Ernst Graamans, Kjeld Aij, Alexander Vonk and Wouter ten Have
This case study aims to shed light on what went wrong with the introduction of new surgical suture in a Dutch hospital operating theatre following a tender. Transition to working…
Abstract
Purpose
This case study aims to shed light on what went wrong with the introduction of new surgical suture in a Dutch hospital operating theatre following a tender. Transition to working with new surgical suture was organized in accordance with legal and contractual provisions, and basic principles of change management were applied, but resistance from surgeons led to cancellation of supplies of the new suture.
Design/methodology/approach
Researchers had access to all documents relevant to the tendering procedure and crucial correspondence between stakeholders. Seventeen in-depth, 1 h interviews were conducted with key informants who were targeted through maximum variation sampling. Patients were not interviewed. The interviews were recorded, transcribed and analysed by discourse analysis. A trial session and workshop were participatively observed. A cultural psychological perspective was adopted to gain an understanding of why certain practices appear to be resistant to change.
Findings
For the cardiothoracic surgeons, suture was more than just stitching material. Suture as a tactile element in their day-to-day work environment is embedded within a social arrangement that ties elements of professional accountability, risk avoidance and direct patient care together in a way that makes sense and feels secure. This arrangement is not to be fumbled with by outsiders.
Practical implications
By understanding the practical and emotional stakes that medical professionals have in their work, lessons can be learned to prevent failure of future change initiatives.
Originality/value
The cultural psychological perspective adopted in this study has never been applied to understanding failed change in a hospital setting.
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Reggie Raju, Jill Claassen, Amina Adam, Alexander DAngelo, Sadiq Keraan, Niel Mostert and Saskia Vonk
The purpose of this paper is to report on the development of a flexible and robust academic library structure that meets the demands of an ever changing user community and remains…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to report on the development of a flexible and robust academic library structure that meets the demands of an ever changing user community and remains relevant and fit for purpose in a technology-driven age. The new structure makes provision for the delivery of new and innovative services responding to the need for a paradigm shift in twenty-first century academic librarianship. The move away from subject librarianship, which has been the bastion of South African academic librarianship, is significant.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper used the exploratory method to gain new insights into library structures that have restructured for the twenty-first century. The exploratory study was used to gain new insights into functional librarianship. Despite the short comings of the exploratory method, the method was deemed most appropriate as UCT Libraries was not seeking definitive answers but a process that would provide opportunities to explore possibilities for subsequent processes.
Findings
The move from subject librarianship to functional librarianship has given the library the opportunity to restructure. The restructured library can now offer new and/or radically expanded services to meet the demands of a twenty-first century academic library.
Practical implications
The development of new and future roles and responsibilities commensurate with a robust and “future-driven” structure will consolidate the library’s role as a collaborator in the teaching and learning, and research agendas of a higher education institution.
Originality/value
This paper will be of interest and value to library managers and staff wanting to develop a library structure that responds positively to the redefinition of the professional roles and functions of the library and to strategically position the academic library for the future. It will also be of interest to library and information science academics who may want to re-examine their curricula for the incorporation of new trends.
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Clement Nangpiire, Joaquim Silva and Helena Alves
The customer as an active and engaged value co-creator raises new challenges for theory and practice, especially in the hospitality industry. However, the connection between…
Abstract
Purpose
The customer as an active and engaged value co-creator raises new challenges for theory and practice, especially in the hospitality industry. However, the connection between engagement and co-creation is little studied in the hotel/tourism literature. This paper proposes a connection between customer engagement (CE) and value co-creation frameworks to ascertain and depict the internal actors' activities and factors that foster or hinder guests' co-creation and destruction of value.
Design/methodology/approach
The researchers used qualitative methods (35 in-depth interviews, document analysis and four observation sessions) in seven regions of Ghana to explore the customer's perspective. Data were analyzed with NVivo11 within a thematic analysis framework.
Findings
The findings suggest that positive and negative engagement fosters or hinders guests' interactions, which lead to value co-creation or destruction. The research also discovered that negative interactions occasioned by any factor or actor trigger value destruction at multiple stages of the experience journey.
Practical implications
Industry players can use the framework developed to assess their businesses, explore and reflect on the proposed value they aim to generate, and thus be more aware of how they can better facilitate value co-creation with their consumers and avoid value destruction.
Originality/value
This research proposes a novel connection between customer interactions, engagement and value co-creation to ascertain and depict the internal actors' activities and factors that foster or hinder customers' experience in the hotel/tourism industry.
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With the implementation of Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education since April 2010, the responsibility and role of the teachers in Indian school has been changed. Once…
Abstract
With the implementation of Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education since April 2010, the responsibility and role of the teachers in Indian school has been changed. Once again, the teacher quality in Indian schools has taken a center stage in nation-wide debate. The discussion on teacher quality has reappeared in submitted report as Draft National Education Policy (DNEP) on May 31, 2019, that gets endorsement in cabinet approved NEP 2020. The evaluation, as a process and system, starts with the very moment when a teacher assumes its duties in K-12 schools. This chapter addresses the main research questions as: what is the status of teacher evaluation in Indian schools as mentioned in various Commission reports, policies, and draft regulations? How does teacher evaluation could be reframed for local setting based on global standards laid in international and multinational context? This chapter employs qualitative research through review of policies, draft regulations, research, articles, and government documents as data analysis and frames hypotheses through comparative analysis. The objectives of this chapter are to frame hypotheses regarding policies and recommendations for: teacher quality; teacher appraisal process; teacher appraisal in local, regional, and national settings; and teacher appraisal in multinational context.
