Frishammar (2002, p. 145-6), environment refers to \"all of the relevant factors outside an organization's boundary that are incorporated into its decision making\". Since \"most managers identified the need for forecasting as one of the most important managerial roles\" (Raspin and Terjesen, 2007, p. 4), we suggest that organizations will potentially have to renew the way they delineate their supply chains and scan their environments to provide relevant information for proper forecasting. Our research program aims to provide an adequate scanning framework that could structure the way companies look for information they can put to use for future sustainable supply chain design. Our research questions are as follows:RQ1. In order to face new sustainable development issues, what should companies scan in their supply chains' environment?RQ2. Do traditional scanning approaches and targets fit these new requirements?RQ3. Should new frameworks be developed?Our article is organized as follows. First, since environmental scanning is an important topic in strategy, we analyze the dedicated literature to check whether scanning approaches fit sustainable supply chain's imperatives or not. Second, concluding that available scanning approaches do not explicitly address sustainable supply chain issues, our research design and methodology have been devised to question their relevance to sustainable supply chain scanning. Our results will then be presented and discussed, encapsulated in the concept of \"sustainable scanning framework\". We shall conclude by summing up our research contributions, while discussing its limits and highlighting future research needs.\n2 Findings from literature review: The first step of our research was to explore the scanning literature. We first referred to academic papers, identified through a broad literature analysis of a doctoral dissertation (Roussat, 1996). Second, we updated these early readings, thanks to a free literature research and a mechanical one bearing on all the journals found in Emerald and Science Direct databases, where we focused on articles published since 2000. \"environmental scanning\" was sought as an exact match in all fields (Emerald) or in abstract/title/keywords (Science Direct), and then completed with \"competitive intelligence\" and/or \"corporate intelligence\" searches. We also sought for associations between environmental scanning and \"sustainable supply chain\", \"sustainable development\" and \"sustainability\". The whole literature analysis, whose details can be provided on request, has been conducted in several steps since 2007.2.1 Environmental scanning to face strategic challenges\n3 Research design and methodology: In order to question the relevance of scanning frameworks and targets for sustainable supply chains design, we explored data sources in various fields. We analyzed sustainable supply chains and SCM empirical studies to find out which salient points or relevant targets were to be considered, and we sought knowledge and know-how from sustainable supply chain \"experts\". The choice of such data is justified by state-of-the-art scanning literature (Section 2) and the need to capture detailed and practice-related data to challenge existing scanning frameworks and targets.3.1 Collecting secondary data through sustainable supply chain case studies\n4 Towards a scanning framework for sustainable supply chains: 4.1 Generating the scanning framework\n5 Conclusion: Focusing on sustainable supply chains leads us to apply a (systemic) gaze, looking at phenomena from a new angle of perception thus urging scanners to develop a vision \"beyond established categories\" (Neugarten, 2006 p. 903), to explore \"new alternatives and challenge the status quo way of thinking\" (Veflen Olsen and Sallis, 2006, p. 51). Thus, our sustainable scanning framework balances the \"research fails to recognise SCM's role for further analysing sustainability issues\" (Sigala, 2008, p. 1590) and draw up several results: they provide an early conceptual answer to our research questions (Sections 1 and 2), and lay out its managerial implications for managers confronted with sustainable development issues who need to scan their environment before redesigning their supply chain. We asked what companies should scan for in their supply chain environments and, more precisely, what should be the scope, the targets and the orientation of a sustainable scanning process. Based on our results (Section 4), we promote a wide, multi-level, scanning scope (Section 4.2) and suggest that \"sustainable scanning\" cannot rely on a single organization given that it has proved necessary to scan at network level with a supply chain orientation (Section 4.3). Scanning people's attitudes, orientations and creativity (and their evolution) is part of the scope (Section 4.2). Besides, to improve sustainable scanning, we recommend combining standard targets with new ones and considering interactions leading to the emergence of new actors and factors to scan (Section 4.4). Finally, we observed that sustainable developments modify scanning priorities (Section 4.5). We propose a draft for a sustainable scanning framework (Section 4.6) that complements existing models while pointing out puzzling issues related to territory and temporal boundaries. Those will have to be taken into account, while individual representation and scanning practices need to improve.From a more theoretical point of view, the sustainable scanning framework offers part of a new scanning methodology promoting a scanning orientation using more adaptable and flexible practices, together with a supply chain orientation (Mentzer et al., 2001), thus complementing the scanning literature. The findings concerning the boundaries of the scanning scope (Section 4.6) have theoretical implications for SCM research: geographic, temporal and activity boundaries as well as matters of supply chain and network representation have proved relevant, thus questioning the units of analysis in SCM research. In line with the IMP perspective, by rejecting the idea of natural boundaries (networks are borderless), it is important to argue in favor of setting up the arbitrary boundaries (or levels of analysis) to be used in SCM. This implication is in line with Holmen and Pedersen's (2003) distinction between the network context (the part of the network that the actor considers relevant), the network horizon (comprising those other firms and relationships a focal firm is aware of - whether or not it considers them relevant) and the environment, that begins when the horizon ends. As for the network context, the scanning scope is thus a matter of the firm's (or the researcher's) \"choice of perspective\", which is in turn related to the firm's (or the researcher's) cognitive process.This is a first stage of a research program dedicated to scanning for sustainable supply chain design. It undoubtedly presents some limitations. First, we have chosen to focus on environmental scanning, a research trend in strategic management, dealing with the collection of relevant external data within the firm's environment (Section 1). To determine the nature of the information suitable for scanning, we could also have explored corporate environmental management literature or research trends addressing the strategic orientation of the firms with regards to its supply chain or environment (supply strategy, strategic renewal or stakeholders' theory for example) and presenting more recent approaches. Second, to widen our field material, we could have used other PhD dissertations from other countries and extended our research to other academic papers databases, along with interviewing more experts. Unsurprisingly, our field investigations mostly return to the \"ecological\" dimension of sustainable development, due to clear research focalization on that sustainable pillar (as mentioned by Seuring and Muller, 2008) and to experts' deeper awareness on these themes. Finally, the framework we propose is more a methodology than a tool, so Table IV can be considered as lacking in operationalization.This research has enabled us to generate a framework for future research. Future research should involve several stages which are needed to validate the usefulness of this conceptual framework so as to come up with managerial guidelines. First, the framework needs to be compared with existing