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1 – 10 of over 15000Saija Mauno, Bettina Kubicek, Jaana Minkkinen and Christian Korunka
In order to understand the driving forces behind intensified job demands (IJDs), the purpose of this paper is to examine demographic factors, structural work-related factors…
Abstract
Purpose
In order to understand the driving forces behind intensified job demands (IJDs), the purpose of this paper is to examine demographic factors, structural work-related factors, personal and job resources as antecedents of IJDs.
Design/methodology/approach
The study is based on cross-sectional (n=4,963) and longitudinal (n=2,055) quantitative data sets of Austrian employees. Data sets were analyzed via regression analyses.
Findings
The results showed that IJDs, as assessed through five sub-dimensions: work intensification, intensified job-related, career-related planning and decision-making demands, intensified demands for skills and for knowledge-related learning, remained fairly stable overtime. The most consistent antecedents of IJDs were personal initiative and ICT use at work. Job resources, e.g. variety of tasks and lacking support from supervisor, related to four sub-dimensions of IJDs.
Research limitations/implications
The findings suggest that personal (being initiative) and job resources (task variety) may have negative effects as they associated with IJDs. Moreover, supervisors’ support is crucial to counteract IJDs.
Practical implications
Employers should recognize that certain personal (e.g. personal initiative) and job-related resources (e.g. lacking supervisory support) might implicate higher IJDs, which, in turn, may cause more job strain as IJDs can be conceived as job stressors.
Originality/value
IJDs have received very little research attention because they are new job demands, which however, can be expected to increase in future due to faster technological acceleration in working life. The study has methodological value as longitudinal design was applied.
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Tiger Li, J.A.F. Nicholls and Sydney Roslow
Although the impact of market‐driven learning on new product success in export markets is assumed in the literature, its role is not yet empirically tested due to an absence of…
Abstract
Although the impact of market‐driven learning on new product success in export markets is assumed in the literature, its role is not yet empirically tested due to an absence of the concept operationalization. Develops a conceptual framework of market‐driven learning and new product success in export markets to address these issues. The authors further test the model using data collected from US software companies. The findings indicate that both customer and competitor learning processes exert positive impacts on new product success in foreign markets. The results regarding market environmental factors offer some evidence suggesting correlations between these factors and behavioral activities of market learning. Concludes with a discussion of managerial implications and directions for future research.
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Sharon Louise Clancy and John Holford
The purpose of this paper is to examine the implications for adults of learning in a residential context and whether the residential aspect intensifies the learning process, and…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine the implications for adults of learning in a residential context and whether the residential aspect intensifies the learning process, and can lead to enhanced personal transformation, moving beyond professional skills and training for employability.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper reports on research, conducted in 2017, with 41 current and former staff and students (on both short courses and longer access courses) in four residential colleges for adults: Ruskin, Northern, Fircroft and Hillcroft Colleges.
Findings
Key findings include the powerful role residential education plays in accelerating and deepening learning experiences, particularly for adults who have faced extraordinary personal and societal challenges and are second chance learners. The colleges, all in historic settings, confer feelings of worth, security and sanctuary and the staff support – pastoral and academic, bespoke facilities and private rooms are vital enabling mechanisms. Seminar-style learning creates opportunity for experiential group learning, helping to foster critical thinking and challenge to mainstream views.
Social implications
The colleges’ ethos, curricula and traditions foster among students an “ethic of service” and a desire to offer “emotional labour” to their own communities, through working for instance in health and social care or the voluntary sector.
Originality/value
Little research has been undertaken in contemporary settings on the impact of learning in a residential environment, particularly for second chance learners and vulnerable adults. Still less research has examined the wider implications of learning in a historic building setting and of learning which extends into critical thinking, intellectual growth, transformation and change.
