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The purpose of this systematic literature review (SLR) is to examine the theoretical landscape of knowledge hiding (KH) research, identifies prevailing theories, the different ways KH is understood within these theories and the underlying assumptions that shape these views. Based on this, ideas for further research are derived to advance the theoretical basis of KH studies.

Using a theory-based SLR, the authors analysed 170 scientific papers from Scopus and Web of Science. This involved thematic analysis to categorise theories frequently applied in KH research and a detailed examination to link core assumptions to these theoretical perspectives.

The analysis revealed a reliance on 86 distinct theories, with a notable emphasis on social exchange theory and conservation of resources theory. KH is predominantly conceptualised as a negative, objective, reactive and relational behaviour rooted in social reciprocity and resource conservation. The review uncovers the multifaceted nature of KH, challenging the field to incorporate broader theoretical views that encompass positive aspects, subjective experiences, strategic intentions and non-relational determinants of KH.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to systematically map and analyse the theoretical underpinnings of KH research. It offers a unique contribution by categorising the diverse theories applied in KH studies and explicitly linking these theories to their inherent assumptions about KH. This approach provides a comprehensive overview that not only identifies gaps in the current research landscape but also proposes alternative theoretical perspectives for exploring KH, thereby setting a new direction for future studies in this field.

This study explores the consequences of digitalization in the field of education, particularly in relation to teachers’ course processes in higher education institutions. It emphasizes the importance of understanding how information systems (IS) support not only individual tasks but also processes as a whole. The results reveal that process practices have not been considered comprehensively and even core processes may be unseen.

A systematic literature review was conducted to explore the extent to which teachers’ processes are discussed in the literature. A qualitative case study was then conducted at a Finnish higher education institution to identify course processes and their relationships to IS.

Teachers’ processes have scarcely been discussed in the literature, and the process support provided by ISs is remarkably limited. It seems that course processes, which are core to education, are a blind spot in education digitalization. To support evaluating the level of support by IS, novel course process indicators were introduced.

Developing core processes, teachers’ course processes and thesis processes in education field, supports improving service quality. In all industries, organizations should consider whether processes are properly recognized and whether IS support not only individual tasks but also processes as a whole. We recommend recognizing and applying business process management practices to better support teachers’ work and to improve overall efficiency in education.

To the best of our knowledge, this is the first education sector study that attends to teacher’s work as a comprehensive process.

While entrepreneurship has long been heralded for its positive contributions, there is a growing recognition of its “dark side,” characterized by unproductive, unethical and destructive actions. This exploratory literature review aims to illuminate the underexplored dark side of entrepreneurship, thereby enriching the discourse on entrepreneurship’s dual nature.

This study employs a robust mixed-method approach, integrating phenomenologically detailed co-citation bibliographic coupling with detailed thematic data and code-weaving. Science mapping tools like R-Bibliometrix and VOSviewer enhance the credibility of the findings by providing a sophisticated and reproducible methodological framework.

This review defines dark entrepreneurship, its characteristics, and its complexities. We introduced the “Dark Entrepreneurship Trinity”: Ethical Complexity, Institutional Navigation and Conflict Entrepreneurialship, with Institutional Navigation as the apex theme. It elucidates how this theme influences ethical dilemmas and operational strategies in conflict zones, illustrated through a diagram depicting their complex interrelations and dynamics.

The originality of this literature review lies in its comprehensive synthesis of the dark side of entrepreneurship. This review significantly contributes to the academic discourse by delineating a clearer picture of the destructive potentials of entrepreneurship. It compiles existing research, critically addresses the gaps and suggests future pathways for empirical studies.

This study analyzes the performance implications of adopting blockchain to support supply chain business processes. The technology holds as many promises as implementation challenges, so interest in its impact on operational performance has grown steadily over the last few years.

Drawing on transaction cost economics and the contingency theory, we built a set of hypotheses. These were tested through a long-term event study and an ordinary least squares regression involving 130 adopters listed in North America.

Compared with the control sample, adopters displayed significant abnormal performance in terms of labor productivity, operating cycle and profitability, whereas sales appeared unaffected. Firms in regulated settings and closer to the end customer showed more positive effects. Neither industry-level competition nor the early involvement of a project partner emerged as relevant contextual factors.

