Toward a typology of weak-signal early alert systems: functional early warning systems in the post-COVID age
ISSN: 1468-4527
Article publication date: 28 October 2021
Issue publication date: 16 August 2022
Abstract
Purpose
The study aims to expand on the concept of an early warning system (EWS) by introducing weak-signal detection, human-in-the-loop (HIL) verification and response tuning as integral parts of an EWS's design.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors bibliographically highlight the evolution of EWS over the last 30+ years, discuss instances of EWSs in various types of organizations and industries and highlight limitations of current systems.
Findings
Proposed system to be used in the transforming of weak signals to early warnings and associated weak/strong responses.
Originality/value
The authors contribute to existing literature by presenting (1) novel approaches to dealing with some of the well-known issues associated with contemporary EWS and (2) an event-agnostic heuristic for dealing with weak signals.
Peer review
The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/OIR-11-2020-0513.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to acknowledge the long-term institutional support of research activities by the Faculty of Informatics and Statistics, Prague University of Economics and Business (IP400040) and the Program Committee of CASLIN (https://caslin.net/), the international library workshop, for accessing the qualitative & quantitative data for our research. The authors would also like to thank Dr. James Partridge, Professor Ikhlaq Sidhu, Assoc. Professor Ota Novotný, the Faculty of Informatics and Statistics at Prague University of Economics and Business, Data & Business platform, and the Sutardja Center for Entrepreneurship & Innovation at UC Berkeley for their academic support.
Citation
Černý, J., Potančok, M. and Castro Hernandez, E. (2022), "Toward a typology of weak-signal early alert systems: functional early warning systems in the post-COVID age", Online Information Review, Vol. 46 No. 5, pp. 904-919. https://doi.org/10.1108/OIR-11-2020-0513
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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