day-to-day sustainable scanning practices and operations, through case studies and surveys conducted in companies that want to redesign their supply chains to face up to (or take advantage of) sustainability requirements. The discrepancies between framework and practices will then be analyzed and discussed with managers and experts distributed in focus groups. The usefulness of the suggestions as to changing the scope, the targets and their prioritization, as well as the role of people in scanning practices, could be tested through action research. Thanks to such in-depth approach of sustainable scanning practices bearing on actual sustainable SCM topics will also permit to answer questions such as: how can companies cover such a deep and broad scope of scanning? In order to draw a \"big and relevant picture\", is it possible to develop collaborative scanning practices within a supply chain or a company network? Can we develop tools or methods to analyze interactions between factors and \"read\" the overall picture provided by the scanning results? Does the framework improve people's representation of their company's supply chain and network, and does it incite them to contribute to scanning operations? Are time and space boundaries issues useful to focus and prioritize scanning? Future field research could also explore further research avenues related to the determining factors for scanning practices. In particular, it could be used to check whether scanning practices (and scanning scope) depend on the position of the company in the chain; on the company's future visibility (fighting for short-term survival or not); on the partners operating in its supply chains and on the gaps in logistics, SCM and on the sustainable maturity of the actors in the chain.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - Companies that try to build sustainable supply chains or that have to reengineer their supply chains to face sustainable development issues are confronted with such a complex and uncertain context that scanning their environment becomes more than ever necessary. This paper makes up the first stage of a research program. It aims to find an adequate scanning approach for sustainable supply chain design.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The research follows a two-steps methodology. First, it looks for appropriate scanning frameworks by reviewing the dedicated literature. Second, it gathers ideas and knowledge combining an analysis of sustainable supply chain empirical studies with the collection of experts' scanning know-how, by means of semi-structured interviews.\nFindings: - This first stage of the research program suggests use of a multi-and interrelated levels scope for sustainable scanning with a network perspective. The renewed target approach it promotes results in modifying scanning priorities. The overall findings shape up the first draft of a sustainable scanning framework, including a multi-levels scope of analysis, a list of sustainable targets and a first contribution concerning scanning methods and attitudes.\nResearch limitations/implications: - The relevance of our scanning framework needs further testing to validate its usefulness and provide recommendations for managers.\nPractical implications: - The paper proposes a scanning framework and a list of targets that could be implemented by professionals.\nOriginality/value: - The contribution in this paper is to link environmental scanning and sustainable development adding a supply chain orientation, and to propose a conceptual \"sustainable scanning framework\". It is hoped that further research will prove that it has interesting managerial implications for companies challenged by sustainable development issues.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
A quantitative approach for measuring the degree of flexibility of business process models	[ "Quantitative approach", "Business process flexibility", "Change operations", "Emergency care process", "Measurement distance", "Model variant" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The field of BPM has gained the attention of organizations. BPM includes methods, techniques, and tools to support the design, enactment, management, and analysis of operational business processes (Nurcan, 2008). In particular, the topic of business process flexibility has become a center of attention from both commercial and research institutions as understanding of requirements for business processes (Mulyar et al., 2008). Flexibility has also been following the evolution of BPM, especially because of its ability to adapt business processes to predicted and unpredicted real-world changing scenarios.\n2. Related work: In this section, we present some background on business process flexibility measurement. In literature, there is very little explicit criteria that can be used to measure business process flexibility. In this setting, many research works have developed this idea, such as Kasi and Tang (2005), Eijndhoven et al. (2008), and Jansen-Vullers et al. (2007). Flexibility can also refer to the degree of variation that a process permits. This flexibility can be discussed in relation to the event logs the process produces (Dumas et al., 2013).\n3. Background: 3.1 Previous work\n4. Methodology for measuring flexibility: In this paper, we provide a new methodology for measuring flexibility of business processes. We explain first the research methodology we have followed in order to define the different steps.\n5. Case study: an EC business process: In this section, we are going to give first a description of the EC process. Then, we will present the main changes that can occur.\n6. Simulation: In our simulation, we describe how the simulation is setup in the next subsection, and discuss simulation results afterwards.\n7. Conclusion and future work: 7.1 Implications to theory and practice\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to measure the flexibility of business process models. The authors give the notions of flexible process distance, which corresponds to the number of change operations needed for transforming one process model into another, considering the different perspectives (functional, operational, behavioral, informational, and organizational).\nDesign/methodology/approach: The proposed approach is a quantitative-based approach to measure the flexibility of business process models. In this context, the authors presented a method to compute the distance between two process models. The authors measured the distance between a process model and a process variant in terms of the number of high-level change operations (e.g. to insert or delete actors) needed to transform the process model into the respective variant when a change occurred, considering the different perspectives and the flexible features.\nFindings: To evaluate the flexibility-measurement approach, the authors performed a comprehensive simulation using an emergency care (EC) business process model and its variants. The authors used a real-world EC process and illustrated the possible changes faced in the emergency department (possible variants). Simulation results were promising because they fit the flexibility needs of the EC process users. This was validated using the authors' previous work which consists in a guidance approach for business process flexibility.\nResearch limitations/implications: The authors defined six different distances between business process models, which are summarized in the definition of total process distance. However, changes in one perspective may lead to changes in other perspectives. For instance, adding a new activity may lead to adding a new actor.\nPractical implications: The results of this study would help companies to obtain important information about their processes and to compare the desired level of flexibility with their actual process flexibility.\nOriginality/value: This study is probably the first flexibility-measurement approach which incorporates features for capturing changes affecting the functional, operational, informational, organizational, and behavioral perspectives as well as elements related to approaches enhancing flexibility.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
