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1 – 10 of over 26000Rehab Iftikhar and Khadija Mawra
This paper focuses on knowledge storage, knowledge accessibility and the associated challenges with these processes in an interorganizational project. For this purpose, the…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper focuses on knowledge storage, knowledge accessibility and the associated challenges with these processes in an interorganizational project. For this purpose, the context of the Orange Line (OL) metro train project in Pakistan is examined, where multiple organizations were involved.
Design/methodology/approach
This study adopts an exploratory single case study approach. The empirical data comprise semi-structured interviews and archival documents. Thematic analysis is used for analyzing the data.
Findings
The distinct findings include (1) the use of knowledge storage systems, such as manual storage systems, electronic storage systems and assigning a dedicated resource; (2) that knowledge accessibility occurs at different levels within the organization (including intradepartmental and interdepartmental levels) as well as at interorganizational levels and (3) the challenges, such as misuse of knowledge, time pressures, confidentiality of sensitive knowledge, government regulations and the reliance on human memory, which are associated with knowledge storage and knowledge accessibility. Based on the findings, an integrative framework of the interplay between knowledge storage, knowledge accessibility and challenges is proposed.
Originality/value
This paper contributes to the literature on resource-based theory by examining knowledge storage and accessibility in an interorganizational project.
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Christine M. Kowalczyk and Natalie A. Mitchell
This paper aims to investigate how consumers perceive the value of luxury brands and the antecedents to these perceptions, including consumer knowledge, reference group influence…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to investigate how consumers perceive the value of luxury brands and the antecedents to these perceptions, including consumer knowledge, reference group influence and accessibility. Prior studies focused less on the salience of consumer knowledge and sources of luxury information, in addition to their accessibility to luxury. Hence, a more nuanced luxury conceptualization is needed to reflect luxury’s conceptual fluidity, consumers’ different lived experiences, accessibility levels and persistent retail marketing changes.
Design/methodology/approach
In a survey involving 475 US respondents, five hypotheses were tested and analyzed with structural equations modeling, examining the relationships among knowledge and accessibility of luxury brands, as well as reference group influence and its impact on consumer value perceptions of luxury brands and consumer behaviors.
Findings
Significant relationships were found for all five hypotheses and demonstrated that knowledge, reference group influence and accessibility have strong relationships with consumers’ personal value perceptions of luxury brands and behavioral measures, including purchase intentions, willingness to recommend to a friend and willingness to pay a price premium.
Originality/value
This conceptualization recognizes that consumers must have luxury brand awareness prior to reference group influence, developing individual luxury value perceptions and entering the buying process. This research contributes to the literature by highlighting consumers’ views of the luxury category, which induce perceptions and potential outcomes. It also expands the understanding of consumer’s accessibility to luxury products, which impacts purchase intentions. While it was conducted in the USA, it yields broader consumer perspectives.
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Marie Christoffersen Gramkow, Marcus Tang Merit and Ulrika Karlsson Stigsdotter
During the past decade, Danish policies and legislation have increasingly focused on accessibility, which, by virtue of adopting the UN Sustainable Development Goals, has spurred…
Abstract
Purpose
During the past decade, Danish policies and legislation have increasingly focused on accessibility, which, by virtue of adopting the UN Sustainable Development Goals, has spurred new demands for the expertise of Danish landscape architects. Surveys indicate as much as 27% of the Danish population have a physical disability. Therefore, landscape architectural firms play an important role in designing accessible, public and green spaces, which could reduce the number of people who experience disability in their everyday life arising from inaccessible designs. Despite this, peer-reviewed research has not attempted to qualitatively understand how landscape architects approach accessibility in their daily practice.
Design/methodology/approach
Based on a grounded theory analysis of 15 semi-structured qualitative interviews with randomly selected landscape architectural firms, this study aims to describe how landscape architectural firms approach and perceive accessibility.
Findings
The results of the study show a complex understanding of accessibility among practising landscape architects, with firms focusing on the role of Danish building regulations, the programming of accessibility and professional aesthetic dilemmas. Moreover, accessibility is perceived with some frustration as an element that takes valuable space from green areas due to clients' lack of willingness to provide resources for integrated solutions, landscape architects' own limited expertise and knowledge of integrated accessibility solutions and insufficient regulatory leeway.
Originality/value
As accessibility is a major element of the tasks within contemporary landscape architecture, graduates need additional training in accessibility, which, in turn, necessitates additional research into accessible design solutions.
