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1 – 10 of over 20000Stefan Szücs and Inger Kjellberg
The purpose is to analyse the relationship between democratic accountability and how sustainable governance is achieved by horizontally integrating care services for older people…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose is to analyse the relationship between democratic accountability and how sustainable governance is achieved by horizontally integrating care services for older people through collaboration in a coordination body of key leaders from across the health and social care system.
Design/methodology/approach
The data and measures come from two surveys with coordination body members in Sweden (politicians, administrators, professionals) from a sample of 73 bodies in 2015 (n = 549) and the same/corresponding 59 bodies in 2019 (n = 389).
Findings
The governance of integrating care scale and the accountability scales repeatedly show consistency among individual members. Systematic progress is found among large coordination bodies: the greater the average perception of governance of horizontally integrating care in 2015, the greater it was in 2019 – and regardless of the period, the stronger the internal administrative or political monitoring and reviewing of the coordination body, the greater its governance (while the relationship to the external monitoring and reviewing is weak). However, the growing importance of external accountability is indirect, shown by stronger correlations between the internal political and external monitoring and reviewing, regardless of size.
Research limitations/implications
The scales are based on self-reported perceptions that cannot be objectively verified, but they can be linked to changes in outcomes and user experiences in the later stages of the research.
Originality/value
Repeatedly verified scales of internal and external accountability for analysing and evaluating governance of integrating care services horizontally, which is useful for improving strategic coordination of integrated care.
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The purpose of this paper is to test Chandler’s dictum that “unless structure follows strategy, inefficiency results” (Chandler, 1962, p. 314) by assessing the continuing efforts…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to test Chandler’s dictum that “unless structure follows strategy, inefficiency results” (Chandler, 1962, p. 314) by assessing the continuing efforts to align structure with strategy in the automobile industry from the turn of the century through the 1980s.
Design/methodology/approach
The historical analysis utilized conceptual mediation and moderation methodologies wherein the impacts of strategy on structure were mediated by their impacts on coordination and control, and moderated by external conditions such as uncertainty, variability, interdependence and asset specificity.
Findings
The findings demonstrate that structure followed differing strategies at General Motors, Ford and Chrysler, and provide strong support for Chandler’s dictum. The findings demonstrate the difficulties of maintaining alignment of strategy and structure with changes in the external competitive environment, and the severe consequences of a misalignment of strategy and structure. The findings also demonstrate that structure alone is not sufficient to implement strategy effectively, and that firms must judiciously utilize both internal firm and external market coordinating and control mechanisms to optimize performance.
Research limitations/implications
Limitations include that this is a study of a single industry over an extended, but specific time period.
Practical implications
Generalization is limited by a study of a single industry, but there are numerous implications for organizational design and strategy implementation that are not industry-specific.
Originality/value
Chandler’s dictum is often cited, but this is one of very few studies that demonstrate the relationship between specific organizational designs and company strategies, and the consequences of misaligning strategy and structure.
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Marianne Jahre and Leif‐Magnus Jensen
In the field of humanitarianism, cluster thinking has been suggested as a solution to the lack of coordinated disaster response. Clusters for diverse functions, including…
Abstract
Purpose
In the field of humanitarianism, cluster thinking has been suggested as a solution to the lack of coordinated disaster response. Clusters for diverse functions, including sheltering, logistics and water and sanitation, can be viewed as an effort to achieve functional coordination. The purpose of this paper is to contribute to a greater understanding of the potential of cluster concepts using supply chain coordination and inter‐cluster coordination. The focus is on the conceptual level rather than on specific means of coordination.
Design/methodology/approach
The cluster concept in humanitarian relief, along with some key empirical issues, is based on a case study. The concept is then compared to the literature on clusters and coordination in order to develop a theoretical framework with propositions on the tradeoffs between different types of coordination.
Findings
The results provide important reflections on one of the major trends in contemporary development of humanitarian logistics. This paper shows that there is a tradeoff between different types of coordination, with horizontal coordination inside cluster drawing attention away from important issues of the supply chain as well as the need to coordinate among the clusters.
Research limitations/implications
There is a need for more in‐depth case studies of experiences with clusters in various operations. Various perspectives should be taken into account, including the field, responding agencies, beneficiaries, donors, military and commercial service providers, both during and between disasters.