The impact of relationship between IT staff and users on employee outcomes of IT users	[ "Job satisfaction", "Partial least squares", "Work performance", "Social capital theory" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: End users in the organization rely on information technology (IT) service to work more efficiently, and IT service is critical to the operations of organizations. Thus, IT service has been recognized as a critical enabler of business performance (Mithas and Rust, 2016). Firms invested much money in IT to provide support for employees. In the USA, corporations allocate more than 50 percent of their capital investment to IT in 2009 (Ong and Chen, 2016). Because of large amount of IT investments, organizations often predict a large return on the investments (Sabherwal and Jeyaraj, 2015). However, the value obtained by organizations is not always as much as they anticipated. This phenomenon is referred to by information systems (IS) researchers as \"inefficiency and ineffectiveness of information systems development\" (Hatzakis et al., 2005, p. 60).\nTheoretical background: What is social capital?\nTheoretical framework and hypotheses: Figure 1 illustrates our conceptual model that relates three dimensions of social capital to job-related outcomes, as measured by job satisfaction and performance. In the model, three dimensions of social capital serve as the antecedents to knowledge sharing and IT service quality. Knowledge sharing between IT staff and users is anticipated to have a positive effect on IT service quality. In addition, knowledge sharing and IT service quality are posited to contribute to job satisfaction and job performance of IT users, respectively. Job satisfaction is also expected to have a positive relationship with the job performance of those users.\nMethodology: Data collection\nData analysis and results: Common method bias\nDiscussion: Key findings\nConclusion: This research serves as an exploration of the effect mechanisms through which social capital between IT staff and users affect users' employee outcomes, which are job satisfaction and job performance in this study. Drawing on social capital theory and past literature, we developed a model suggesting that social capital between IT staff and users encourages knowledge sharing and improves the quality of IT service, which in turn affects users' job satisfaction and performance. The effect mechanisms of social capital on employee outcomes are distinguished by performing a bootstrapping mediation test. The results indicate that three dimensions of social capital each have a positive relationship with employee outcomes but through different paths. This study verifies the vital role of social capital between IT staff and users in improving users' job satisfaction and performance and deepens our understanding of how social capital can be used to increase benefits of the IT staff-user relationship.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: Firms invest much money in information technology (IT) since IT support has been recognized as a critical enabler of employee outcomes. However, the value obtained by organizations and their employees is not always as much as they anticipated because of, at least partly, a poor relationship between IT staff and users. The purpose of this paper is to apply the social capital theory to examine relationship management between IT and business and explores mechanisms through which social capital between IT staff and users affect users' employee outcomes, including job satisfaction and job performance.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Based on social capital theory and past literature, the researchers propose a research model and explore the effect of social capital on knowledge sharing, IT users' perceived service quality, job satisfaction and ultimately job performance. Based on a survey of 289 respondents, this study applies the partial least square technique to test the research model.\nFindings: Mediation test was performed to explore the effect mechanisms of social capital on employee outcomes, and the results indicate that three dimensions of social capital affect IT users' job satisfaction and job performance in different approaches.\nOriginality/value: This study uses social capital theory to direct how to improve the poor relationship between IT staff and users and provides a useful insight into the mechanisms through which three dimensions of social capital improve users' job satisfaction and job performance.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Productivity gains through standardization-of-work in a manufacturing company	[ "Manufacturing industry", "Lean manufacturing", "Process management", "Industrial engineering", "Standardization" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Lean manufacturing (LM) principles were developed 1950s by Taiichi Ohno at Toyota Motor company (Fricke, 2010). Later, the lean thinking got different names for defining the manufacturing strategies like agile, just-in-time, repetitive manufacturing, stockless manufacturing, synchronous manufacturing, Toyota production system, world-class manufacturing, etc. All these names are used in parallel with LM (Altekar and Burte, 2003; Gaither and Frazier, 2004). Garg et al. (2016) achieved a significant productivity improvement in terms of setup changeover time (86 percent) by implementing the single minute exchange of die in a corrugation box manufacturing industry. LM aims at half the human effort, half the manufacturing space and half the engineering hours to develop a new product in half the time (Womack et al., 1990). LM is a multi-level process to recognize and prioritize the waste as non-value-adding activities and provides recommendations to reduce/eradicate them. Taiichi Ohno developed the LM technique as a means of meeting customer demands with minimum delay. Earlier, instead of reducing wastages, LM was also recognized as stockless production as it focuses on the reduction of inventory levels at shop floor (O'Brien, 2001). This includes proper coordination between workstations so as to produce exact volume (Nordin and Baba, 2011). Reduced costs, eradication of waste and process integration are the fundamentals of industry's success globally (Rahul and Kaler, 2013; Mor et al., 2017; Mor, Singh, Bhoria and Bhardwaj, 2018). LM consists of describing the production flow and setting up the production shop floor with a smooth and unobstructed flow of materials (Duggan, 2012). This setup ensures that the materials will undergo manufacturing without queuing or stoppage (Bhardwaj et al., 2018).\n2. Literature review: Abreu et al. (2017) studied various production support tools that were developed as a temporary solution to solve a specific problem in the manufacturing industry. Marksberry et al. (2011) found that standardized work as a lean tool is being applied by various companies over the years, and Toyota uses standardized work as an analysis tool which requires a support structure, that is, not fully understood. Ingvaldsen et al. (2013) presented a case study at the manufacturing industry and concluded that the standardized work leads to continual improvement. LM helps to leverage the competence of an enterprise by eliminating waste and NVAs from the manufacturing system (Singh et al., 2009; Womack et al., 1990). LM has the potential to improve operational efficiencies, quality and financial performance of the industry (Kumar and Kumar, 2012). Standardized work not only controls the process, but also minimizes the cost and maximizes the overall efficiency of an organization (Wang et al., 2010). Dave (2012) defined the standard work as specific instructions that help to make a product in the most efficient way. The author highlighted the importance of implementing the standard work. LM affects all areas of a business, major changes take place in manufacturing management, purchasing, human resources management and quality management. Whereas the lean execution needs the acceptance of the fundamental concepts of the lean production system (Shah and Ward, 2003; Mor et al., 2017). A lean enterprise will produce greater value for the shareholders, higher levels of customer satisfaction and above all greater employee satisfaction as all play an active role in continuous improvement. Oehmen (2012) suggested that for the successful implementation of LM all the elements must be properly understood, measured and implemented. It is very difficult to take care of each of these elements individually without any structured approach. The approach adopted here is to divide all the elements into seven major elements, which covers some of the lean basics (Singh et al., 2010).