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To provide librarians with a better understanding of what makes online content truly accessible and to increase awareness of the current common accessibility issues found in…
Abstract
Purpose
To provide librarians with a better understanding of what makes online content truly accessible and to increase awareness of the current common accessibility issues found in library web sites and vendor supplied electronic resources.
Methodology/approach
A through and in-depth literature review takes a look at the web accessibility problems historically found in library web sites. It then briefly explains the basics of web accessibility and delves more deeply into structural content access, which is the hallmark of true accessibility. The simple mechanics as well as the pros and cons of traditional methods of providing keyboard access to web content is discussed. The chapter then provides a gentle introduction to HTML5 and the Web Accessibility Initiative-Accessible Rich Internet Applications (WAI-ARIA), current use, techniques for use, and application opportunities. The chapter also provides the research results of a broad examination of the basic structural accessibility state of many current database providers.
Findings
The research shows that the accessibility of library web sites is improving; however many library vendor database products still have significant accessibility problems.
Practical implications
Through the practical accessibility explanations, the chapter points out the ways librarians can use this knowledge to work with users and communicate with product providers regarding the accessibility of library resources.
Originality/value
This chapter provides a rich resource for understanding and implementing web accessibility, particularly as it applies to keyboard navigation and the new accessibility features in HTML5 and WAI-ARIA.
The purpose of this paper is to propose a model of competitiveness for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) by investigating the structural relationship between…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to propose a model of competitiveness for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) by investigating the structural relationship between organizational structure, knowledge quality (KQ) dimensions, improvisational creativity, compositional creativity and innovation in an emerging market – Malaysia – grounding in sense-making and organizational improvisational theories.
Design/methodology/approach
A total of 358 valid questionnaires administered among SMEs’ top management were used in examining the measurement model and structural relationship between latent constructs using partial least squares (PLS) path-modelling approach.
Findings
The findings indicate that a flat organizational structure influences business entities’ sense-making activities in the way they realize the intrinsic value of knowledge (intrinsic KQ) and take action to apply the organizational knowledge (actionable KQ). These sense-making activities are also conducive to SMEs’ improvisational creativity, compositional creativity and innovative capabilities. All KQ dimensions are positively interrelated, thus supporting sense-making theory.
Originality/value
A sustainable competitive advantage for SMEs requires a setting that is based on a lean, decentralized and cooperative organizational structure that shapes organizational KQ. As a contribution to the literature, accessibility KQ is introduced as a KQ dimension. Even though previous research was unclear on the reflectiveness/formativeness of KQ, by applying confirmatory tetrad analysis-PLS, this study empirically supports that KQ is a formative construct.
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Jessica Li, Gary Brake, Angeline Champion, Tony Fuller, Sandy Gabel and Lori Hatcher‐Busch
The purpose of this paper is to examine how knowledge management systems have been used by the studied organizations to improve knowledge accessibility and knowledge sharing in…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine how knowledge management systems have been used by the studied organizations to improve knowledge accessibility and knowledge sharing in order to increase workplace learning.
Design/methodology/approach
The study relies on a qualitative multisite case study method. Data were obtained from five organizations at a southern state in the USA. Multiple interviews, onsite observation, and documentation analyses were conducted at each studied organization. Data analysis used open coding and thematic analysis. Results were triangulated based on multiple data sources.
Findings
The findings revealed that the learning environment of an organization is important for workplace learning. All studied organizations share a need for a conversion of tacit to explicit knowledge in order to facilitate effective informal learning in the workplace. This research concludes that engineering the learning environment through effective knowledge management should be a cohesive effort of the entire organization and demands congruent support from all levels of the organization.
Originality/value
The study expands the understanding of issues related to workplace learning through knowledge accessibility in both business and academic settings. To improve workplace learning, one should not just stipulate technology interventions; other factors, such as the organization's design, work design, and the culture/vision of the organization, all play important roles in the creation of a learning organization that will induce informal learning in the workplace.
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Motohiro Nakauchi, Mark Washburn and Kenji Klein
Knowledge transfer (KT) processes are important for building and sustaining competitive advantages and dynamic capabilities. Prior research often treats KT processes as a…
Abstract
Purpose
Knowledge transfer (KT) processes are important for building and sustaining competitive advantages and dynamic capabilities. Prior research often treats KT processes as a firm-level capability, assuming knowledge flows uniformly within a firm. The purpose of this paper is to examine whether such a view is too simplistic because it ignores potential differences between inter-group and intra-group KT processes within a firm.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors surveyed 137 software development professionals in a large Japanese electronics firm regarding co-workers who acted as critical sources of useful knowledge and the factors that affected KT within and across internal organizational boundaries. Using regression analysis, the authors test the extent to which factors such as the characteristics of the knowledge, the characteristics of the tie, and the characteristics of the network differentially affect KT within internal organizational boundaries vs across them.
