Search results

Despite the importance of knowledge sharing (KS), organizations find it difficult to motivate their employees to share their knowledge with co-workers. Based on a combination of the group value model and the socialization resources theory (SRT), this study is, therefore, an endeavor to contribute to the understanding of how organizations can develop efficacious tacit knowledge sharing (TKS)-strategies by harnessing insights from the impact of respectful engagement (RE) and workplace friendship (i.e. friendship opportunity and friendship prevalence).

Group value model and SRT are used to develop a new pathway to TKS which focuses on how RE among employees contributes to the development of workplace friendship which in turn facilitates TKS. Self-reported data were collected online from 593 employees working in various organizational sectors. Hypotheses were tested with structural equation modeling (SEM).

The results suggest that RE is an essential precursor of TKS, having both direct positive relationship with TKS and partial indirect positive relationship through friendship opportunity and friendship prevalence. RE was also positively related to the two facets of workplace friendship (i.e. friendship opportunity and friendship prevalence). Both friendship opportunity and friendship prevalence were positively related to TKS.

These findings underscore the importance of implementing initiatives that support positive interrelations characterized by respect at work in order to promote TKS.

By linking RE to TKS, this study adds new insight to the relational basis of sharing personal asset/resource as tacit knowledge. The inclusion of mediation path helps in shedding light and opening up a black box of RE-TKS interface.

Given the intensified need to be responsive to change, employees' discretionary and constructive efforts, such as those aimed at effecting workplace functional change (i.e. taking charge), are required to enhance organizational effectiveness. Therefore, the authors reckon that due to their serving attitude of prioritizing the needs of others above the self and their motivational qualities, the servant leadership approach can enhance the confidence of subordinates' capabilities to perform a range of meaningful activities (i.e. role breadth self-efficacy; RBSE), which in turn should facilitate their engagement in taking charge.

The authors collected data from 324 leader-subordinate dyads (i.e. academicians) from two federal universities in Nigeria. The authors assessed the measurement and structural models with partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM).

This study found that servant leadership and RBSE were crucial enablers of subordinates' taking charge. Furthermore, a positive relationship between servant leadership and RBSE was found. Lastly, RBSE was a partial mediating mechanism partly underlying the positive relationship between servant leadership and taking charge.

Selecting and training leaders to practice servant leadership in Nigerian public universities may serve as a springboard for employees to take charge because it also enables them to develop their RBSE.

The current study sheds light on the psychological process through which servant leadership affects subordinates' taking charge by identifying RBSE as a crucial motivational state partly underlying the process.

The purpose of this study is to examine gender and rural economic relations of the Nrobo of Southeastern Nigeria. Specifically, the study was designed to examine the subsistence strategies, gendered role patterns and gender gaps in economic relations of the Nrobo.

This study used ethnographic methods of participant observation – adopting chitchatting and semi-structured interviews. Also, focus group discussion (FGD) was used to cross-check the validity of data from the other instrument.

This study found among other things, that although there is still verbal expression of gendered roles division, it does not mirror what actually obtains in society, except bio-social roles. Ideological superiority of men reflects the patrilineal kinship arrangement of society. Theoretically, some of the hypotheses of gender inequality theory were disputed for lack of adequate explanation of gender and economic relations in an egalitarian-reflected society such as Nrobo.

This study, to the best of my knowledge, is the first attempt to ethnographically examine gender and economic relations among this group. As such it adds to the corpus of ethnographies on the Igbo of Southeastern Nigeria.

The successful implementation of an optimal online system for specification and procurement has been impeded by the existence of semi‐structured or non‐structured product information held in catalogues in various formats. Consequently, a significant amount of time is spent in gathering relevant information. Proposes introducing a successful optimal online specification and procurement system for construction products.

The design and specification of the prototype were based on the analysis of closely related agent‐based implementations in various domains.

In the development phase it emerged that agent infrastructure is still maturing, even when a stable development environment is finally available. This is consistent with the latest research in this area which places the highest value on internet agents within the context of the semantic web.

This research demonstrated how agent technology can be used alongside other paradigms such as web services and XML to make the specification and procurement of construction products more effective and more efficient.

Unplanned changes in construction projects are common and lead to disruptive effects such as project delays, cost overruns and quality deviations. Rework due to unplanned changes can cost 10‐15 per cent of contract value. By managing these changes more effectively, these disruptive effects can be minimised. Previous research has approached this problem from an information‐processing view. In this knowledge age, the purpose of this paper is to argue that effective change management can be brought about by better understanding the significant role of knowledge during change situations.

Within this knowledge‐based context, the question of how construction project teams manage knowledge during unplanned change in the construction phase within collaborative team settings is investigated through a selected case study sample within the UK construction industry.

Case study findings conclude that different forms of knowledge are created and shared between project team members during change events which is very much socially constructed and centred on tacit knowledge and experience of project personnel.

Building on the case study findings the paper finally offers a model that represents the role of knowledge during managing project change.

This paper aims to examine the prospect of utilising corporate social responsibility and entrepreneurship (CSRE) as antidotes for mitigating the incidences of poverty, insecurity and underdevelopment in Nigeria. The paper derives its theoretical foundation from the stakeholder, instrumental and legitimacy theories, which all justify the use of CSRE for actualisation of Triple Bottom Line (i.e. the social, economic and environmental concerns of business organisations).

The study used the quantitative research method relying on the use of secondary data published by institutional bodies. The quantitative method entail a systematic extraction of reliable data on corporate social responsibility (CSR), insecurity, poverty and development from the publications of Office of the Millennium Development Goals in Nigeria, CLEEN Foundation, National Bureau of Statistics and Central Bank of Nigeria, respectively. For missing years, the authors improvised using projections as well as proxies. The extracted data, which spanned a period of 13 years, were subjected to econometric tests using SPSS, on the basis of which informed conclusions were drawn.

The first econometric result indicates a negative relationship between gross domestic product and poverty. The second result indicates that there is a positive significant relationship between gross domestic product and total crime rate. The third result indicates that there exists a positive relationship between gross domestic product and unemployment rate. The fourth result indicates that there is a negative relationship between gross domestic product and industrial growth rate. The last result indicates that there is a significant positive relationship between gross domestic product and CSR.

The results of this research have macro-level application, hence the outcomes cannot be narrowed to any particular sector of the economy. A micro-level analysis across diverse sectors of the economy is recommended in future studies. The implication of this empirical research is that policymakers in the Nigerian private sector need to reinvent their CSR programmes as mechanisms for poverty eradication, entrepreneurship development (CSRE), dousing tension of restive youth, empowerment/support for security agencies for better crime prevention and for impacting on sustainable development.

In the face of dwindling financial resources in the treasury of governments, the reinvention of CSRE by private sector organisations as complementary mechanisms for combating social problems is becoming acceptable in both developed and developing nations. This paper therefore boldly recommends that policymakers reinvent CSRE as development mechanisms through a sound partnership between government, advocacy groups and business corporations in Nigeria.

The paper explicates that CSR can indeed be reinvented by corporations as part of their social concerns to their operating environment instead of leaving all social problems to governments.

The research lends credence to stakeholder, instrumental and legitimacy theories of CSR. It also justifies the plausibility of CSRE, a novel concept being promoted in this research.