\n3. Methodology: The standard work tool (an enabler of lean) was executed followed by the action-research methodology. The core making section of case company was studied comprehensively and found that it consisted of total 29 operations per product cycle. Out of these 29 operations, 16 were manual operations (say Mp), 13 were machine operations (say Ma). Some operations were being performed simultaneously also, i.e., man-machine activities (say Mm). Being an industrial engineer, the aim was to club Mp and Ma activities in the Mm activities up to the maximum possible. This resulted in reducing the idle time for both man and machine, and hence, an increased productivity. However, the name of the manufacturing company is not disclosed anywhere in this paper as per industry's privacy policy. The need for SW in current study came from various aspects, such as:\n4. Case study: In the diagnosis phase, the current status of core making section was analyzed and some analysis and diagnosis tools such as process chart, sequence diagram and Ishikawa chart were considered. In the action planning phase, an action plan was formed and a proposal was developed by suggesting forms to solve the problem. The persons responsible for the execution of SW as well as the places to execute and the moment of execution was also identified. This section describes the phases of standard work execution process, i.e., action taking (Stage 3) of action-research methodology. Stages 4 and 5 are presented in the next section, i.e., discussions, of this paper.\n5. Results and discussion: The current study illustrated an important step to provide more visibility to the LM concept by addressing the problem of lack of standard procedures. The process study revealed that the average man-time and machine-time of the core making process were 287 s and 332 s, respectively, per product cycle. The representation of the shop-floor situation in the parts-production capacity worktable indicated that the capacity in this particular workstation should be 54 parts per 7 h work shift at the current pace. This was a relatively good capacity since it was slightly higher than the Takt time of core making process. Finally, the standard worktable facilitated in identifying the key bottleneck elements. The standard work combination chart offered a better visual representation of the operations against their respective cycle time.\n6. Conclusions: Lean production is an umbrella term which basically means \"doing more with less\" at no or little investment from the company. In this context, the current study started with the aim of filling the research gap for exploring the NVAs of core making process in a manufacturing company. Various NVAs were identified in discussion with shop-floor executives and were recorded after continuous process study including the method study and motion analysis followed by the standard operating procedures. SW was executed to eradicate the NVAs and it helped in enhancing the productivity of the particular core making process up to 6.5 percent by eliminating the NVAs. This improved the level of safety, provided more process flexibility and enabled the cost reduction in the context of core making. The productivity gains in the current study were compared with the previous research work in this area and were found approximately the same as achieved by Rahul and Kaler (2013), Womack et al. and Mor et al. (2016). The productivity gains in the current study were substantially higher than Bhardwaj et al. (2018), Mor, Singh, Bhoria and Bhardwaj (2018) and Garg et al. (2016). The results of the current study have significant relevance with past research works in this area and hence, the results appear to be reliable.\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to identify the non-value-adding activities (NVAs) of core making process and to eliminate them through the standardization-of-work (SW) procedures in a manufacturing company.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The action-research methodology was adopted for the current study. First, various lean tools were identified through literature review, and the bottleneck area was identified in discussion with the shop-floor executives. NVAs were recorded after a continuous process study including method study and motion analysis followed by the standard operating procedure. Second, the standardized work combination tables were prepared and NVAs were eliminated using the SW procedures. SW has been opted because it is a set of actions which helps in analyzing, improving and controlling the process and it leads to continual improvement.\nFindings: The production logbook revealed that the capacity in this particular workstation was 54 pieces per 7 h work shift against the current production of approx. 45-50 pieces (past data). SW saved 31.6 s per cycle which boosted the production up to 58 pieces per 7 h work shift. Finally, the authors came to know that the productivity of this particular process increased up to 6.5 percent which may upsurge if this action is executed continually with the support from shop-floor executives and management. These results were also compared with previous research works in this area and found significant relevance, and hence, the results appear to be reliable.\nResearch limitations/implications: This is a unique study in itself which explores the lean model by assessing NVAs of core making process. The proposed approach needs to be tested across different other core making processes of the case company so as to generalize the effectiveness of SW as well as the results obtained in the current study.\nPractical implications: The current study illustrates an important step to give more visibility to the lean concept by addressing the problem of lack of standard procedures. This study will help the shop-floor executives and managers to focus their efforts in achieving high performance through effective implementation of SW. The study should be of the interest of researchers in the area of lean manufacturing, operations management, productivity analysis, etc.\nOriginality/value: The findings of this study are based on the problem formulation for productivity gains using SW procedures in the case company. The study introduces a new perspective for the execution of SW for core making processes. SW created transparency in workflow, enhanced the safety and eliminated the 3Ms. The outcome of the current study was discussed with the production team and management of the company to validate the productivity gains and received an optimistic response. Most importantly, these improvements were achieved with no investment in machinery or tooling.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Gender and the #MeToo effect in Spanish professional football organizations: an exploratory qualitative approach	[ "Gender", "Football", "Women", "#MeToo", "Glass ceiling", "Management positions" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: In the fall of 2017, the phenomenon known as #MeToo became a global topic. However, the movement itself was actually created a decade before by Tarana Burke with the mission to help victims of sexual harassment and assault. The #MeToo movement has later been characterized as an online, social media phenomenon that specifically serves to provide support for those who disclose sexual harassment and assault (Brown and Battle, 2019, p. 58). One of its main outcomes has been the increase of social consensus regarding the treatment of victims who have suffered workplace harassment (Brown and Battle, 2019). Nevertheless, different effects of the movement across the world; not only between countries but also in different organizations have been observed (Boyle and Cucchiara, 2018). For example, in Sweden, the repercussion of the #MeToo movement influenced the creation of a new law prohibiting non-consensual sex, which came into force in July 2018 (Pollack, 2019). The campaign also raised awareness in sports, where it brought forth the need to talk about victimization openly (Abrams and Bartlett, 2019). It is known that sexual harassment occurs in every sports group, but mainly in \"masculine\" sports (Fasting et al., 2004).