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Christian Korunka, Bettina Kubicek, Matea Paškvan and Heike Ulferts
Increasing speed in many life domains is currently being discussed under the term “social acceleration” as a societal phenomenon which not only affects western societies, but may…
Abstract
Purpose
Increasing speed in many life domains is currently being discussed under the term “social acceleration” as a societal phenomenon which not only affects western societies, but may also lead to job demands arising from accelerated change. Demands such as work intensification and intensified learning and their changes over time may increase emotional exhaustion, but may also induce positive effects. The purpose of this paper is to examine how increases in demands arising from accelerated change affect employee well-being.
Design/methodology/approach
A total of 587 eldercare workers provided data on work intensification and intensified learning as well as on exhaustion and job satisfaction at two points in time.
Findings
Work intensification was negatively related to future job satisfaction and positively related to future emotional exhaustion, whereas intensified learning was positively associated with future job satisfaction and negatively with future emotional exhaustion.
Social implications
Intensified demands represents a growing social as well as work-specific challenge which needs to be addressed by practitioners.
Originality/value
Using a longitudinal perspective this study is the first to examine the relationship of increases in work intensification and intensified learning with job satisfaction and emotional exhaustion at work.
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This chapter suggests that welfare management is becoming a matter of being able to use the open space in between formal roles, silos and organisations to actualise a not yet…
Abstract
Purpose
This chapter suggests that welfare management is becoming a matter of being able to use the open space in between formal roles, silos and organisations to actualise a not yet possible, qualitatively better welfare here and now. The discourse about the open-ended and futuristic space in between is challenging practices of welfare education. A growing field of studies is criticising the centres of education, learning and research for being a McDonald’s culture, with an overly linear approach, unable to connect passion, sensitivity and intuition with knowledge. This chapter goes further than criticising existing practices. Building on notions of affective studies, the aim is to experiment on how to shift the focus from thinking about open spaces to intensifying thinking-spaces, able to generate the processual relations increasing the opportunity for a qualitative better welfare to occur here and now.
Design/methodology/approach
The object of the chapter is an experiment entitled The Future Public Leadership Education Now. It is based on non-representational studies and designed to operate on the affective registers.
Findings
The chapter offers a theoretical and pragmatic wandering as wondering. It continues and expands the experiment as an ongoing thinking-spaces moving between the known and the unknown. It aims at gently opening the opportunity for a qualitatively better welfare to occur.
Practical implications
Researchers become welfare artists intensifying affective co-motions as ongoing and form-shifting processes.
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Abdallah Taamneh, Abdallah Alsaad, Hamzah Elrehail, Manaf Al-Okaily, Abdalwali Lutfi and Rommel Pilapil Sergio
This study aimed at determining factors which affect university lecturers’ adoption of the Moodle platform under the conditions of COVID-19. In considering the condition of the…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aimed at determining factors which affect university lecturers’ adoption of the Moodle platform under the conditions of COVID-19. In considering the condition of the COVID-19 pandemic, the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT) model was applied and extended by adding two additional variables of learning demand and time pressure to assess their influence on Moodle platform adoption.
Design/methodology/approach
Data were obtained from the 226 participants through an online structured questionnaire. The covariance-based approach of structural equation modeling was used to examine the proposed model. The structural model was tested using the maximum likelihood method of analysis of a moment structures to analyze the study’s hypotheses.
Findings
Results suggest that performance expectations have a substantial influence on behavioral intent. The effort expectancy, social effect and facilitative factors have no effects on behavioral intentions. Facilitating conditions directly and significantly affect the actual use of Moodle. The results also reveal that learning demands, which is a salient predictor of perceived time pressure, in turn directly and significantly affects the actual use of Moodle. Finally, the behavioral intention has a strong influence on Moodle’s actual usage.
Originality/value
Although the UTAUT 2 model is considered to be a new and updated version of UTAUT, it has not been used since newly added variables, namely, price, habit and hedonic motivations, are less related to the context and to avoid respondents’ paradox. Moreover, using the Moodle platform in the researched context is compulsory for both students and instructors. Discussion, insights, limitations and recommendations for future studies are suggested.