This research presents the first extensive analysis of operational performance based on objective measures. In contrast to previous studies and theoretical predictions, the results indicate that blockchain adoption is not associated with sales improvement. This can be explained considering that secure data storage and sharing do not guarantee the factual credibility of recorded data, which needs to be proved to customers in alternative ways. Conversely, improvements in other operational performance dimensions confirm that blockchain can support inter-organizational transactions more efficiently. The results are relevant in times when, following hype, there are signs of disengagement with the technology.

This study aims to examine process improvement strategy (PIS) (proxied by remote work, workforce training, and technological innovation), and employee productivity amid the COVID-19 pandemic among bank employees.

The study employed cross-sectional and descriptive design by applying multistage sampling techniques using convenience sampling to select the study organization and stratified and simple random sampling to select 900 respondents for the study. Data were collected by using validated measures of the study variables designed into a questionnaire. Pearson’s correlation and simple regression analysis were employed to establish relationships and causal effects among variables respectively.

Results showed significant relationships between the PIS (work-from-home, workplace training, and technological innovation) and the outcome variable (employee productivity); and predictive capabilities between the PIS and the outcome variables (employee productivity). The study revealed that remote work accounted for the highest variability (R2 = 0.775) in employee productivity, followed by workplace training (R2 = 0.499), and finally investment in technological innovation (R2 = 0.486)] and as such PIS fosters employee productivity and may, therefore, be applied when faced with a similar pandemic in the future.

The study was recognized for its significance in examining how PIS supports enhancing employee productivity in banks and, by extension, other organizations during a pandemic. The research has proven to be crucial in providing insights into bank management in emerging economies and other organizations worldwide that have previously gone unnoticed during a pandemic. It has aided in the extension of existing literature on PIS and employee productivity by carefully developing a framework, thus covering practical knowledge gaps.

Healthcare systems receive criticism from both providers and recipients. The diversity in these systems throughout the world makes innovation and change difficult. However, a structured analysis of healthcare systems is crucial to identify areas for improvement and to share best practices for the betterment of healthcare throughout the world.

The paper uses organizational theory as an unbiased tool for evaluating healthcare systems. This theory analyses healthcare systems across five dimensions: environment, culture, social structure, physical structure and technology. This analysis provides an in-depth understanding of the organization's surroundings, formation and function. It offers a lens through which healthcare systems can be envisioned and establishes a vocabulary for communication.

Organizational theory presents a multifaceted approach to initiate assessments aiming to enhance existing healthcare systems and customize them to serve all stakeholders within the focused ecosystem. It alters the dynamics of criticism and presents an opportunity to sustainably address unforeseen healthcare challenges in the future. As the author proceeds to understand healthcare organizations through the perspective of organizational theory, the author also uncovers subtle yet crucial issues such as resource dependence, cultural clashes, organizational silence, bureaucracy, hierarchy, ethics, values, engagement and burnout.

This paper was crafted from a collaborative paper for the final of a master's degree. A collaboration was conceptualized using organisation theory as the tool to align processes and achieve successful outcome. The narrative of the collaboration has been edited and paper presented highlighting the importance of the tool of organisation theory in healthcare systems.

The purpose of this multi-voiced paper is to propose a prosocial paradigm for the field of performance management and management control systems. This new paradigm suggests cultivating prosocial behaviour and prosocial groups in organizations to simultaneously achieve the objectives of economic performance and sustainability.

The authors share a common concern about the future of humanity and nature. They challenge the influential assumption of economic man from neoclassical economic theory and build on evolutionary science and the core design principles of prosocial groups to develop a prosocial paradigm.

Findings are based on the premise of the prosocial paradigm that self-interested behaviour may outperform prosocial behaviour within a group but that prosocial groups outperform groups dominated by self-interest. The authors explore various dimensions of performance management from the prosocial perspective in the private and public sectors.

The authors call for theoretical, conceptual and empirical research that explores the prosocial paradigm. They invite any approach, including positivist, interpretive and critical research, as well as those using qualitative, quantitative and interventionist methods.