\nMethodology: To answer the two research questions of this paper, what impact has the #MeToo movement has in the football sector (RQ1) and how does a gender approach help to understand women's position in football organizations (RQ2), 24 interviews were carried out with professionals in the sector. The interviewees were 12 men and 12 women from clubs, organizations or companies directly related to the football industry in Spain. Interviews were conducted by telephone (22) and face-to-face (2). The use of in-depth telephone interviewing in qualitative research is a controversial subject (Holt, 2010; Cachia and Millward, 2011); the method that is typically used is quantitative research. However, different studies have confirmed the data collected from the qualitative analysis has methodological strengths in a range of sectors and has come to the conclusion that telephone interviews are a valid and effective procedure (Carr and Worth, 2001; Sturges and Hanrahan, 2004; Holt, 2010; Cachia and Millward, 2011). Telephone interviewing was chosen for two reasons; firstly, because of the geographical distance, and secondly, because of the limited availability of the participants. The semi-structured, in-depth interviews (DiCicco-Bloom and Crabtree, 2006) revealed the current status of men and women working in this sector. The structure of the interview was based on the three levels proposed in Risman's \"gender as a social structure\" model. Additionally, we included questions related to the #MeToo movement and the effects it has had on each level.\nResults: The effect of the #MeToo movement and sexual discrimination in football\nConclusions: The impact of the #MeToo movement in the football sector\nPractical implications: Concerning the practical implications of this study, our results are made available to all interested parties within the football sector to offer an approximated understanding of the current situation of women working in this area.\nLimitations of the study and future research lines: Limitations\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the effects of the #MeToo movement in the work environment of professional football organizations in Spain. It also explores the current situation of the professional career of women working in this industry to know if the opportunities are equal for men and women to reach management or executive positions.\nDesign/methodology/approach: From a gender approach and considering gender as a social structure (Risman, 2004), the authors are going to analyse men and women's professional careers in football organizations from a three-dimensional gender perspective (individual, interactional and institutional). The objective is twofold: to know the effect of the #MeToo movement in these organizations; and also to know the opinion of both men and women of these organizations concerning gender influence for women's career progression. The methodology implemented in this investigation is qualitative; 24 in-depth interviews (12 men and 12 women) have been carried out with professionals from different executive positions in both football clubs and organizations.\nFindings: The gender approach improves current knowledge about women's roles in the football industry. The exploratory analysis of the results shows that although the #MeToo phenomenon is relatively known it has had an indirect impact in Spanish football, where its consequences have not been as visible as in other sectors.\nOriginality/value: The paper provides an exploratory approach by analysing the effects of the #MeToo movement in the football sector, an area where almost no previous research has been done. Also, it presents the main factors that influence women's professional careers in this sector and the significance of the recent #MeToo phenomenon in the football industry.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
Family purchase decision making at the bottom of the pyramid	[ "Purchase decision making", "Bottom of pyramid", "Family", "Children", "Zimbabwe", "Decision making", "Consumers" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: An executive summary for managers and executive readers can be found at the end of this article.\nBackground and purpose: International business research has increasingly focused on emerging and underdeveloped markets as areas from which new insights can be drawn (Ni and Wan, 2008). Although the tendency has been to treat these markets as one that displays similar consumer behavioural trends and processes, this approach does not acknowledge differing characteristics in such markets. The original description of the bottom of pyramid market (BOP) describes a large body of consumers whose annual income on a purchasing power parity basis is less than US$1,500 per year and number approximately 4 billion (Hart, 2002). However, there have been other attempts to classify this market in view of changing world demographic and economic circumstances. Consensus has been to use the World Bank classification which, when rounded up, classifies BOP consumers as those who live on less than US$1 a day (Banerjee and Duflo, 2006; Mahajan and Banga, 2006; Prahalad, 2005). This classification was further expanded to households of consumers who live on less than $2 a day (Rangan et al., 2007). This level takes into consideration changing global income patterns since the World Development Report (World Bank, 1990) and encompasses consumers able to purchase a wider variety of basic products such as foodstuffs and personal hygiene products, in addition to meeting basic needs for shelter and sanitation (Rangan et al., 2007).Evolution of the literature on the BOP raises the need for researchers to investigate consumer behaviour in these markets, without necessarily treating BOP consumers as homogeneous but acknowledging common constraints that can be found in these environments (Hart, 2002; Prahalad, 2002; Prahalad and Hart, 2002). The call for increased business attention towards the BOP was primarily advocated by Prahalad (2005) although Hart (2002) is credited with initiating discussion of the concept.At a global level, the major BOP markets are to be found in countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia, East Asia and non-resource rich countries in Latin America and the Caribbean (World Bank, 2008). Africa's BOP market had an estimated value in 2007 of US$429 billion (Hammond et al., 2007) and the BOP consumer is the dominant consumer in this region. Population growth between 2005 and 2050 is forecast to be highest in this region compared to other regions with BOP markets (Hammond et al., 2007). Proponents of serving the BOP argue that the challenges in serving the market do not just lie in the large number of people but in the distinct challenge of re-inventing western models of doing business to fit local needs and requirements (Prahalad and Hart, 2002; Mahajan and Banga, 2006; Viswanathan et al., 2008). Addressing this challenge requires understanding the behaviour of consumers and how they make decisions when buying products given the constraints they face in a changing environment.There is an opposing school of thought that questions the desirability of focussing on the BOP market, pointing to the lack of consensus on classification, the size of the market, and the problems of reducing poverty (Bendell, 2005; Hopkins, 2005; Jenkins, 2005; Crabtree, 2007; Karnani, 2006; Landrum, 2007). However, there is general consensus by both advocates and opponents of firm engagement with the BOP on the fact that there will never be agreement on actual size and classification of the market but that it is an important market which requires increased research on its dynamics and the behaviour of its consumers (Crabtree, 2007; Landrum, 2007).The purpose of this paper is to examine the nature of family purchase decision making at the BOP using a study of BOP consumers in Zimbabwe. The primary objective is to identify the purchase approach used, the role of the family in this approach and the types of roles assumed by different family members, given the constraints they face in the dynamic environment that characterises the BOP. This focus on the family is because of the claim that it constitutes one of the most important influences on consumer decision making (Brown, 1979; Hawkins et al., 2004). However, this study seeks to establish how differences in family make up and the role the family plays in individual's