Search results

Are lateral transshipments an effective instrument to ensure the safe and efficient supply of blood? This paper will use the lens of institutional theory to determine how the blood supply chain can benefit from lateral transshipments and what requirements are necessary for their implementation. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

The research design comprises two stages. First, 16 case studies clustered into two case groups were conducted with transfusion laboratories in UK hospitals resulting in the derivation of eight key themes which were tested using a follow-up survey.

The blood supply chain acts under the influence of significant institutional pressures. Coercive pressures result from regulations enforced to ensure the safe supply of blood, normative pressures are imposed by society, demanding wastage is minimized and mimetic pressure from other hospitals fosters efficient supply chain operation. Lateral transshipments offer a powerful organizational tool to allow the blood supply chain to conform to these pressures.

This paper offers a novel institutional perspective on a complex supply chain issue where additional external pressures are seen to complicate the context. Due to the special characteristics of the blood supply chain, generalization of the findings to other industries must be done with care.

The paper confirms the benefits of lateral transshipments in a perishable product context. Special requirements for the blood supply chain/health care services are identified.

The key contributions of this paper are five propositions which offer an institutional theory perspective on the application of lateral transshipment relationships in the blood supply chain.

The main goal of the work presented here is the study and comparative analysis of the changes that take place in the structure of organizations when managers decide to establish work teams in the context of quality management. It can be observed that team characteristics change and adapt to evolving management programs.

The authors selected a qualitative research method, in particular the case study methodology. The comparative analysis of organizational changes was analyzed in three different business units that had implanted advanced quality management programs using work teams.

There is a relationship between the quality management approach and the degree of integration of the teams into the organizational structure; when the quality approach is an advanced TQM approach, teams are more integrated into the organizational structure. Results show that a reduction of hierarchical levels in the organizational structures favors the integration of work teams and vice versa. It also facilitates effective development of the teams.

As a result of the findings, supervision should be reduced and a great deal of autonomy and resources should be assigned to teams. In any case, the existence of linkage positions (a leader or facilitator that forms a part of the team) makes the required supervision easier and more flexible.

The paper shows that significant organizational changes requiring different uses of design variables can be obtained with the simultaneous establishment of TQM programs and work teams. The paper is relevant to managers attempting to use teams as an effective asset for obtaining the competitive advantage of their firms.

The purpose of this paper is to focus on the analysis of the influence of organizational design variables on the creation of knowledge within the organization. The impact that enablers have on knowledge creation has been widely demonstrated and established in the relevant literature. Using this assumption as a starting‐point, the main aim of this study is to consider and explore the role of differentiation – horizontal and vertical – in knowledge creation using enablers as mediator variables.

The paper has created a model of relations of the design variables that correspond to differentiation – horizontal job specialization, vertical job specialization and number of hierarchical levels; the enablers – autonomy, redundancy and variety; and knowledge creation. This model is then contrasted with an empirical investigation of a quantitative nature, using a sample of 167 large Spanish firms.

The findings in the paper confirm both the impact of enablers on knowledge creation, as defined in the literature, and the fact that vertical specialization is shown to be a suitable design variable for creating knowledge through the autonomy enabler. However, the relation between the horizontal specialization of work and the number of hierarchical levels is not confirmed as being significant in terms of knowledge creation.

This paper considers the main limitation of this research to be that the questionnaire was answered by only one respondent, which forced one to consider the outcomes of this research with a certain degree of caution.

The results in the paper may be relevant for managers in decision making with regard to organizational design. Herein, reference is made to variables relative to job design and the number of hierarchical levels.

The value of this paper lies in two aspects. First, it overlaps two fields of research; organizational design and knowledge creation. Second, although there is a lot of literature on knowledge creation, there are very few empirical studies, especially of a quantitative nature.

This paper compares balanced scorecard and intellectual capital and finds important differences between their theoretical underpinnings, which suggest that the breath of indicators will work differently in organisations.

Analysing texts about balanced scorecard and intellectual capital, the paper discusses not the obvious similarities – that they are both integrated performance management systems – but four more aspects: strategy, organisation, management, and indicators. Comparing these four dimensions the paper discusses the differences arising from the very different theories of strategy that they presuppose: competitive advantage versus competency strategy.

The paper suggests that the very different notions of strategy that underpin the balanced scorecard and the intellectual capital approach make such comprehensive performance management systems behave in very different ways – the difference between a tightly coupled and a loosely coupled system accounts for this.