Findings
The authors find that factors such as the accessibility of the knowledge source, network density, and collective teaching all help in transferring knowledge, while knowledge tacitness inhibit such transfers, but that the effect of these properties varies significantly depending on whether KT occurs across group boundaries.
Originality/value
Existing research on KT within firms tends to treat all such transfers as uniform, with little difference between the dynamics of within-group transfer and between-group transfer. This study establishes key differences in KT between and within organizational groups, demonstrating that managers need to consider internal boundaries when deploying tools and strategies for facilitating knowledge flows.
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Satyanarayana Parayitam, Syed Aktharsha Usman, Rajeshwaran Raja Namasivaayam and Mohamed Shaik Naina
This paper aims to investigate the importance of knowledge management as a moderator in the relationship between two of the burnout variables, namely, role ambiguity and work…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to investigate the importance of knowledge management as a moderator in the relationship between two of the burnout variables, namely, role ambiguity and work overload. In addition, the paper tests a conceptual model where emotional exhaustion is a moderator in the relationship between role ambiguity, work overload and performance.
Design/methodology/approach
Using a structured survey instrument, this paper gathered data from 692 respondents from the information technology industry in the southern part of India. The first psychometric properties of the instrument were tested and then hierarchical regression was used as a statistical technique for analyzing the data.
Findings
Results show that role conflict is positively related to role ambiguity and work overload, role ambiguity is negatively related to performance, work overload is positively related to performance, knowledge management moderates the relationship between role conflict and role ambiguity and role conflict and work overload. The hierarchical regression results also support that emotional exhaustion moderates the relationship between role ambiguity and performance and work overload and performance.
Research limitations/implications
As the present research is based on self-report measures, the limitations of social desirability bias and common method bias are inherent. However, this study attempts to minimize these limitations by following appropriate statistical techniques and procedures.
Practical implications
This study contributes to both practicing managers and the literature on conflict management. The study suggests that managers use knowledge management practices to mitigate the ill-effects of role conflict and enhance performance. This study also highlights the role of emotional exhaustion in organizations.
Originality/value
This study provides new insights about the importance of knowledge management practices and emotional exhaustion in the relationship between role conflict and performance. To the knowledge, the importance of knowledge management practices is underemphasized in conflict management research. The study also provides insights into the role of one of the burnout variables i.e. emotional exhaustion in its influence on performance. The implications of this relationship for organizational role theory and organizational learning theory and for management practice, are discussed.
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Margie Foster, Hossein Arvand, Hugh T. Graham and Denise Bedford
In this chapter, the authors define the new business term, future-proofing, and apply it to knowledge preservation and curation. The fundamental principles of future-proofing and…
Abstract
Chapter Summary
In this chapter, the authors define the new business term, future-proofing, and apply it to knowledge preservation and curation. The fundamental principles of future-proofing and the challenges and mechanics are discussed. These challenges are discussed in developing future-proofed knowledge preservation, and a curation strategy is identified. The authors identify four challenges to future-proofing a knowledge preservation and curation strategy – availability, visibility, accessibility, and consumability of knowledge assets. Ultimately, the greatest challenge to future-proofing these strategies lies in the channels we use to create, transmit, share, and store knowledge assets. At a minimum, the chapter speaks to the critical importance of future-proofing the preservation of knowledge assets, so there is a possibility of curation at some point in a known or unknown future.
The purpose of this paper is to conceptualize the link between individual learning and organizational learning and offer guidelines to harness the individual capability of…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to conceptualize the link between individual learning and organizational learning and offer guidelines to harness the individual capability of learning for organizational objectives.
Design/methodology/approach
This is a conceptual paper using arguments from the theory of meaning structures.
Findings
The author shows that, learning, whether organizational or individual, is about the construction and accessibility of meaning, and that such processes thrive in a culture which fosters collaborative team work.
Research limitations/implications
The theory presents a perspective of how organizational knowledge exists in a triad – private, accessible and collective – and the interrelationships to create organizational learning. These constructs can form the building blocks for future research.
Practical implications
The theory brings organizations closer to prioritizing and evaluating learning processes to ensure that they facilitate the accessibility of knowledge.
Social implications
The theory can enable organizations to identify processes which inhibit the accessibility of knowledge and create the environment to promote such.
Originality/value
The theory opens a new insight into viewing organizational learning from the perspective of constructing and sharing meaning structures.
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