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1 – 10 of over 8000Carrie Dossick, Laura Osburn and Gina Neff
Through the study of visualizations, virtual worlds and information exchange, the purpose of this paper is to reveal the complex connections between technology and the work of…
Abstract
Purpose
Through the study of visualizations, virtual worlds and information exchange, the purpose of this paper is to reveal the complex connections between technology and the work of design and construction. The authors apply the sociotechnical view of technology and the ramifications this view has on successful use of technology in design and construction.
Design/methodology/approach
This is a discussion paper reviewing over a decade of research that connects three streams of research on architecture, engineering and construction (AEC) teams as these teams grappled with adapting work practices to new technologies and the opportunities these technologies promised.
Findings
From studies of design and construction practices with building information modeling and energy modeling, the authors show that given the constructed nature of models and the loose coupling of project teams, these team organizational practices need to mirror the modeling requirements. Second, looking at distributed teams, whose interaction is mediated by technology, the authors argue that virtual world visualizations enhance discovery, while distributed AEC teams also need more traditional forms of 2D abstraction, sketching and gestures to support integrated design dialogue. Finally, in information exchange research, the authors found that models and data have their own logic and structure and, as such, require creativity and ingenuity to exchange data across systems. Taken together, these streams of research suggest that process innovation is brought about by people developing new practices.
Originality/value
In this paper, the authors argue that technology alone does not change practice. People who modify practices with and through technology create process innovation.
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Mai Nguyen, Nicolas Pontes, Ashish Malik, Jaya Gupta and Ritika Gugnani
Amid challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, fostering employee creativity has become paramount for organizations. However, there is a scarcity of research on digitalization of…
Abstract
Purpose
Amid challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, fostering employee creativity has become paramount for organizations. However, there is a scarcity of research on digitalization of the workplace and its implications for implementing high involvement work systems (HIWSs) in organizations, particularly in relation to their impact on employee outcomes, such as creativity and job satisfaction. Additionally, limited attention has been given to the role of job level and organizational type in driving change during times of adversity. This study aims to examine the factors within the HIWSs model using the PIRK model – power (P), information sharing (I), rewards (R) and knowledge (K) to explore how HIWSs shape the extent of power individuals have over their employment, the sharing of information, the types of rewards that engage and motivate employees and the knowledge required to fulfil employees’ responsibilities effectively, both individually and collectively.
Design/methodology/approach
Using a qualitative research methodology, this study uses thematic analysis for data collection, analysis and interpretation. Semi-structured interviews (n = 48) served as the primary data collection method. Using the theoretical lenses of high-involvement practices and employee perceptions of PIRK, the effect on employee creativity and job satisfaction is analysed.
Findings
The findings of this study reveal that employee creativity is significantly influenced by how employees perceive power, information, rewards and knowledge. Moreover, the study highlights the role of transformational and transactional leadership in shaping employee perceptions of power, information and knowledge within HIWSs. A high perception of PIRK is found to positively impact employee job satisfaction.
Research limitations/implications
This study offers valuable insights for human resource management (HRM) professionals seeking to make informed decisions regarding best practices and initiatives for enhancing employee outcomes in the post-COVID era. By recognizing the pivotal role of HIWSs and their influence on employee perceptions, organizations can strategically implement HIWSs to foster creativity and job satisfaction. Furthermore, this research contributes to the existing literature by examining the interplay between HIWSs and the PIRK model in the context of workplace digitalization, emphasizing the importance of adapting HRM practices to address the evolving needs of the modern workforce.
Originality/value
This study will help HRM professionals in making informed decisions on the best practices and initiatives to enhance employee outcomes in the post-COVID era. This paper adds to the existing literature on HIWS and PIRK in the context of workplace digitalization.
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Debolina Dutta, Chaitali Vedak and Anasha Kannan Poyil
The COVID-19 pandemic found deliberate and idiosyncratic adoption of telecommuting and other flexibility practices across industries. With the pandemic waning, many organizations…
Abstract
Purpose
The COVID-19 pandemic found deliberate and idiosyncratic adoption of telecommuting and other flexibility practices across industries. With the pandemic waning, many organizations adopted various models for employee work locations. Based on Self-Determination Theory and Social Comparison Theory, the authors examine the impact of the dissonance between employee preference for their work location and enforced work location norms and its impact on general well-being and organizational commitment.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors’ empirical study is based on a sample of 881 respondents across multiple industries in India over six months of the COVID pandemic. The authors use PLS-SEM for data analysis to examine the model and the moderating influence of individual resilience on control at work.
Findings
The authors find that increased dissonance between work locations reduces general well-being, control and work. Further, higher individual resilience reduces the impact of this dissonance on control at work.
Practical implications
The study informs policy and practices that choice of work location is important for employees to feel a higher sense of control, impacting their affective commitment and general well-being. While implementation of policies across an organization for varying job roles and complexities presents a challenge, practitioners may ignore this need of employees at their peril, as employees are likely to demonstrate lower well-being, engagement and organizational commitment and eventually leave.