The main limitation is that the paper is primarily a literature study and therefore it is not certain that in practical situations companies will necessarily adopt the theoretical perspectives mobilised behind balance scorecard and intellectual capital.

The usefulness of that paper is that practitioners may understand the breath of implications of a shift in strategic focus and realise the various organisational conditions that can help mobilise the use of indicators in different ways.

The paper's analysis shows how the two models assume how indicators work in an organisational systems and concludes that the differences are significant and that therefore there are considerable differences in how a system of indicators may work in the context of balanced scorecard compared with the context of intellectual capital.

Despite the prevalence and potential benefits of multiauthority organizational structures (i.e. matrix organizations), research is lacking on the resulting impact on employees’ work–family conflict (WFC). The purpose of this article is to use leader–member exchange (LMX) as a framework to examine how employees who report to two leaders experience WFC.

A sample of 111 engineers and researchers nested within 33 branches and 21 project teams completed an online questionnaire containing measures of LMX and WFC. Hierarchical multiple regressions were used to test the study’s hypotheses.

LMX with one's immediate supervisor (branch manager, LMX–BM) and project manager ( LMX–PM) each contributed unique variance in predicting WFC. LMX–PM moderated the negative relationship between LMX–BM and WFC, such that the negative relationship was stronger in magnitude at higher levels of LMX–PM quality.

While most research studies have focused upon the impact of a single leader, modern organizations often involve dual reporting. Thus, results expand the extant literature to be more applicable to modern organizational realities. Findings provide evidence that future longitudinal research is worthwhile.

Results indicate that LMX theory is relevant beyond one's immediate supervisor. As a result, all managers should communicate with one another to seek better alignment. Particularly in a matrix organization where positional power is limited, leaders stand to reap the many benefits of high LMX relationships.

This study is the first among its type to examine LMX in a dual reporting context, and it is also the first to examine the impacts of dual reporting on WFC.

This paper examines how lateral accountability mechanisms may be used to address the unity–diversity tension in a large not-for-profit (NFP) inter-organizational partnership governed under a lead organization model.

A case study was conducted in the New South Wales Settlement Partnership comprising 23 NFP organizations providing settlement services for migrants and humanitarian entrants. Multiple data sources included semi-structured interviews, proprietary and publicly available documents and observation.

The paper demonstrates (1) the usefulness of a strength-based approach that the lead organization adopts in enacting lateral accountability mechanisms, which enables a balance between unity and diversity in the partnership; and (2) the capability of the lead organization governance model to address the unity–diversity tension.

The paper (1) identifies the importance of a strength-based approach in implementing lateral accountability mechanisms to address the unity–diversity tension; and (2) challenges prior research that advocates the network administrative organization governance model in addressing the tension.

For practice, the paper identifies a suite of lateral accountability practices designed to address the unity–diversity tension. For policy, it provides confidence for government in promulgating the lead organization governance model in “purchasing” public services.

The paper demonstrates how lateral accountability mechanisms may be used to provide a balance between the objectives of preserving and leveraging the benefits of partner diversity and achieving unity. The strength-based approach (used in enacting the accountability mechanisms), while having a history in psychology and social work research, has not been recognized in prior partnership accountability and governance studies.

Focusing on ethical issues when making organizational decisions should encourage a variety of positive outcomes for companies and their employees. The purpose of this paper is to determine the degree to which data-based ethical decision making, lateral relations and organizational commitment are interrelated in organizations.

Data were collected from business professionals employed at multiple locations of a financial services firm operating in the USA. Mediation analysis (based on structural equation modeling) was used to test the proposed relationships.

Results indicated that employees’ perceptions of data-based ethical decision making were positively related to perceived lateral relations, and that perceived lateral relations were positively related to organizational commitment.

Given that information was collected using only a self-report questionnaire, common method bias could be an issue. In addition, the study’s cross-sectional design limits conclusions about causality. Another limitation involves the study’s homogenous sample, which decreases the generalizability of the findings. Finally, variable responses could have been impacted by individual frames of reference and other perceptual differences.

Results suggest that information flow enhancements should support or be consistent with horizontal information flow enhancements, and that together these factors should increase employee commitment.

Given the dearth of existing research, this interdisciplinary investigation is important because it fills gaps in the management literature. This study is also important because the results could inform decisions regarding the use of data analysis in ethical decisions and lateral forms of organizational structuring to improve work attitudes.

