Search results

This study explores the critical success factors (CSFs) for Security Education, Training and Awareness (SETA) program effectiveness. The questionable effectiveness of SETA programs at changing employee behavior and an absence of empirical studies on the CSFs for SETA program effectiveness is the key motivation for this study.

This exploratory study follows a systematic inductive approach to concept development. The methodology adopts the “key informant” approach to give voice to practitioners with SETA program expertise. Data are gathered using semi-structured interviews with 20 key informants from various geographic locations including the Gulf nations, Middle East, USA, UK and Ireland.

In this study, the analysis of these key informant interviews, following an inductive open, axial and selective coding approach, produces 11 CSFs for SETA program effectiveness. These CSFs are mapped along the phases of a SETA program lifecycle (design, development, implementation and evaluation) and nine relationships identified between the CSFs (within and across the lifecycle phases) are highlighted. The CSFs and CSFs' relationships are visualized in a Lifecycle Model of CSFs for SETA program effectiveness.

This research advances the first comprehensive conceptualization of the CSFs for SETA program effectiveness. The Lifecycle Model of CSFs for SETA program effectiveness provides valuable insights into the process of introducing and sustaining an effective SETA program in practice. The Lifecycle Model contributes to both theory and practice and lays the foundation for future studies.

The purpose of this paper is to identify the dominant strategy and business models of companies and to analyse the awareness of design and the stage of design application in business in its broader sense from the perspective of business executives in the manufacturing sector and professional designers in the design industry that lead to creating successful business models in Latvia and Estonia.

The questionnaire was used with two target groups – business executives (based on NACE 2, B-E sections, i.e. manufacturing companies) and professional designers in the design industry (NACE 2, M 74.10 section). In the first target group, 374 responses of business executives in Latvia and 371 responses of business executives in Estonia were received; in the second target group, 85 respondents in Latvia and 42 respondents in Estonia providing professional design services were analysed to identify the level of design awareness and its application in business in the respective countries.

There are national and regional specifics in Latvia and Estonia based on the development level of micro and macro factors that influence the entire innovation ecosystem. When comparing both countries in these terms, both target groups specify that design is applied more frequently in the processes of product development in Estonia, thus leading to new forms of innovation, than it is in Latvia. Conversely, in Latvia, many business managers still focus on short-term business solutions and cost-reduction as a sole challenge, with limited awareness of management approaches based on the broader application of design as a powerful innovation source for product development, improvement, and renewal of business models.

A suggestion for further research is to replicate the study in Lithuania and explore the perspective of other stakeholders.

The results of this research demonstrate the necessity to change the thinking patterns of business managers in order to develop their skills and capabilities to recognize emerging new driving forces of innovation unfolding through awareness of design and opportunities for its extended application that create successful business models for continuous value generation.

This paper makes a contribution to understanding the current stage of awareness of design and its application in the manufacturing sector in the Baltic States.

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the effect of design awareness on consumers’ purchase intention.

The experiment consisted of showing a new beer package design to 185 participants who evaluated it using a self‐administered questionnaire.

Using an Item Response Theory approach, results show that there are two dimensions of consumer design awareness: basic design and differential design. These findings are, to some extent, consistent with the theoretical discussion within design literature. Moreover, a multiple regression model estimates the effect of both dimensions on consumers’ purchase intention, and the paper concludes that both dimensions have a similar effect (p<0.05). The sign of the effects are consistent with the theoretical discussion.

The design of new products must consider attributes associated to the basic and practical use of a product as well as those attributes that mark a comparative difference in the product category.

This paper conceptually and empirically combines two different areas of knowledge (design and consumer behavior) under the design awareness construct. This concept evaluates consumers’ perceptions about new products, facilitating more accurate decisions in cases of innovation.