Originality/value
This study is significant as it provides relevant scholarship based on the COVID-19 pandemic, guiding practice on future ways of working. This study further supports the impact of an individual's sense of control on where work is done. The authors build a strong theoretical foundation to justify the impact of the lack of autonomy in the emerging working norms on employees' general well-being and organizational commitment.
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Sofia Antera and Marianne Teräs
This study explores the role of previous occupational identity in the formation of the (new) teacher identity of vocational teachers. The focus is on how vocational teachers…
Abstract
Purpose
This study explores the role of previous occupational identity in the formation of the (new) teacher identity of vocational teachers. The focus is on how vocational teachers discover their teaching identity, how they describe the connection between their previous occupation and teacher identity and how they describe a competent member of the teaching community.
Design/methodology/approach
The theoretical approach is inspired by Communities of Practice (CoP) theory. More specifically, the realignment between socially demanded competence in the profession and personal experience as well as identification with the teaching community are discussed. The research material comes from 14 interviews with vocational teachers in different disciplines.
Findings
Findings indicate first that the process of professional identity (trans)formation was initiated by finding one's teaching self when the individuals became aware of their interest in teaching by discovering that they had already achieved some sort of teaching-related competence. Second, individuals had been connecting their professional identities – finding common competence between their previous occupation and the teaching role. Third, vocational teachers experienced legitimising their competence and their new identity with reference to what their new CoP instructed as important competence (regime of competence).
Originality/value
While teachers' vocational competence is not scrutinised, their teaching competence needs to be constantly proved. This imbalance often leads to teachers returning to an aspect of their identity that is well established – their vocational competence. Looking back to their occupational competences constitutes a realignment backwards, when teachers attempt to serve their new professional goal by drawing on old competence.
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Daryl John Powell, Désirée A. Laubengaier, Guilherme Luz Tortorella, Henrik Saabye, Jiju Antony and Raffaella Cagliano
The purpose of this paper is to examine the digitalization of operational processes and activities in lean manufacturing firms and explore the associated learning implications…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine the digitalization of operational processes and activities in lean manufacturing firms and explore the associated learning implications through the lens of cumulative capability theory.
Design/methodology/approach
Adopting a multiple-case design, we examine four cases of digitalization initiatives within lean manufacturing firms. We collected data through semi-structured interviews and direct observations during site visits.
Findings
The study uncovers the development of learning capabilities as a result of integrating lean and digitalization. We find that digitalization in lean manufacturing firms contributes to the development of both routinized and evolutionary learning capabilities in a cumulative fashion.
Originality/value
The study adds nuance to the limited theoretical understanding of the integration of lean and digitalization by showing how it cumulatively develops the learning capabilities of lean manufacturing firms. As such, the study supports the robustness of cumulative capability theory. We further contribute to research by offering empirical support for the cumulative nature of learning.
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Kujtim Hameli and Bujamin Bela
This study aims to examine the relationship between high commitment human resource management (HCHRM) practices and employee well-being in the food service industry, with a focus…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to examine the relationship between high commitment human resource management (HCHRM) practices and employee well-being in the food service industry, with a focus on the mediating roles of job demands and psychological conditions.
Design/methodology/approach
A survey was conducted among 296 frontline employees in the food service industry, and the data were analyzed using structural equation modeling (SEM) in AMOS ver26.
Findings
The results showed that HCHRM practices do not directly affect employee well-being. However, psychological conditions play a crucial role in mediating the relationship between HCHRM practices and employee well-being. Specifically, the psychological conditions of meaningfulness and availability significantly predicted work engagement and mediated the relationship between HCHRM practices and employee well-being. On the other hand, job demands did not mediate the relationship between HCHRM practices and employee well-being.
Research limitations/implications
Although the study addressed common method variance, the cross-sectional nature of the data limits the ability to infer causal relationships among variables. Future studies could adopt a longitudinal research design to investigate the causal relationships among variables. In addition, the study recommends that managers in the food service industry adopt HCHRM practices and provide necessary psychological conditions to promote employee well-being.
Originality/value
This study extends the current literature on HCHRM and employee well-being in the food service industry by providing new insights into the mediating role of psychological conditions. The findings suggest that HCHRM practices can indirectly promote employee well-being through the enhancement of psychological conditions. These insights could help managers in the food service industry to design effective HRM strategies that foster employee well-being and reduce turnover.
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Luminita Hurbean, Louie H.M. Wong, Carol XJ Ou, Robert M. Davison and Octavian Dospinescu
The authors investigate the relationship between instant messenger (IM) use and work performance, mediated by interruptions and two key indicators of the stress associated with…
Abstract
Purpose
The authors investigate the relationship between instant messenger (IM) use and work performance, mediated by interruptions and two key indicators of the stress associated with technology use: overload and complexity.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors validate this research model using partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) with data collected through a survey of 416 working professionals.
Findings
The data reveal that while IM use contributes minimally to work interruptions and to a greater extent to technological complexity, these two constructs fully mediate the direct influence of IM use at work on technology overload, and meanwhile significantly and directly contribute to work performance.
Research limitations/implications
This research provides theoretical insights into the deployment of IM and its actual impacts in the workplace. To improve the generalisation of the findings, the authors call for more IM-related research in other countries, with more native theories and various methodologies in this domain.
