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This book aimed to conceptualise a construction workforce management model suitable for effectively managing workers in construction organisations. To this end, this chapter presents the conceptualised model, which consists of seven workforce management practices with their respective measurement variables. Drawing from existing theories, models, and practices, the chapter concludes that a construction organisation that will attain its strategic objectives in the current fourth industrial revolution era must be willing to promote effective recruitment and selection, compensation and benefits, performance management and appraisal, employee involvement and empowerment, training and development, as well as improving workers emotional intelligence and handling external environment pressure. These practices can promote proactiveness, participation, and improved skills and can lead to effective commitment, better quality, and flexibility within the organisation.

The paper discusses how the management of a sports and fashion company, which we refer to as NULMA, successfully applied the neo/normative control technology “karma organisation” and gained employee engagement. Whereas other studies have documented employee resistance to organisational cultures when used for managerial control, our case demonstrates resistance to management practices that employees find inconsistent with the dominant karma culture.

The study is based on a six-year longitudinal organisational at-home ethnography conducted by one of the authors using methods of both participant and non-participant observation, semi-structured interviews and collaborative production of secondary data in the case organisation.

While our research shows that management can successfully apply neo/normative control which employees accept and support, we further show that employees mobilise the same values to resist management when it fails to deliver on the commitments and promises of the organisational culture.

The study contributes to the literature on organisational culture and, in particular, neo/normative control by theorising employee resistance as being by “accident”, by which we mean an inherent negative potentiality co-invented and released by managers establishing a “karma organisation”. Our theorising culminates in a discussion of the study’s implications for research and practice.

This case study documents the move to emergency virtual learning at the University of Johannesburg. Prefacing promoting social justice and care, the authors explain how key challenges unique to a university in a developing world context were considered. The findings highlight the importance of agility, adaptability and the role of Ubuntu (i.e. values of compassion, solidarity and sharing) in higher education institutional leadership in a crisis. Furthermore, the authors highlight the need to address how structural inequality and poverty impact the pace of technological infusion in higher education in the Global South.

Despite the innovation and performance of venture capital (VC)-backed firms receiving extensive attention, how and under what conditions VC influences innovation and performance remains unclear. The present paper draws on organizational learning (OL) theory to examine the moderating effect of syndication on backed firms.

Drawing on a literature review that connects OL and innovation to the performance of VC-backed firms, this study examines the effects of OL on innovation and firm performance among these firms by questioning the moderating effect of VC syndication. A sample of 78 VC-backed firms was used to test the robustness of the proposed model and causal relationships through the use of partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM).

The empirical evidence demonstrates that the intervention of venture capitalists can not only stimulate innovation, but also have a significantly positive effect on firm performance. Furthermore, the evidence reveals that syndication of VC investment supports backed firms in improving the firms' performance and generating innovation from acquired knowledge.

To the best of the authors' knowledge, this study is the first in North Africa that focuses on the moderating effects of venture capital syndication on the relationships between OL, innovation and firm performance.

The purpose of this study is to examine the effect of organizational readiness (OR) dimensions (organizational culture, climate and capability) on three types of innovations (INs) (service, process IN and entering new markets) in telecommunication companies. The study also tests the mediating role of employee engagement (EE) in the causal relationship between OR and IN.

In the theoretical framework, a deep and broad review of the literature was presented to determine the study variables and hypotheses that were tested in the field study. The study sample consisted of 306 respondents distributed to the headquarters of the three companies (Zain, Orange and Umniah) working in the Jordanian telecommunications sector. The number of questionnaires retrieved and valid for analysis was 255 (83%).

Results indicate a positive effect of organizational climate and organizational capacity on process IN and entering new markets. While organizational culture had no significant effect on the three types of IN EE did not have a mediating role in the relationship between OR and IN.

The results of this study are related to the telecommunications sector as a highly competitive service sector and more able to work remotely with regard to customers, so its results cannot be generalized to other sectors such as the industry sector, which has suffered in recent years from the epidemic more than other sectors.

The study of OR as a concept, dimensions and effects provides great experience for leaders and managers facing the challenges of competition and threats posed by the Covid-19 pandemic. This study also helps researchers to study OR in new areas and in relation to other concepts.

The OR covers a wide field that includes the individual, the group and the company. Therefore, readiness includes a social experience that can extend from the company to the community.

The study gains an important value by revealing that organizational culture as a dimension of readiness does not have a significant impact on IN. With the readiness to respond quickly to challenges, culture can be more inclined to the status quo and the prevailing routine than to IN and change.

This study aims to explore the innovation deployment of construction contracting firms through exploratory–exploitative learning and organisational ambidexterity.

Firstly, a literature-based conceptual framework was developed to explain innovation implementation through exploratory–exploitative learning and organisational ambidexterity. A prominent Hong Kong construction contracting firm was then selected as the case study to explore its innovation deployment at different organisational levels (i.e. firm and project levels). Qualitative data were attained by conducting 12 semi-structured interviews with industry experts and document analysis. The thematic analysis using NVivo 12 software was adopted to analyse data.

