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1 – 10 of 66Marta Giovannetti, Arun Sharma, Deva Rangarajan, Silvio Cardinali and Elena Cedrola
The COVID-19 pandemic has led to major sales strategy and process changes as many interactions migrated from face-to-face to virtual environments. The nature of the interactions…
Abstract
Purpose
The COVID-19 pandemic has led to major sales strategy and process changes as many interactions migrated from face-to-face to virtual environments. The nature of the interactions changed, and sales firms, the sales function and salespeople created new processes to excel in virtual environments. As sales processes evolve further, this paper aims to focus on understanding the enduring shifts in sales strategy and processes. In addition, this study seeks to understand the characteristics of enduring shifts and how they are distinct from temporary shifts.
Design/methodology/approach
This qualitative analysis provides a comprehensive overview of the sales organizations and salespeople over the period from the start of the pandemic to early 2022. The authors interviewed 66 sales professionals from different countries and industries to better understand the temporary and enduring shifts in sales strategy and processes, adopting ad inductive and narrative approach.
Findings
There are four major findings. First, four key themes emerged: increased digitalization, resistance to digitalization, sales process changes and sales organization transformation. Second, changes are classified as temporary, permanent and accelerated changes. Third, some proposed changes were not supported. Finally, five findings were found that were not discussed in previous literature.
Originality/value
This paper finds distinctive findings that offer additional valuable insights that connect to and extend existing literature. These include emerging themes, classification shifts, unsupported proposed changes and unique findings.
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Brian N. Rutherford, Nathaniel Hartmann, Nwamaka Anaza and Scott C. Ambrose
Purpose. This chapter discusses the challenges and different strategies to increase skill development for the future workforce.Methodology. Multiple sources on the topic were…
Abstract
Purpose. This chapter discusses the challenges and different strategies to increase skill development for the future workforce.
Methodology. Multiple sources on the topic were studied and reviewed in this chapter. The idea of skill and its development is discussed in the literature review.
Findings. Different nations’ governments have promoted human capital development by providing up-skilling and retraining programs to balance supply and demand. Skills gaps need to be brought to the attention of stakeholders, such as governments, businesses, and the educational system. Teachers, employers, and other stakeholders need to develop strategies and action plans to ensure that the skills gaps are appropriately identified and adequately addressed. These initiatives must be developed with input from various stakeholders.
Practical Implications. The research results would inform the curriculum, incorporating skill development processes tailored to various scenarios. These findings would aid business organisations in crafting skill development programs that address identified skill gaps. Challenges in skill development would be taken into account during course development, and relevant teaching–learning materials would be created. Key stakeholders, such as accrediting organisations, employers, and students, should exert more influence on academic institutions to prioritise societal demands for economic development.
Originality/Value. The uniqueness and significance of this chapter lie in its concise summary of the strategies to tackle the hurdles in skill development.
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Arun Malik, Shamneesh Sharma, Isha Batra, Chetan Sharma, Mahender Singh Kaswan and Jose Arturo Garza-Reyes
Environmental sustainability is quickly becoming one of the most critical issues in industry development. This study aims to conduct a systematic literature review through which…
Abstract
Purpose
Environmental sustainability is quickly becoming one of the most critical issues in industry development. This study aims to conduct a systematic literature review through which the author can provide various research areas to work on for future researchers and provide insight into Industry 4.0 and environmental sustainability.
Design/methodology/approach
This study accomplishes this by performing a backward analysis using text mining on the Scopus database. Latent semantic analysis (LSA) was used to analyze the corpus of 4,364 articles published between 2013 and 2023. The authors generated ten clusters using keywords in the industrial revolution and environmental sustainability domain, highlighting ten research avenues for further exploration.
Findings
In this study, three research questions discuss the role of environmental sustainability with Industry 4.0. The author predicted ten clusters treated as recent trends on which more insight is required from future researchers. The authors provided year-wise analysis, top authors, top countries, top sources and network analysis related to the topic. Finally, the study provided industrialization’s effect on environmental sustainability and the future aspect of automation.
Research limitations/implications
The reliability of the current study may be compromised, notwithstanding the size of the sample used. Poor retrieval of the literature corpus can be attributed to the limitations imposed by the search words, synonyms, string construction and variety of search engines used, as well as to the accurate exclusion of results for which the search string is insufficient.