The purpose of this paper is to explore professional employees' career move preferences and the impact of both individual and organizational career management. Departing from theoretical work on the “new career”, different types of career moves employees can make on the internal labor market are discussed and related to the literature on both organizational and individual career management.

To test the hypotheses, a cross‐sectional survey of 472 professional employees from one company is presented.

The preferences for both vertical career moves and moves relating to job enrichment and temporary moves are significantly affected by individual career management, but not by organizational career management practices. The preference for making lateral moves could not be explained by our antecedent variables.

Future research should involve a larger sample of organizations in order to collect empirical data about the extent to which OCM practices impact career preferences. Our results provide evidence for the relationship between individual career management and career move preferences and thereby adds to the literature on the “new career”.

This study has a number of practical implications that relate to the ways in which organizations can stimulate different career moves among their employees through the enhancement of personal career initiatives.

The value of this paper is the contribution it makes to the career literature by relating to different streams of research, about career mobility on the one hand and individual and organizational career management on the other.

The purpose of this paper is to explore two hospital departments, one of which is laterally dependent on the other to function, but which are subject to distinct vertical managerial controls. This complexity in vertical–lateral relations generates tension amongst the hospital’s senior managers and a perception of coordination difficulties. However, this paper shows how the interplay between managerial and non-managerial controls, plus important employee “work”, moderates tension and facilitates day-to-day lateral coordination at the patient-facing level.

This is a case-study, relying mostly on the findings of semi-structured interviews. Theoretically, the paper draws from previous insights on inter-organisational relations (but informing the focus on intra-organisational coordination) and an “institutional work” perspective.

Consistent with much extant literature, this paper reveals how non-managerial controls help to moderate tensions that could emerge from the coercive use of managerial controls. However, the authors also show a maintained influence and flexibility in the managerial controls at patient-facing levels, as new circumstances unfold.

The findings of this paper could generalise neither all laterally dependent spaces in hospitals nor patterns across different hospitals. The authors recommend future research into the dynamics and interaction of managerial and non-managerial controls in other complex settings, plus focus on the purposeful work of influential agents.

The paper has two primary contributions: extending our knowledge of the interplay between managerial and non-managerial controls inside complex organisations, where non-managerial controls reinforce rather than displace managerial controls, and highlighting that it is seldom just controls per se which “matter”, but also agents’ purposeful actions that facilitate coordination in complex organisations.

The purpose of this paper is to theoretically propose a complex perspective as the third way to understand disasters which is used to describe the Hiroshima landslide disaster 2014 in Japan. In the first half of the paper the complex perspective is explained in detail with comparison to two conventional perspectives on disasters, i.e. hazard approach and vulnerability approach. According to the complex perspective, deaths in disasters are avoidable. In the second half of the paper, Hiroshima landslide disaster is analyzed in line with the complex perspective. Also, how will Hiroshima not repeat such landslide disaster is suggested.

To develop the case study for Hiroshima, a desk-based literature review, a field site visit and five key informant interviews were conducted by the authors in 2016. The authors’ initial analysis based on newspaper reports indicated a failure in the early warning system, evacuation and severity of the hazard. Based on this, the broader literature on traditional perspectives on risk, vulnerability and complexity were mined to understand and theorize the failure in Hiroshima. Then the interviews were conducted in the city of Hiroshima to analyze the disaster from complex perspective.

The authors demonstrated that the Hiroshima Landslide disaster 2014 and its deaths could be explained by complex perspective. Complex perspective brings us the following suggestions not to repeat landslide disaster in Hiroshima. Political leaders at national and local levels must take up responsibilities to set a “goal” for the disaster management system to “reduce deaths.” Also, governmental and non-governmental organizations should make efforts to engage proactively with community through disaster education or through community awareness program to shift the mind set from hito-goto to jibun-no-koto (their story to our story).

Reducing deaths by disasters is essential for the world thus it is UN’s Sendai Goal One. As most contemporary sciences are based on reductionism, disasters have been described as a combination of the related components such as hazards, vulnerability. Although the great contributions from the reductionism to disaster studies, it has been said that integrated disaster management is needed since the reductionism usually give the partially optimized solution to disaster reduction. This study proposes complex approach to find comparatively total optimized solution to disaster reduction, in particular reducing deaths. Although it is based on merely one case study, this paper describes the possibility of different way to reduce deaths by disasters.