Practical implications
The paper presents the tradeoffs between different types of coordination, in which basic aims such as standardisation through functional coordination, must be balanced with cross‐functional and vertical coordination in order to more successfully serve the users' composite needs.
Originality/value
The focus on possible trade‐offs between different types of coordination is an important complement to the literature, which often assumes simultaneous high degrees of horizontal and vertical coordination.
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Shabana Naveed and Aisha Azhar
With governance networks as the critical emerging feature of public administration, this article examines the structure, governance and challenges of networks in the public…
Abstract
Purpose
With governance networks as the critical emerging feature of public administration, this article examines the structure, governance and challenges of networks in the public sector. Using complexity theory, this article explains that control-based relations do not hold much relevance to govern the complex systems of networks.
Design/methodology/approach
Case study research design is employed taking the power network in Pakistan as the unit of analysis. Data were collected through eleven semi-structured interviews, companies' websites, government policy reports and other companies' reports. The structure of the power network was examined through the technique of social network analysis using UCINET. Thematic analysis of interviews was conducted with the help of NVivo 13 to identify the mode of governance and challenges.
Findings
The study found that five central public sector actors have a high degree centrality and betweenness centrality. Thematic analysis further revealed that these actors are controlling most of the decisions in the network in a hierarchical mode of governance. Other actors face multiple challenges including lack of autonomy, overlapping authorities, conflicting rules and complex decision processes.
Research limitations/implications
The findings imply that instead of top-down and control-based relations, networks require self-governance mechanisms where actors independently participate and interact with other actors to generate common solutions to problems.
Practical implications
The authorities should use network management strategies, participatory approaches and consensus-building methods to reach decisions.
Originality/value
The study explores the network structure and network governance challenges in the context of a developing country that is barely addressed in the public management literature.
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Generation A individuals with Asperger's (high-functioning autism) might increase their chance that their skills fit with job requirements (person-job fit) by considering various…
Abstract
Generation A individuals with Asperger's (high-functioning autism) might increase their chance that their skills fit with job requirements (person-job fit) by considering various nonacademic and popular lists of Asperger's-friendly jobs. Asperger's “celebrity” and professor Temple Grandin's list of 51 jobs was investigated using Asperger's-related job characteristics from the US Department of Labor's O*NET job description database. Using a factor analysis resulting in six Asperger's-related job characteristics, social orientation was the only factor that significantly predicted Grandin's judgment of what is an Asperger's-related job based on a binomial logistic regression analysis. Another analysis using O*NET data showed a wide variety of jobs that were most and least associated with each of the six factors. Study limitations and future research follow the analyses.
Indri Dwi Apriliyanti, Bevaola Kusumasari, Agus Pramusinto and Widodo Agus Setianto
This study addresses the critical factors that contribute to the success of e-government programs in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) member states (AMS). We…
Abstract
Purpose
This study addresses the critical factors that contribute to the success of e-government programs in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) member states (AMS). We investigate the factors that play key roles in e-government adoption and implementation in AMS that stem from multiple dimensions.
Design/methodology/approach
Our qualitative study on eight ASEAN countries with different political situations and economic developments suggests that in general, institutions (formal and informal institutions), resources, leadership, organizational design and culture values determine the success of e-government.
Findings
The provision of adequate information and communication technology infrastructure alone is insufficient to ensure the success of e-government.
Research limitations/implications
Our findings lead to a conceptual framework of factors that drive the success of e-government projects that advances the literature on e-government, particularly the research about e-government in the context of developing countries.
Originality/value
An empirical evidence and in-depth understanding suggest that different factors are associated with detrimental impacts on e-government implementation.
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Raquel Sebastian and Magdalena Ulceluse
The purpose of this paper is to analyse the effect of an increase in the relative supply of immigrants on natives’ task reallocation, with a focus on Germany. Specifically, it…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to analyse the effect of an increase in the relative supply of immigrants on natives’ task reallocation, with a focus on Germany. Specifically, it investigates whether natives, as a response to increased immigration, re-specialise in communication-intensive occupations, where they arguably have a comparative advantage due to language proficiency.
Design/methodology/approach
The analysis uses regional data from the German Labour Force Survey between 2002 and 2014. To derive data on job tasks requirements, it employs the US Department of Labor’s O*NET database, the results of which are tested through a sensitivity analysis using the European Working Condition Survey and the Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies data sets.