Originality/value
This research is the first-ever study in which a natural language processing technique is implemented to predict future research areas based on the keywords–document relationship.
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Ravi Dandotiya and Arun Aggarwal
The question of whether tourist destinations established in the aftermath of a disaster will attract visitors remains unanswered. This study attempts to answer this question by…
Abstract
Purpose
The question of whether tourist destinations established in the aftermath of a disaster will attract visitors remains unanswered. This study attempts to answer this question by examining the effect of nation identity on tourists' loyalty in dark heritage tourism through place attachment using the social identity and attachment theory.
Design/methodology/approach
In this quantitative study, data were collected from 622 tourists through a survey method at Jallianwala Bagh, Amritsar, India. Data analysis was performed using exploratory factor analysis (EFA), confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and structural equation modelling.
Findings
The findings of the study suggest that tourists' national identity is a very important variable, not only in retaining the tourists at a destination but also in increasing their attachment towards that particular destination. Place attachment is found to be a predictor of tourist loyalty at a dark tourist destination. Finally, results of the mediation analysis show that place attachment mediates the relationship between national identity and tourist loyalty.
Research limitations/implications
The findings of the study contribute to the research knowledge about a dark heritage tourist destination by exploring the role of national identity in explaining the place attachment and tourist loyalty towards a dark heritage tourist destination. The practical implications for site managers have also been discussed.
Originality/value
The study used the social identity theory and attachment theory to come up with an empirical model of place attachment for a dark heritage tourist destination. This study adds value to understanding national identity, place attachment and tourists' loyalty by exploring their inter-relationship. The focus on diverse characteristics of place attachment is what makes this study unique.
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Rifat Kamasak, Deniz Palalar Alkan and Baris Yalcinkaya
There is a growing interest in the use of HR-based Industry 4.0 technologies for equality, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) issues yet the emerging trends of Industry 4.0 in EDI…
Abstract
There is a growing interest in the use of HR-based Industry 4.0 technologies for equality, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) issues yet the emerging trends of Industry 4.0 in EDI implementations and interventions are not fully covered. This chapter investigates the emerging themes regarding EDI and Industry 4.0 interaction through Google-based big data that show the actual interest in Industry 4.0 and EDI. Drawing on a web analytics method that tracks the real click behaviours of web users through querying combined sets of keywords, the study explores the trends and interactions between Industry 4.0 technologies and EDI-related HR practices. Our search engine results page (SERP) analyses find a high volume of queries and a significant interest between EDI elements and artificial intelligence (AI) only. In contrast to the suggestions of the extant literature, no significant user interest in other Industry 4.0 applications for EDI implementations was observed. The authors suggest that other Industry 4.0 technologies such as machine learning (ML) and natural language processing (NLP) for EDI implementations are in their early stages.
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Tisha Meriam Cherian and C. Joe Arun
The strict lockdown during COVID-19 has suspended construction, procurement and logistics in construction industry and affected the entire Supply Chain Management (SCM). The…
Abstract
Purpose
The strict lockdown during COVID-19 has suspended construction, procurement and logistics in construction industry and affected the entire Supply Chain Management (SCM). The COVID-19 has been universally observed in all sectors, but a limited study has been done in construction industry and also the ways to mitigate it. Hence, the current study aims to identify the impact of COVID-19 in Construction Supply Chain (CSC) and to analyse the influence of factors on Supply Chain (SC) performance during uncertainty in the construction industry.
Design/methodology/approach
From previous studies, the factors enhancing the SCM performance are taken. The research follows a qualitative in-depth interview to identify the factors and quantitative study to collect data using a questionnaire. Samples for the study were chosen using purposing sampling techniques. The collected data were analysed using “Statistical Package for Social Science” (SPSS V 20).
Findings
Effect of COVID-19 is more on medium sized builders and developers. A positive impact is found between SC agility, SC resilience and information technology (IT) capabilities on SC performance.
Research limitations/implications
Firstly, the study adopted cross-sectional data to test the hypothesis. The study results on the combined effect of the factors SC agility, SC resilience and IT capability during uncertainty were found to have a positive influence. The longitudinal study would enrich the understanding of the research. Secondly, the study was focussed on the perspective of the dynamic capability view. Further studies can adopt a multi-method approach to develop a theoretical framework using in-depth study and empirical validation. It will help in a better understanding of the current situation and young discipline in SC. Thirdly, the study has considered only Kerala construction companies; hence, the data were less. More data with better results will be obtained if the study has included construction companies from other states. Fourthly, the study can be extended to understand the interdependent effects of SC agility, SC resilience and information technology capability on performance. Presently, the interdependent effect in the study is limited.