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The purpose of this paper is to conduct an exploratory study of potential business-to-business (B2B) customers that includes an empirical analysis that investigate the effect that…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to conduct an exploratory study of potential business-to-business (B2B) customers that includes an empirical analysis that investigate the effect that customer entertainment has on customer suspicion toward the salesperson, and how those negative attitudes are influenced by the relationship stage and the perceived cost of the event.
Design/methodology/approach
Using an experimental design, data were collected from 105 potential customers working in a B2B environment that assessed their attitudes regarding offers of varying levels of customer entertainment across differing stages of the relationship.
Findings
Results demonstrate that B2B customers have important perceptions regarding the perceived cost of customer entertainment offers by salespeople. Those evaluations resulted in a positive relationship between customer attitudes of suspicion toward the salesperson and the perceived cost of the entertainment event. However, the stage of the relationship tended to ameliorate suspicious attitudes of customers, although not in a completely symmetrical manner.
Research limitations/implications
Additional testing with larger sample populations would better solidify the existence of the relationships.
Practical implications
This study provides a framework for practitioners that gives direction to the strategic use of customer entertainment such that it acts as a relationship catalyst, and not a relationship poison.
Originality/value
The paper uses a customer perspective to fill a need to better understand the instrumental role of customer entertainment in relationship marketing, and how it interacts with the perceived cost of the event and relationship stage to create differing customer attitudes.
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Firehiwot Kedir, Daniel M. Hall, Sara Brantvall, Jerker Lessing, Alexander Hollberg and Ranjith K. Soman
This paper aims to conduct a qualitative assessment of synergies between information flows of a multifamily product platform used for industrialized housing and materials…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to conduct a qualitative assessment of synergies between information flows of a multifamily product platform used for industrialized housing and materials passports that can promote a circular economy in the construction industry.
Design/methodology/approach
Using a single case study method, the research assesses the availability and accessibility of materials passport-relevant information generated by a leading Swedish industrialized housing construction firm. Data is collected using semistructured interviews, document analysis and an extended research visit.
Findings
The research findings identify the functional layers of the product platform, map the information flow using a process diagram, assess the availability and accessibility of material passport relevant information by lifecycle stage and actor, and summarize the key points using a SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats) analysis.
Research limitations/implications
The three main implications are: the technical and process platforms used in industrialized construction allow for generating standardized, digital and reusable information; the vertical integration of trades and long-term relationships with suppliers improve transparency and reduce fragmentation in information flows; and the design-build-operate business model strategy incentivizes actors to manage information flows in the use phase.
Practical implications
Industrialized construction firms can use this paper as an approach to understand and map their information flows to identify suitable approaches to generate and manage materials passports.
Originality/value
The specific characteristics of product platforms and industrialized construction provide a unique opportunity for circular information flow across the building lifecycle, which can support material passport adoption to a degree not often found in the traditional construction industry.
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Jeffrey A. Miles and Stefanie E. Naumann
The study's purpose is to present and empirically test a model that identifies academic self-concept as a mediator of the relationship between gender, sexual orientation and…
Abstract
Purpose
The study's purpose is to present and empirically test a model that identifies academic self-concept as a mediator of the relationship between gender, sexual orientation and self-perceptions of leadership ability.
Design/methodology/approach
Surveys were administered to 964 first-year undergraduate students.
Findings
Academic self-concept mediated the relationship between gender and leadership for all subjects and for self-reported heterosexual subjects but not for self-reported nonheterosexual subjects.
Research limitations/implications
Gender differences in leadership perceptions still exist and appear as early as the college years. The fact that academic self-concept did not mediate the relationship between gender and self-perceptions of leadership for nonheterosexual students might be explained by considering research that has identified different levels of gender conformity between straight and gay individuals.
Practical implications
Student self-perceptions of leadership could be improved if opportunities were provided for students showing that people other than White, male, heterosexuals can also be effective leaders. When women and underrepresented groups attain leadership positions in the workplace, it attracts others because it sends a message that this organization welcomes women and underrepresented groups in positions of leadership.
Originality/value
This study addresses a gap in the field by using the social identity theory of leadership to integrate conflicting research streams in the existing literature and by proposing that academic self-concept underlies the relationship between gender, sexual orientation and self-perceptions of leadership. The study responds to Bark et al.'s (2016) call for future research to consider how highly prototypical individuals have a key advantage in people's perceptions of their leadership.
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The purpose of this paper is to outline how refugees’ transnational networks and online relationships facilitated through social media provide access to timely and trusted…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to outline how refugees’ transnational networks and online relationships facilitated through social media provide access to timely and trusted translated information in disaster settings.
Design/methodology/approach
The study is a digital ethnography of resettled refugees’ practices of transnational care and support through social media that took place over 12 months. It involved conducting 50 semi-structured interviews and collecting 472 online social media diaries with 15 participants. Data analysis was conducted through constructivist grounded theory.
Findings
Transnational networks are increasingly part of refugees’ everyday lives that illustrate how social media platforms can provide forms of transnational care and access to trusted translated communications during times of crisis. The paper discusses the possibilities and cautions of such support.
Research limitations/implications
The small number of participants limits the ability to make generalised claims about refugees and transnational possibilities for reducing disaster risk. However, the reality that social media effectively provide a bridge between “here” and “there” signals the importance of incorporating these considerations as a form of transnational disaster risk reduction.
Practical implications
The project highlights from policy and practice standpoints, how transnational networks and social media can be used to improve disaster communications and translation. This focus is achieved through examining the usability, accessibility and affordability of digital communication technologies for forced migrants.
Originality/value
Few studies focus on refugees and disaster risk reduction. This is particularly the case as it relates to the roles of transnational networks, which have increasing everyday interactions in countries that provide refugee resettlement programmes.