Findings reveal that the case study firm successfully fosters innovation when ambidexterity is achieved through the balance between exploratory (i.e. radical innovation) and exploitative learnings (i.e. incremental innovation).

Establishing uniform ambidexterity (i.e. 50:50) at the firm or project level is not mandatory to deploy innovation successfully. The ratio can vary based on the characteristics and requirements of construction firms.

This paper shall motivate construction practitioners to adopt radical–incremental innovation ambidexterity in firms and ultimately enhance the productivity and efficiency of the construction industry.

Previous construction innovation research has frequently explored firm or project-level innovation separately. This study identified a multi-level focus on innovation. Through the lens of exploratory–exploitative theory, different forms of innovation ambidexterity for different levels are suggested rather than one specific ambidexterity.

The purpose of the study is to identify how knowledge management processes impact innovation performance in the Jordanian medical sector (private hospitals) as well as identify how big data analytics moderates this performance.

Two hundred ninety-one questionnaires were analyzed for the purpose of this study. A structural equation model (SEM) was used to test convergence validity, discriminant validity and reliability. In order to analyze the data, bootstrapping was used.

The empirical results showed that all knowledge management processes are statistically significant in influencing innovation performance. Furthermore, big data analytics moderates the relationship between knowledge management processes and innovation performance.

The results of this cross-sectional study are limited to one country and one industry due to methodological limitations, and the results represent a snapshot at a particular point in time.

Jordan's medical leaders will benefit from this study, since it emphasizes the importance of knowledge management processes to enhance innovation performance, especially given the importance of big data analytics in the field, increasing innovation capabilities in the medical field, thereby increasing innovation levels.

The objective of the study was to explore which COVID-19 teaching and learning methods, that enhanced accounting students' learning experience, should be applied at a residential university after the pandemic.

A qualitative exploratory approach within an interpretive paradigm was applied. A total of 15 semi-structured interviews were conducted with accounting students and the data were analysed using thematic analysis.

This study shows how pre-COVID-19 accounting education can be adapted by learning from the teaching and learning experiences gained during the pandemic and that there are various teaching and learning methods that can be applied in the post-COVID-19 period to enhance students' learning experience. These blended active teaching and learning methods include: the flipped classroom, discussion forum, electronic platform (to ask questions during class), key-concept videos and summary videos. Introducing these teaching and learning methods comes with challenges and the study provides recommendations on how to overcome foreseen obstacles. The contribution of the research is that it informs accounting lecturers' decision-making regarding which teaching and learning methods to apply in the aftermath of COVID-19 to enhance students' learning experience.

It is uncertain which teaching and learning methods employed during the COVID-19 pandemic should be applied at a residential university to enhance the teaching and learning experience after the pandemic. Accounting lecturers might return to their pre-COVID-19 modus operandi, and the valuable experience gained during the pandemic will have served no purpose.

A paradigm shift toward a corporate model of higher educational settings has led to complex and excess work demands, yet the potential long-run ramifications of work overload are still under-examined. Building the arguments on the “spiral of resource loss” corollary of the conservation of resources (COR) theory, the authors have bridged this gap by testing how work overload spills over into career resilience via reduced harmonious passion. In addition, the authors compare how the employees having standardized workloads differ in their harmonious passion and career resilience from those having excessive (non-standardized) workloads.

Through a longitudinal natural field experiment of 402 faculty members [N = 198 in the standardized group (optimal load) and N = 204 in the non-standardized group (overload)] working in higher educational institutions of Pakistan, data were collected in three waves (each six months apart). The group comparison, trend analysis and longitudinal mediation analysis done through SPSS and MPlus affirmed the hypothesized associations.

The results have shown that work overload impacts career resilience through the mediating role of harmonious passion. The faculty members in the standardized workload had more passion and career resilience as compared to the non-standardized workload group. In addition, these impacts intensified overtime for the overloaded faculty members while faculty members with optimal workload sustained their passion and resilience for the teaching profession.

Taking the COR perspective, this study sheds light on how faculty members' work overloads reduce their capability to retain their passion and resilience for teaching from a longitudinal and experimental perspective.

The current study has a two-fold purpose. Firstly, it aims to analyze the extent to which knowledge management (KM) affects the performance of individuals (task and contextual) on the one hand and that of organizations (product or service, perceived and financial) on the other hand. Secondly, it proposes to investigate the mediating effect of motivation and innovation in the relationship between KM and individual and organizational performance.

Partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) was employed in this study, with mediation analysis performed using advanced PLS-SEM techniques. A total of 1,284 respondents from organizations in both the public and private sectors were included in the sample.

The findings emphasize that KM has a more significant direct effect on individual performance compared to organizational performance. Concurrently, in terms of indirect influence, it is found that KM, through motivation and innovation, has a positive and significant effect on both individual and organizational performances, with a higher influence on the organizational one.

The originality of the work can be noted in designing two different structural models to represent the proposed relationships at the individual and organizational levels. These findings could provide organizational decision makers with empirical evidence, helping them (1) internalize the significance of the KM process in organizations as well as its subsequent effects on individual and organizational performance and (2) identify factors that mediate variable relationships.