Practical implications
The study helps the construction professionals to understand the preventive measures needed for the industry during any uncertainty. Also, the study is expected to help the construction managers and leaders with better performance in SCM and other business activities by adopting IT connectivity and being agile in all situations. Moreover, the study also helps policymakers take active solutions by providing awareness and incentives to the construction industry professionals. The literature and the factors will also help the academicians in further research progress.
Originality/value
The research is important for construction professionals to comprehend the impact of COVID-19 and to analyse the influence of factors such as SC agility, SC resilience and IT capabilities on improving the SC performance. This research can assist private and public construction firms to enhance SC performance during times of uncertainty. The result is likely to help construction companies with better SC performance and helps academicians' further progress in research.
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Chaitanya Arun Sathe and Chetan Panse
This study aims to examine the enablers of productivity of enterprise-level Agile development process using modified total interpretative structural modeling (TISM). The two main…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to examine the enablers of productivity of enterprise-level Agile development process using modified total interpretative structural modeling (TISM). The two main objectives of the current study are to determine the variables influencing enterprise-level agile development productivity and to develop modified TISM for the corresponding components.
Design/methodology/approach
To identify enablers of the productivity of enterprise-level agile software development process a literature review and opinions of domain experts were collected. A hierarchical relationship among variables that show direct and indirect influence is created using the modified TISM (M-TISM) technique with Cross Impact Matrix-Multiplication Applied to Classification analysis. This study examined and analyzed the relationships between the determinants within the enterprise using a M-TISM technique.
Findings
With the literature review, the study could identify ten enabling factors of the productivity of Agile development process at the enterprise level. Results depict that program increment (PI) planning and scalable backlog management, continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD), agile release trains (ART), agile work culture, delivery excellence, lean and DevOps practices, value stream mapping (VMS), team skills and expertise, collaborative culture, agile coaching, customer engagement have an impact on the productivity of enterprise-level Agile development process. The results show that team collaboration, agile ways of working and customer engagement have a greater impact on productivity improvement for enterprise-level Agile development process.
Research limitations/implications
The developed model is useful for organizations employing scaled Agile development processes in software development. This study provides a recommended listing of key enablers, that may enable productivity improvements in the Agile development process at the enterprise level. Strategists should focus on team collaboration and Agile project management. This study offers a modified TISM model to academicians to help them understand the effects of numerous variables on maintaining the productivity of an enterprise-level Agile. The identified characteristics and their hierarchical structure can help project managers during the execution of Agile projects at the enterprise level, more effectively, increasing their success and productivity.
Originality/value
The study addresses the gap in the literature by interpretative relationships between the identified enabling factors. The model validation is carried out by a panel of nine experts from several information technology organizations deploying Agile software development at the enterprise level. This unique method broadens the knowledge base in Agile software development at scale and provides project managers and practitioners with a practical foundation.
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Rupinder Singh, Gurwinder Singh and Arun Anand
The purpose of this paper is to design and manufacture an intelligent 3D printed sensor to monitor the re-occurrence of diaphragmatic hernia (DH; after surgery) in bovines as an…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to design and manufacture an intelligent 3D printed sensor to monitor the re-occurrence of diaphragmatic hernia (DH; after surgery) in bovines as an Internet of Things (IOT)-based solution.
Design/methodology/approach
The approach used in this study is based on a bibliographic analysis for the re-occurrence of DH in the bovine after surgery. Using SolidWorks and ANSYS, the computer-aided design model of the implant was 3D printed based on literature and discussions on surgical techniques with a veterinarian. To ensure the error-proof design, load test and strain–stress rate analyses with boundary distortion have been carried out for the implant sub-assembly.
Findings
An innovative IOT-based additive manufacturing solution has been presented for the construction of a mesh-type sensor (for the health monitoring of bovine after surgery).
Originality/value
An innovative mesh-type sensor has been fabricated by integration of metal and polymer 3D printing (comprising 17–4 precipitate hardened stainless steel and polyvinylidene fluoride-hydroxyapatite-chitosan) without sacrificing strength and specific absorption ratio value.
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