Practical implications
The level of stress generated through IM use is moderate, considering IM is not a significant contributor to work interruptions. Thus, despite the potential negative effects of IM communication, the positive effects of using IM at work prevail. As a result, the technology can be promoted as long as employees, their managers and the organisation as a whole are well prepared. Employees can transfer skills and behaviour from the personal setting to their work environment and thus may find an intrinsic motivation to make better use of the IM technology at work.
Originality/value
The authors argue that this research model is novel for its perspective on evaluating the actual impacts of IM use at work instead of the reasons of using it. The authors conceptualise the process to explain how IM contributes to interruptions and other technostress indicators in the working context, and the impact on performance. Contrary to some prior research, the authors find that overall IM applications do not have a negative impact on work performance, and instead may enhance it.
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My-Trinh Bui and Thi-Thanh-Huyen Tran
In the wake of severe socio-economic damage, many firms have made creative and technological progress in their responses to the COVID-19 crisis. This paper examines internal and…
Abstract
Purpose
In the wake of severe socio-economic damage, many firms have made creative and technological progress in their responses to the COVID-19 crisis. This paper examines internal and external environmental complexity elements as antecedents of business responses and builds a framework for tourism firms to respond to the pandemic crisis.
Design/methodology/approach
This study obtained survey data from 395 respondents in the Vietnamese tourism and hospitality industry. A partial least squares structural equation modeling–artificial neural network approach was used to examine various combinations of internal and external environmental complexity elements that have different impacts on business responses and firms' performance.
Findings
The knowledge and practice created by the firm's employees (individual creativity), obtained from traditional contexts (traditionality) were identified as internal environmental complexity factors while practice learned from other firms (mimetic pressure), information processing (status certainty) and digital transformation (digital technology speed) were treated as external environmental complexity factors. Internal and external environmental complexity factors influence business responses and firms' performance positively but differently.
Practical implications
This study demonstrates that firms should integrate their internal environment of creativity and traditionality with external environmental factors of mimetic pressure, status certainty and digital technology speed to create better business responses, and thus firm performance in the COVID-19 era.
Originality/value
This investigation contributes to environmental research and narrows the existing research gap relating to the association between types of environmental complexity and firms' responsive action, which then influence firms' performance in terms of sustainable competitiveness.
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Giorgio Giacomelli, Nora Annesi and Marta Barbieri
The study aims to examine the relationship between telework conditions and employees' job satisfaction (JS) within knowledge-intensive public organizations (KIPOs). Additionally…
Abstract
Purpose
The study aims to examine the relationship between telework conditions and employees' job satisfaction (JS) within knowledge-intensive public organizations (KIPOs). Additionally, it aims to unfold the mediating role played by both organizational and job characteristics, namely supervisory support (SS) and job autonomy (JA).
Design/methodology/approach
The analysis adopts a simultaneous qualitative-quantitative design, starting with a preliminary inductive analysis of qualitative data, followed by a deductive quantitative analysis using structural equation modeling (SEM). The data were retrieved from a survey completed by some 700 employees of a regional environmental protection agency in Italy.
Findings
Findings show that the positive association between conditions for telework (CT) and JS is partially mediated by both SS and JA. Moreover, the results of the study suggest a sequential nature of such mediational patterns.
Originality/value
This research provides an empirical contribution to a relatively under-investigated area: the role of job characteristics in explaining the nexus between telework and JS. Furthermore, the study takes place within the context of a KIPO, adding particular significance to the emerging insights due to the distinct nature of the work conducted in such settings.
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Sunil D. Santha, Devisha Sasidevan, Atul Raman, Khadeeja Naja Ali, Soofiya Yoosuf, Deepankar Panda and Gauri Shenoy
This paper showcases how the PAR embedded in posthumanist perspectives enabled us to navigate several complexities in the field through methodological situatedness and pluralism…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper showcases how the PAR embedded in posthumanist perspectives enabled us to navigate several complexities in the field through methodological situatedness and pluralism. It also attempts to critically outline the drivers and barriers that shaped our capacities to engage with the PAR.
Design/methodology/approach
The Tamil Nadu state in the Bay of Bengal along the southeast coast of India is one of the six regions in the world where severe tropical cyclones originate throughout the year. Storm surges in this region are well known for their destructive potential due to strong winds and heavy rainfall. This paper describes our participatory action research (PAR) journey towards strengthening grassroots action by providing access to safe and affordable housing for cyclone-impacted households (CIHs) in the Villupuram district of Tamil Nadu, India. The PAR was guided by an adaptive innovation model (AIM) that draws inspiration from posthumanism, action research and reflective practice traditions.
Findings
The insights from the PAR insist that we must recognise and work with diverse knowledge systems and situated practices to develop meaningful disaster risk reduction (DRR) and climate adaptation strategies. Our approach has to be rooted in the lived experiences of various vulnerable groups, their entanglements with nature and their everyday struggles of interacting with a complex social-ecological system.
Originality/value
This paper is an outcome of a PAR in a cyclone-impacted village in Tamil Nadu, India. The discussions and findings of the paper are original in nature and have not been published elsewhere.
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