This paper offers implications from the prosocial paradigm for practitioners, particularly for executives and managers, policymakers and educators.

Adoption of the prosocial paradigm in research and practice shapes what the authors call the prosocial market economy. This is an aspired cultural evolution that functions with market competition yet systematically strengthens prosociality as a cultural norm in organizations, markets and society at large.

Organizations are confronted with problems and political risks to which they have to respond, presenting a need to develop tools and frames of understanding requisite to do so. In this article, we argue for the necessity of cultivating “political judgment” with a “sense of reality,” especially in the upper echelons of organizations. This article has two objectives: First to highlight how a number of recent interlinked developments within organizational analysis and practice have contributed to weakening judgment and its accompanying “sense of reality.” Second, to (re)introduce some canonical works that, although less in vogue recently, provide both a source of wisdom and frames of understanding that are key to tackling today’s problems. We begin by mapping the context in which the need for the cultivation of political judgment within organizations has arisen: (i) increasing proliferation of political risks and “wicked problems” to which it is expected that organizations adapt and respond; (ii) a wider historical and contemporary context in which the exercise of judgment has been undermined – a result of a combination of economics-inspired styles of theorizing and an associated obsession with metrics. We also explore the nature of “political judgment” and its accompanying “sense of reality” through the work of authors such as Philip Selznick, Max Weber, Chester Barnard, and Isaiah Berlin. We suggest that these authors have a weighty “sense of reality”; are antithetical to “high,” “abstract,” or “axiomatic” theorizing; and have a profound sense of the burden from exercising political judgment in difficult organizational circumstances.

This article aims to clarify the concepts used to understand, analyze and improve a patient’s progress through a health service system. A patient pathway describes plans and intentions. Within it, we distinguish between the clinical pathway of decisions and interventions and the care pathway of supportive activities. As a patient pathway is implemented, it turns into a patient journey of what is done, what happens to a patient’s medical condition and what is experienced and felt. We introduce “patient journey disruption” (PJD) as a concept describing the events that need to be prevented from happening to accomplish integrated, coordinated and seamless care.

The method used in this paper is concept analysis. First, an expert steering group worked to refine the concept of PJDs; second, an analysis of similar concepts from related fields was done to root the concept into existing theories, and third, semi-structured interviews with professionals and patients were done to test the concept of PJDs in the home care context.

PJDs are agency-based harmful events in the execution of the care pathway that deviate the patient journey from what can be reasonably expected. PJDs are management failures, which is why they should be studied by healthcare operations management (HOM) and service science scholars with the intention to find ways to prevent them from happening.

This study has limitations, including presenting conceptual ideas and preliminary results that are only indicative.

We believe that the introduction of the concept of PJDs into the literature provides a new, systematic way of approaching the different shortcomings in our healthcare production systems. Moreover, by systematically identifying different PJDs, interventions can be designed and targeted more appropriately.

Managerial challenges regarding healthcare processes have been studied but have not been well defined. The concept of PJDs is an original, well-thought-out definition.

The purpose of this paper is to propose a framework for evaluating the relationship between China and Peru, drawing on dependency theory, against the backdrop of China’s explicit policies towards foreign direct investment. It seeks to transcend traditional interpretations of this relationship in the literature that focuses on China as either hegemon or a South–South partner to Latin American countries to highlight a more nuanced relationship.

The paper adopts a case study approach, focusing on China in Peru. The authors examine three areas of traditional, strategic and emerging industries drawing from Chinese national policies, reviewing these against characteristics of dependency: control of production, heterogeneity of actors, transfer of knowledge and delinking.

The authors find that Chinese foreign direct investment (FDI) in Peru demonstrates mixed motives and collectively operates as an ambiguous player. Chinese firms appear to be willing to work with various actors, but this engagement does not translate into a decolonial development alternative in the absence of a Peruvian political will to delink and Chinese willingness to actively transfer control of production and knowledge.

This paper contributes to existing literature on China in Latin America by evaluating Chinese outward FDI in Peru against China’s strategic aims in terms of a re-evaluation of dependency theory.