In the Ghanaian construction industry (GCI), the option for stakeholders to adopt formwork design as a building construction requirement is uncommon place. This is due to the low level of awareness and practice of formwork design. As a result of this, there have been formwork accidents, cost and time overruns in construction. This paper aims to solicit the view of stakeholders on the awareness of formwork design practices in the GCI.

This paper adopted the interpretivism research philosophy and inductive reasoning. Through a semi-structured interview guide, data was collected. The data (interview) recorded was transcribed using the Amberscript web application. This study used thematic analysis in analyzing the data collected using Nvivo 10 software.

The data collected from the 22 professionals indicated that the respondents were unaware of the concept of formwork design and its practice, neither could they speak to the existence of any specific regulation nor code of practice. However, the respondents established that there was a need to design formwork and stated some benefits of it.

From the literature, little research has been done on formwork design and its context in the GCI is yet to be explored. This research attempts to fill this gap. The findings indicate that to practice formwork design, there must be education and training of human resources for formwork design, there must be a code of practice to guide the design process and legal backing through policies and regulations to mandate the design.

This paper aims to inquire into the awareness of Vietnamese architects about design for safety (DfS) and the level of engagement in applying DfS among them to get a generic view of the implementation of DfS in Vietnam.

Quantitative research was used, in which a questionnaire was sent to Vietnamese architects to evaluate how they consider and apply DfS in the design process. Inferential and descriptive statistics then analysed the obtained data to identify the role of each factor.

The results from the survey conclude that Vietnamese architects have low engagement in applying DfS despite their high awareness and positive attitude towards DfS. Besides, the participants showed the need for further DfS education and training, which is lacking in Vietnamese formal education. In addition, the research also confirms that DfS education and training have positive impacts on the frequency of DfS implementation in Vietnam.

This research contributes to the knowledge of DfS implementation in developing countries. In line with this, further studies on the DfS concept in developing countries are needed to draw a more objective overview and give the solution for the low DfS appliance.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study inquiring into the implication of DfS in Vietnam, contributing to improving the lack of knowledge in this field in developing countries and Vietnam in particular.

This paper aims to enhance clarity for the conceptualization and measurement of group emotional awareness by defining it as an emergent state. The authors explore the emergence of this state through two studies designed to explore the four characteristics (global, radically novel, coherent and ostensive) of emergent phenomena (Waller et al., 2016).

In Study 1, the authors explore in an experimental setting the formation of group emotional awareness and regulation as emergent states as a result of compositional effects (team members’ self-perceptions of their individual emotional awareness capabilities) and group norms regarding emotional awareness. Study 2 uses an experimental design to explore how pre-existing expectations of group emotional awareness, based on previous dyadic interactions between team members, can prevent conflict escalation (from task to relationship conflict) in project teams.

Individual perceptions of members’ own abilities and group norms interact in the emergence of group emotional awareness. Group emotion regulation can develop only under an optimal level of emergent group emotional awareness; groups that build emotional awareness norms compensate for their members’ low awareness and develop equally efficient regulatory strategies as groups formed of emotionally aware individuals. However, the conjunction of personal propensity towards awareness and explicit awareness norms blocks the development of regulatory strategies. Group emotional awareness (both as a developed state and as an expectation) reduces the escalation of task to relationship conflict.

Designing for the exploration of the four characteristics of emergence allowed us to gain new insights about how group emotional awareness emerges and operates too much awareness can hurt, and affective group expectations have the power to shape reality. These findings have strong implications for practitioners’ training of emotional awareness in organizations.

Recent global security surveys indicate that security training and awareness programs are not working as well as they could be and that investments made by organizations are inadequate. The purpose of the paper is to increase understanding of this phenomenon and illuminate the problems that organizations face when trying to establish an information security awareness program.

Following an interpretive approach the authors apply a case study method and employ actor network theory (ANT) and the due process for analyzing findings.

The paper contributes to both understanding and managing security awareness programs in organizations, by providing a framework that enables the analysis of awareness activities and interactions with the various organizational processes and events.