Findings
The paper finds that indeed German workers respond to increasing immigration by shifting their task supply and providing more communication relative to manual tasks. Importantly, the decrease in the supply of communication tasks is stronger and more robust than the increase in the supply of manual tasks, pointing to a potential displacement effect taking place between natives and immigrants, alongside task reallocation. This would suggest that countries with relatively more rigid labour markets are less responsive to immigration shocks. Moreover, it suggests that labour market rigidity can minimise the gains from immigration and exacerbate employment effects.
Originality/value
The paper not only investigates task reallocation as a result of immigration in a different institutional context and labour market functioning, but the results feed into broader policy and scholarly discussions on the effects of immigration, including questions about how the institutional context affects labour market adjustment to immigration, worker occupational mobility in a more rigid labour markets and the fine balance needed between flexibility and rigidity.
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Franciscsa S. Rodriguez, Jan Spilski, Felix Hekele, Nils Ove Beese and Thomas Lachmann
Investigating demands within an occupational context has always been an essential endeavor to guarantee worker well-being and performance efficiency. In blue-collar occupations…
Abstract
Purpose
Investigating demands within an occupational context has always been an essential endeavor to guarantee worker well-being and performance efficiency. In blue-collar occupations, the physical demands of manual labor have always been the major focus, but recent technological changes may come with higher demands on the intellectual capacities of workers. For this reason, the purpose of this paper is to assess physical and cognitive demands that construction workers face.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors conducted a quantitative study using standardized research instruments. Construction workers of three German construction companies were asked to volunteer to participate in interviews (n=35) and a survey (n=30) that assessed the extent of physical demands and a variety of cognitive demands experienced by construction workers.
Findings
The results suggest that construction work is demanding in physical terms as well as in perceptual, psychomotor, social and cognitive terms. Using and updating specialized knowledge, giving advice and providing consultation, friendliness, assertiveness and reliability are important demands among construction workers.
Research limitations/implications
Construction workers face an undervalued level of demands in their everyday work environment. As high demands can affect well-being and mental health, construction companies would greatly benefit from investing efforts into evaluating the multi-component demands profile of their workers and the impact on their health, in particular through the strongly increasing cognitive demands due to the ongoing digitization of the sector.
Originality/value
The study identified essential demands in construction work that are relevant for the workers’ productivity and well-being.
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Andrea H. Tapia, Edgar Maldonado, Louis‐Marie Ngamassi Tchouakeu and Carleen F. Maitland
This paper seeks to examine two humanitarian information coordination bodies. The goals of both coordination bodies are the same, to find mechanisms for multiple organizations…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper seeks to examine two humanitarian information coordination bodies. The goals of both coordination bodies are the same, to find mechanisms for multiple organizations, engaged in humanitarian relief, to coordinate efforts around information technology and management. Despite the similarity in goals, each coordination body has taken a different path, one toward defining the problem and solution in a more technical sense and the other as defining the problem and solution as more organizational in nature.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper develops case studies of two coordinating bodies using qualitative methodologies.
Findings
The data suggest that coordination bodies which pursue problems requiring low levels of organizational change are more likely to have visible successes. Coordination bodies that pursue a more challenging agenda, one that aims for information management or management of information technology in ways that require organizational change, are likely to face greater challenges and experience more failures.
Research limitations/implications
The paper only examines two coordination bodies at one point in time thus claims can not be made about all coordination bodies and all information coordination efforts.
Originality/value
In a time where coordination bodies are seen as an answer to the problem of information sharing during disasters, it is essential to gain understanding concerning the success of these efforts.
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Daniel Petry and Ines Dombrowsky
Given that the European Water Framework Directive (WFD) calls for the management of water resources at the river basin level, the German water sector, which has historically been…
Abstract
Given that the European Water Framework Directive (WFD) calls for the management of water resources at the river basin level, the German water sector, which has historically been dominated by the federal states and has been organized along administrative borders, is now challenged to be reorganized. The article introduces the German water sector, reviews past experiences with river basin management such as North Rhine–Westphalia's water associations, the river basin organizations of the former German Democratic Republic, and international river commissions, and addresses current challenges in connection with the implementation of WFD.