lives, shapes their decision making. The primary motivation is to expand knowledge about how BOP consumers behave in sub-Saharan African markets. This is an area that existing literature, with its focus on Asia and Latin America, does not extensively cover. Further motivation is driven by Thomson et al.'s (2007) argument that qualitative investigation will enable researchers to learn more about the processes and complexities of family purchasing given the opportunity it provides researchers to study consumers in their environment. The study also seeks to address calls (Banerjee and Duflo, 2006; D'Andrea et al., 2006) for increased research on understanding BOP consumers' approach to decision making and how they generate a livelihood.Although our study is focused on BOP consumers in Zimbabwe, it acknowledges potential differences in family purchase decision making in other African BOP markets. At the same time however, insights from this study can contribute towards further understanding, given common constraints that BOP consumers may face. The paper is structured as follows: the literature review overviews environmental constraints faced by BOP consumers that can influence their purchase decision making followed by a review of the role of the parties involved in family purchase decision making. An outline of the methods used to collect data in the research context of Zimbabwe is followed by a discussion of the findings, implications, limitations and future research.\nLiterature review: Constraints faced by BOP consumers\nResearch context and methodology: Zimbabwe is an example of a BOP market that has been subject to policy induced risks, giving rise to social conflict, political instability, and economic mismanagement, not uncommon in emerging economies (Scoones et al., 2006). These events have caused population movements and given rise to four distinct groups of BOP consumers referred to as diluted urban, urban based, rural-urban based and rural based (Consumer Council of Zimbabwe, 2007; Ministry of Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare, 2006).The diluted urban group are consumers who were a part of the middle class until national economic problems saw their income dropping to the BOP levels of less than US$1 a day. Occupational categories in this group are teachers, senior public servants, nurses, middle management, and tradespeople. They can be distinguished from the urban based BOP group, consumers who live permanently in the urban areas, are mostly active in the informal sector where they are self employed, and mostly live in rented accommodation in high density areas. They constitute about 32 per cent of the total BOP (Central Statistical Office, 2007; Mass Public Opinion Institute, 2007).Rural-urban based BOP consumers are those who have migrated from the rural areas to the urban areas in search of either formal employment or informal employment. Rural to urban migration is the most common form of migration in Zimbabwe. At least 68 per cent of migration that takes place in Zimbabwe is rural to urban migration (Central Statistical Office, 2007; Maphosa, 2007). They maintain temporary lodgings in the urban areas whilst their families stay in the main lodgings in the rural areas. They visit their rural home once or twice a month depending on availability of income and are likely to take basic provisions back home to the rural areas during their visits. This group constitutes about 22 per cent of the BOP (Central Statistical Office, 2007; Mass Public Opinion Institute, 2007).The rural-based group is made up of peasants who are permanently based in rural areas. Their main economic activity is centred on agricultural activities and informal, small scale enterprises. This group constitutes at least 43 per cent of the BOP (Central Statistical Office, 2007). However, this group is the least active in direct purchasing of goods such as food and personal hygiene products because of their dependence on provisions bought for them by family members who are in the other three groups and also on donations from non-governmental organisations. Interviews and focus groups were drawn from each of these four groups.A mixed research methods approach was used to collect data between 2006 and 2008 drawing insights from the specific BOP context of Zimbabwe. Qualitative consumer interviews and focus groups for consumers (Axinn and Pearce, 2006; Creswell, 2007) were supplemented by ethnographic observations. These techniques permitted multiple sources of information from multiple approaches, a form of triangulation (Clark and Creswell, 2008).A total of 65 semi-structured personal interviews were conducted with Zimbabean BOP consumers to establish how they made purchases. These interviews were conducted while living with informants in their local environments (Wolcott, 1999), enabling the researcher to observe how consumers conducted their purchases and to identify the different players in the process. Interviews were augmented by observations made whilst staying with respondents and accompanying them on shopping trips and attendance at community meetings. Sixteen such meetings were attended: women's community club meetings, self- help group meetings and church meetings. These meetings exposed the researcher to the collective nature of sharing information among BOP consumers and on different aspects of their lives, including how they made product purchases. Four focus groups were conducted with BOP consumers to complement personal interviews (Morgan, 1993).Based on prior discussion with community leaders and BOP consumers, 22 interviewees were selected from the urban based BOP group, 17 from the group of rural-urban based BOP consumers, 14 from the diluted urban BOP group and 12 from the rural based BOP consumer group. The rural sample was the smallest because they undertook limited purchases, tending to depend more than other groups on donor agencies and support from urban groups for their food and personal hygiene provisions.Food and personal hygiene products were chosen as the reference product category since these absorb at least 65 per cent of BOP consumers' income (D'Andrea et al., 2006). Random purposeful sampling was used in order to improve the credibility of the sample since the potential sample was very large. This sampling involved random selection of \"respondents for study who could purposefully inform an understanding of the research problem and central phenomenon in the study\" (Creswell, 2007, p. 125).Analysis of meaning of text was achieved through condensation, categorization, narration, interpretation and ad hoc approaches. Condensation involved reduction of texts into succinct summaries, while categorization involved the reduction of the data to categories, figures and tables. Narrative structuring involved creation of a coherent structure and plots of the data. Interpretation of the text involved a re-contextualization of the statements within a broader framework of reference, such as previous literature. NVIVO software was used to analyse the data.\nFindings: Environmental constraints\nDiscussion and conclusion: Environmental constraints that can influence family purchase decision making may vary between markets, particularly between the markets of advanced economies and, where most BOP markets are to be found, in emerging economies. Such potential differences suggest the need to consider family purchase decision making within its political, legal, economic and social context. In the Zimbabwean economy, faced with a particular set of harsh environmental constraints, consumers at the BOP display differing family purchase decision making processes, in this case primarily segmented by their socio-economic status. Within one country and a particular product category, respondent accounts support a picture of a BOP market that, from a consumer exchange perspective, displays different group responses to similar environmental conditions, conveying a picture of heterogeneity in this market.Food and personal hygiene products are categorized as habitual and low involvement purchases (Assael, 1998; Sheth, 1974; D'Andrea, 2006). However, findings from this study found that BOP consumers engage in a deliberation process when buying food and personal hygiene products, and the process and importance they attach to purchases is not necessarily the same as that of consumers in western markets but is