The application of ANT still remains a challenge for researchers since no practical method or guide exists. In this paper the application of ANT through the due process model extension is enhanced and practically presented. This exploration highlights the fact that information security awareness initiatives involve different stakeholders, with often conflicting interests. Practitioners must acquire, additionally to technical skills, communication, negotiation and management skills in order to address the related organizational and managerial issues. Moreover, the results of this inquiry reveal that the role of artifacts used within the awareness process is not neutral but can actively affect it.

This study is one of the first to examine information security awareness as a managerial and socio‐technical process within an organizational context.

Aiming to find out how to incorporate green building into the architectural curriculum, this study aims to explore the psychological path for cultivating architectural students’ awareness and motivation to learn the green design concepts and related technologies.

Based on a global review of relevant architectural courses in universities, a set of green building learning behaviors was proposed and a survey was conducted in architectural schools in South China to verify the “value-belief-norm” theory through the lens of green building learning behaviors. The psychological path that affects students’ green building learning behaviors was analyzed using structural equation modeling.

The results showed that biospheric and altruistic values could directly affect students’ motivation to learn green building, while personal norms served as the mediating condition for personal values and beliefs, and ultimately improved motivation.

The study suggests that the cultivation of environmental awareness and a sense of the ecological crisis should be developed through foundation courses, by establishing an ecological architecture curriculum, to more effectively guide students to learn and practice green building.

This study, for the first time, applied the “value-belief-norm” theory, which was developed to explain the psychological path for pro-environmental behaviors, to green building learning behaviors of architectural students.

Online social network (OSN) users have a high propensity to malware threats due to the trust and persuasive factors that underpin OSN models. The escalation of social engineering malware encourages a growing demand for end-user security awareness measures. The purpose of this paper is to take the theoretical cybersecurity awareness model TTAT-MIP and test its feasibility via a Facebook app, namely social network criminal (SNC).

The research employs a mixed-methods approach to evaluate the SNC app. A system usability scale measures the usability of SNC. Paired samples t-tests were administered to 40 participants to measure security awareness – before and after the intervention. Finally, 20 semi-structured interviews were deployed to obtain qualitative data about the usefulness of the App itself.

Results validate the effectiveness of OSN apps utilising a TTAT-MIP model – specifically the mass interpersonal persuasion (MIP) attributes. Using TTAT-MIP as a guidance, practitioners can develop security awareness systems that better leverage the intra-relationship model of OSNs.

The primary limitation of this study is the experimental settings. Although the results testing the TTAT-MIP Facebook app are promising, these were set under experimental conditions.

SNC enable persuasive security behaviour amongst employees and avoid potential malware threats. SNC support consistent security awareness practices by the regular identification of new threats which may inspire the creation of new security awareness videos.

The structure of OSNs is making it easier for malicious users to carry out their activities without the possibility of detection. By building a security awareness programme using the TTAT-MIP model, organisations can proactively manage security awareness.

Many security systems are cumbersome, inconsistent and non-specific. The outcome of this research provides organisations and security practitioners with a framework for designing and developing proactive and tailored security awareness systems.

Developing self-awareness as a management instructor and modelling this process for students’ similar awareness has benefits in classroom learning environments. In this chapter, the authors reframe faculty and student traditional roles and responsibilities, providing an iterative, holistic process of embedded interdependent self-awareness development where students experience a sense of empowerment and control over their learning, integral to mutual success. The authors’ experiences draw on aspects of experiential learning, Gestalt psychology, and self-determination theory (SDT). To create an intrinsically motivating, student-centred learning environment in an undergraduate leadership course, the authors reframed teaching to include course design, opportunities for student autonomy, co-creation of psychological safety, and the instructor’s use of self. This evidence-based reflection for self-awareness included examining behavioural patterns, feelings, and thinking. Finally, the authors discuss lessons learned and practical applications, identifying reflexivity, psychological safety, iterative feedback, student autonomy, and modelling as key to the process.