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Andrea D. Ellinger and Maria Cseh
Interest and research on workplace learning has intensified in recent years, however, research on assessing how employees facilitate each other's learning through everyday work…
Abstract
Purpose
Interest and research on workplace learning has intensified in recent years, however, research on assessing how employees facilitate each other's learning through everyday work experiences and how organizational contextual factors promote or impede the facilitation of others' learning at work is underdeveloped. Therefore, the purpose of this research was to explore how employees facilitate others' learning and the contextual factors that influence employees' facilitation of others' learning in a workplace setting.
Design/methodology/approach
A qualitative case study approach was selected for this study. An adaptation of the critical incident technique and semi‐structured in‐depth interviews were conducted with 13 employees representing various functional areas within a learning‐oriented consumer‐focused manufacturer. Content analysis and constant comparative analysis were the approaches used to analyze the data.
Findings
Several findings emerged that describe the catalysts for employees' facilitating others' learning, the behaviors that facilitators engaged to facilitate others' learning, and the perceived outcomes from facilitating learning. Several positive and negative organizational contextual factors emerged that influence the facilitation of others' learning. Specifically, the role of learning‐committed leadership, manifested in several ways, emerged as a powerful organizational contextual factor.
Research limitations/implications
The findings from case study research are not intended to be generalizable. The use of self‐report data is another limitation, as are recollections of critical incidents. However, integrating multiple sources of data collection was an attempt to allow for triangulation of findings.
Practical implications
The findings depict the importance of leadership and management in the process of facilitating learning and the extent to which leaders and managers can create organizational environments conducive to the facilitation of learning that has implications for management and leadership development programs. This study also identifies avenues for future research.
Originality/value
This paper contributes to research that explores how employees facilitate others' learning and the contextual factors that influence employees' facilitation of others' learning in a workplace setting.
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Michele Morais Oliveira Pereira, Minelle E. Silva and Linda C. Hendry
This paper aims to investigate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on supply chain (SC) sustainability learning. In particular, it focuses on the learning associated with changes…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to investigate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on supply chain (SC) sustainability learning. In particular, it focuses on the learning associated with changes in the sustainability initiatives of emerging economy suppliers.
Design/methodology/approach
Through studying three scenarios (pre-outbreak, buyer-centred peak and supplier-centred peak) over a nine-month period, a multi-case study strategy was used to gain an understanding of the learning of export-oriented Brazilian coffee producers, using both exploitation and exploration capabilities. Content analysis was developed after each data collection phase to investigate how sustainability initiatives had changed.
Findings
Social sustainability was observed to be the main priority by suppliers facing this unprecedented outbreak, in ways that go beyond expected sustainability certification requirements. For instance, there was evidence of outstanding contributions to the local community. Suppliers initially developed their sustainability initiatives during the outbreak without any support from global buyers, certification bodies or government. In spite of this, stronger relationships with buyers ultimately emerged facilitating greater SC sustainability. Consequently, by using both exploitation and exploration learning capabilities, multiple levels of learning were observed (i.e. individual, organisational and SC) as related to planning, new procedures and social awareness.
Practical implications
A greater awareness of supplier learning processes will aid buyers in developing recovery plans that are appropriate for their global SC partners.
Originality/value
This paper provides an understanding of how emerging economy suppliers of global SCs are coping with this unprecedented outbreak in regard to sustainability management. Moving the spotlight from buyers to suppliers, the research demonstrates that supplier learning is central to global SC sustainability.
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The paper introduces a tool to intensify organizational learning during a new technology development process.
Abstract
Purpose
The paper introduces a tool to intensify organizational learning during a new technology development process.
Design/methodology/approach
The study used a participatory approach and a series of interviews carried out in five new technology development case projects in the field of wireless communication. The paper reflects the findings to one case study.
Findings
The paper introduces the concept of a personal technology orientation as a practical tool for managers and other key persons to intensify an organization's learning process in adopting new technology solutions by offering important data in a right form for every person.
Practical implications
The paper has real practical implications for leaders/managers and learning and development professionals in field of technology development.
Originality/value
The paper provides useful information for managers in the area of technology development or technology management.
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