more complex given the constraints consumers faced when making the decision.Research on the role of gender in family purchase decisions has largely focused on western markets. Findings from this study only partly accord with those by Purvez (2003) and Viswanathan (2007), who highlight the dominance of women in the purchase of food in BOP markets in Bangladesh and India. However, their findings are restricted to the rural BOP consumers and do not provide insights into the behaviour of urban BOP consumers Our study shows an increase in dual and shared responsibility between husbands and wives that traditionally was not the case in Zimbabwe but has emerged with changing environmental constraints. This shared responsibility is consistent with observations from previous literature although the patterns and forms evident at the BOP are different from those experienced in western markets.Spousal roles among Zimbabwean BOP consumers in the three non-rural groups are changing. Husbands were found to be increasingly involved in the purchase decision and in some instances assumed major responsibility. These have been illustrated by the different models that emerge from this study illustrated in Figures 1 to 4. For example, the pressure of limited income, uncertain product availability and price hyperinflation resulted in spouses making joint purchase decisions and at times speculative purchases. Shared responsibility was intended to militate against the high uncertainty of product availability and to provide some form of security to families' product supply.Whilst the product category used was food and personal hygiene products, family purchase decision in western markets often accommodates children's opinions. This was found to be different in the Zimbabwean case where minor children did not have much say in the food that was bought for the family. Variations could also be attributed to the different definitions of food in the two markets which inevitably determines the role of children in the decision to purchase food products. Findings from this study suggest that at the BOP in Zimbabwe, older children assumed significant responsibility for the support of both their parents and siblings, which resulted in them assuming multiple roles. This was particularly the case in the three non-rural groups. For example, whilst their dependents might be the users or might attempt to initiate purchase, the main roles remained with the elder children who ended up deciding on and buying the products which they gave to their parents and siblings. This also extended to adult children providing products for their extended family members in rural areas.Implications for marketing practice\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - This paper seeks to argue that family purchase decision making at the bottom of the pyramid (BOP) is dynamic, heterogeneous and an evolving process that can be influenced by contextual macro-environmental constraints. Because established perceptions of family purchase decision making are primarily drawn from western markets, this Zimbabwean study aims to provide a contrasting perspective.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Qualitative data collection methods comprising in-depth, one-to-one consumer interviews, focus groups, ethnographic observations and cases studies were used to conduct the research.\nFindings: - Key findings include the identification of changing and multiple family buying models, which are influenced by the constraints consumers face at the BOP, as well as the distinct roles of children, which differ from those common in developed western countries.\nResearch limitations/implications: - The sample used for consumer interviews is small and confining the focus to the food and personal hygiene sector may limit generalization of findings to a broader population.\nPractical implications: - The study provides managers with insights on the importance of understanding family purchase decision making at the BOP and the importance of adapting the marketing mix elements such as promotion strategies to suit the challenges faced by these consumers.\nSocial implications: - The study provides insights into how firms can improve livelihoods at the BOP by provision of employment and business opportunities through their partnerships with social networks.\nOriginality/value: - Research into the BOP is a relatively new area of study in international business. The majority of studies have focused on Latin America and Asia, ignoring the 800 million BOP consumers in Africa. Hence this research expands knowledge in the area by employing empirical mixed research methods to study consumers in their real world setting thereby providing new insights on marketing to the BOP.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]
How information system capability affects e-business information technology strategy implementation: An empirical study in Taiwan	[ "E‐business", "Electronic commerce", "Information technology strategy implementation", "Information system capability", "Information systems" ]	[ { "content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: With groundbreaking innovation in information technology (IT) and rapid development of information systems (ISs), companies have begun emphasizing the development of e-business strategies; and experts and researchers have introduced strategic planning methods relevant to e-business. For example, Hooft and Stegwee (2001) introduced a method for developing e-business strategy, which involves an alignment model as a base for strategic planning of ISs. The model has a number of stages including: depicting a vision of e-business, strategic formation, finding fields for e-business applications, combining electronic application systems, and formulating e-business plans. Li and Chang (2004) introduced an integrated framework for e-business, emphasizing that e-business should be holistic, dynamic, and dialectical. Many firms have introduced innovative IT strategies and e-business applications to improve competitiveness and transform their enterprises (Pai and Yeh, 2008). As a result, the development and implementation of IT strategy has become a focus for information management in industry and academia (Gottschalk, 1999; Teo and Ang, 2001; O'Brien, 2004; Lapointe and Rivard, 2005; Khazanchi, 2005).Gottschalk (1999) suggested IT strategy include plans to develop projects for IT applications, to help organizations to realize their goals. Salmela and Spil (2002) noted that, with continual innovation in new technologies, alignment between IT strategy and corporate strategy has become more difficult than previously, even though the process of planning remained the same as in the past. If a company has a well-planned IT strategy, it can improve its overall competitiveness to integrate corporate strategy and IT implementation effectively (Yrle et al., 2004). However, Kalakota and Robinson (1999) suggested that although many enterprises have solid plans for their ISs, few are able to convert these strategies into action. Even if high-level managers found opportunities to apply e-business applications, enterprises would need the ability to implement IT strategy effectively (O'Brien, 2004). Amit and Schoemaker (1993) noted that \"capability\" referred to the ability of an enterprise to use corporate processes for the allocation and use of resources. Collis (1994) suggested that capability involved socially complex routines and determined the efficiency of an enterprise in converting inputs to outputs. Capability could also be viewed as having the resources required to complete a particular task or activity (Grant, 1991; Amit and Schoemaker, 1993). Barney (1991) viewed capability as an organizational characteristic allowing organizations to devise, select, and implement strategies. If an organization lacked sufficient organizational or ISs capability, its implementation of IT strategy would suffer adverse effects. Many studies have shown that organizations emphasize the use of strategic planning for ISs to guide the production of IT strategies. However, these IT strategies are rarely implemented effectively. Researchers have begun discussing issues of relevance with regard to the importance of IT strategy implementation (Gottschalk, 1999; Teo and King, 2001; Salmela and Spil, 2002; McNish, 2002), and this study collected and compiled a great deal of this relevant literature. Primary research motivations were based on the following points: first, the implementation of IT strategy is a topic of focus in information management for industry and academia; second, capability is an important organizational resource; and third, few studies have examined the implementation of IT strategy from the perspective of IS capability.This paper first examined the implications of implementing IT strategy, and then explored existing studies and applications relevant to IS capability to discover associations linking IScapability and the quality of IT strategy implementation. In the data analysis methodology of this study, confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was used for the measurement model to test for reliability and validity of the scale. A structural model was used to test for the reasonableness of research hypotheses and research model. Finally, this paper discussed research conclusions and suggestions.\nLiterature review: Implementation of IT strategy\nResearch model and hypotheses: Peppard et al. (2000) introduced the conceptual framework to determine IS capabilities, including strategy, definition of ISs contributions, definition of IT capability, exploitation, delivery of solutions, and supply. Peppard and Ward (2004) developed 26 items regarding organizational IS capability using six constructs as a basis for integrating RBV. Their research emphasized the importance of IS capability for the implementation of business IT strategy. Other researchers have examined organizational IS capabilities from the perspectives of information resource management, knowledge management, IT project management, and IT leadership (Tipping and Sohi, 2003; Saini and Johnson, 2005; Khatri, 2006). The literature reveals that a broad range of factors is covered by IS capability. When organizations initiate e-business, they use relevant IT to coordinate the integration and information sharing for various business functions (Langdon, 2006). In addition to project management programs, companies must take into account the system development ability to introduce ERP successfully; businesses must decide whether to outsource the work or develop systems themselves (Nah and Delgado, 2006; Nah et al., 2007). Dixon (1995) suggested that organizational learning be the learning process performed on the individual, group, or organizational levels to regulate organizational activities and improve organization performance. Lee and Bai (2003) suggested that when performing ISSP in the digital era, interactive learning at the individual, group, and organizational levels could be used to improve the effectiveness of planning. Through effective organizational learning processes, businesses integrate the application of processes and organizational structure broadly to create new operating models, thereby improving innovation and response capabilities within the organization, allowing the organization to move into e-business (Cegarra-Navarro et al., 2007). When the organization promotes the development of e-business, it involves a type of organizational learning. For this reason, this study compiled a number of studies regarding IS capability and e-business, and divided IS capability into individual capability, group capability, and organization capability. This study also combined the IS strategy-planning model of Lederer and Salmela (1996) and the IT strategy implementation scale introduced by Gottschalk (1999) as a theoretical basis for the research framework. At the level of individual capability, this study examined the impact of IS/IT leadership and IT resource allocation capability of chief information officers (CIOs) on the quality of IT strategy implementation processes. At the level of group capability, this study examined the effect of collaboration and knowledge sharing capability within the organization on the quality of IT strategy implementation. At the level of organization capability, this study examined the effect of system development capability and project management capability on the quality of IT strategy implementation processes. Figure 1 shows the research model of this study. Research hypotheses are discussed below.Taylor (1997) noted that many strategies appeared only in plans and were not implemented, preventing organizations from being able to achieve business objectives. Teo and Ang (2001) suggested that, for Singaporean businesses, 50.2 percent of information managers believed that the primary problem in IS planning was the fact that developed IS were not considered a priority. O'Brien (2004) suggested that \"implementation\" is a completion of all planned items, and could be viewed as the process of putting into practice business and IT strategies, as well as application plans. Salmela and Spil (2002) argued that the implementation of IS plans was an important point that should be considered in IS planning. In the long-term, effective implementation of IT, strategies could enhance organizational operating performance. This study presents the following research hypotheses:H1. The quality of IT strategy implementation is positively associated with e-business performance.Individual level capability\nResearch methodology: Sample and data collection\nData analysis and results: Sample characteristics\nDiscussion: This study examined factors which affect the quality of IT strategy implementation from the perspective of IS capability. It also considered the effect of quality on IT strategy implementation in e-business performance. Empirical results and analysis are explained below.Effect of IS capability factors on the quality of the IT strategy implementation process\nConclusions: Implications for practitioners\n", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Purpose: - The primary purpose of this study is to examine the effect that information system capability had on e-business information technology (IT) implementation strategy; and to understand how the quality of the implementation process for IT strategy could affect e-business performance.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - This study performed a survey of chief information officers from 1,000 major firms in Taiwan. Structural equation modelling (SEM) was used to test for the validity of research hypotheses.\nFindings: - Results showed that the capability of information systems could have a direct and significant effect on the quality of IT strategy implementation, and how the quality of this process could affect e-business performance.\nResearch limitations/implications: - Every organization hopes to improve corporate competitiveness and transform its enterprise through the effective implementation of IT strategy. This study examined how information systems capability could affect the implementation of enterprise IT strategy. However, since large firms in Taiwan are the primary research subjects of this study, the conclusions may not be applicable to enterprises in different countries or cultures. Future studies could examine the subject from the three aspects of technology, organization, and environment to understand the effect that each of these aspects has on e-business information systems capability.\nPractical implications: - With the rapid development of information technology, the introduction of innovative strategy dealing with IT has become an important topic of research, and has become a focus in the era of e-business. As a result, organizations feel it is important to discover the shortcomings in information system capability factors that must be improved from the individual, group, or organization levels, and develop appropriate implementation frameworks for IT strategy based on this foundation.\nOriginality/value: - This study uses empirical analysis to examine the effect that the capability of information systems has on the quality of implementation of IT strategy. A compilation of relevant literature showed that most studies have focused on conceptual frameworks or have examined the question of IT strategy from the level of technology. Few studies have examined the effect that information system capability has on IT implementation strategy. Therefore, the results and findings of this study could provide an important reference for IT strategy implementation, in the era of e-business.\n", "role": "assistant" } ]

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