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This paper deals with the organizing of interactive product development. Developing products in interaction between firms may provide benefits in terms of specialization, increased innovation, and possibilities to perform development activities in parallel. However, the differentiation of product development among a number of firms also implies that various dependencies need to be dealt with across firm boundaries. How dependencies may be dealt with across firms is related to how product development is organized. The purpose of the paper is to explore dependencies and how interactive product development may be organized with regard to these dependencies.

The analytical framework is based on the industrial network approach, and deals with the development of products in terms of adaptation and combination of heterogeneous resources. There are dependencies between resources, that is, they are embedded, implying that no resource can be developed in isolation. The characteristics of and dependencies related to four main categories of resources (products, production facilities, business units and business relationships) provide a basis for analyzing the organizing of interactive product development.

Three in-depth case studies are used to explore the organizing of interactive product development with regard to dependencies. The first two cases are based on the development of the electrical system and the seats for Volvo’s large car platform (P2), performed in interaction with Delphi and Lear respectively. The third case is based on the interaction between Scania and Dayco/DFC Tech for the development of various pipes and hoses for a new truck model.

The analysis is focused on what different dependencies the firms considered and dealt with, and how product development was organized with regard to these dependencies. It is concluded that there is a complex and dynamic pattern of dependencies that reaches far beyond the developed product as well as beyond individual business units. To deal with these dependencies, development may be organized in teams where several business units are represented. This enables interaction between different business units’ resource collections, which is important for resource adaptation as well as for innovation. The delimiting and relating functions of the team boundary are elaborated upon and it is argued that also teams may be regarded as actors. It is also concluded that a modular product structure may entail a modular organization with regard to the teams, though, interaction between business units and teams is needed. A strong connection between the technical structure and the organizational structure is identified and it is concluded that policies regarding the technical structure (e.g. concerning “carry-over”) cannot be separated from the management of the organizational structure (e.g. the supplier structure). The organizing of product development is in itself a complex and dynamic task that needs to be subject to interaction between business units.

This paper proposes an agentic model of new social capital creation in organizations. The core concepts are “making pipes” and “using pipes.” A “pipe” is a metaphor in network theory for the connection between two nodes through which something flows. “Making pipes” means that members of an organization are agents who can build new pipes. “Using pipes” refers to how a new pipe is utilized. Several illustrations and examples are provided. Overall, this model illustrates how human agency drives the creation of social capital and the evolution of networks in organizations.

Los Angeles, California, is facing record drought conditions. As a result, there is interest in all things related to building and maintaining water capabilities. Leaks in the infrastructure can lead to costly losses of water resources. Accordingly, attention increasingly is being devoted to water leak management. Using data available through the City of Los Angeles’ open data movement, the number of leaks is analyzed in order to study both the impact of temperature and whether the number of leaks is decreasing over time. Three different approaches for modeling the number of leaks, including regression, time series, and neural networks, are compared.

Social media allows students and faculty to research and display information in innovative new ways. Research methods courses – when developed by faculty members and librarian/instructional technologists – can move beyond database navigation and PowerPoint presentations when incorporating social media. This chapter discusses two Information Literacy case studies, one for a junior seminar in the hard sciences and the second for a class on the history of African-American Mathematicians. The courses were developed at a private, four-year Historically Black College/University (HBCU) through a faculty/library collaboration. These classes used a variety of Web 2.0 and social media tools including Google Maps, Flickr, Delicious, Yahoo Pipes, Meebo, YouTube, iTunes U, and the Moodle Learning Management System. Each case study will define and describe how each tool was used and the collaboration between faculty and librarians/technologists to implement social media. Student and faculty assessment of the program as well as anecdotal evidence is discussed for each study and implementation tips are provided. These case studies provide the practitioner ways to create an interactive, collaborative learning experience for students and faculty while alleviating library anxiety.

Although within the leadership literature there is a body of research concerning the physical attributes of leaders, close examination reveals that much of it offers a rather surface level of analysis. A number of studies, for example, attempt to correlate leaders’ height with their success, and attempts have been made to identify a relationship between leaders’ performance and their attractiveness. In this book, a range of scholars from differing perspectives delve below the apparent level of physicality to highlight its paradoxically ‘invisible’ aspects including: the impact of gesture, the way in which the physical is intrinsically interwoven with the social and the contradictory nature of bodily taboos. The book shows how each of these aspects plays an important role in the creation and maintenance of leadership relationships.

This chapter introduces three tussles we and our authors have faced in navigating this territory. Firstly, we have worked hard to find forms of writing which ‘point towards’ the experience of physicality. Realising that written language can never ‘be’ that experience (just as Magritte demonstrates with his painting, ‘Ceci n’est pas une pipe’ that the reproduction of the pipe is not the pipe itself) we have encouraged authors to contribute first-person accounts, in-depth case studies focused on individuals and even activities which involve the reader in order to evoke a sense of the physical. Secondly, we have endeavoured to distinguish the ‘inside-out’ phenomenon of ‘embodiment’ from the ‘outside-in’ occurrence of ‘physicality’. Finally, our authors have worked to reveal the mutual entanglement of social and material worlds, such that paradoxically, the physical reveals itself to be ‘in flow’ and continually in a process of ‘becoming’. After describing how we have sought to resolve these challenges, a taster from each chapter is offered. The chapter concludes by reasserting the importance of recognising the physical nature of the connection at the heart of human relationships experienced as leadership.

The following is an introductory profile of the fastest growing firms over the three-year period of the study listed by corporate reputation ranking order. The business activities in which the firms are engaged are outlined to provide background information for the reader.

This chapter begins with an exploratory approach to understanding how online branded video results in positive impressions among viewers. Scholars have examined the characteristics of videos that contribute to their appeal (e.g. Ashley & Tuten, 2015; Berger & Milkman, 2012; Botha & Reyneke, 2013; Dafonte-Gomez, 2014; Southgate, Westoby, & Page, 2010). Separate strands of literature have identified social practices and emotions likely to influence the perceptions of branded content. This chapter bridges the gap between those two strands by asking which social practices produce the emotions that lead to greater enjoyment of a video. Using a series of multiple regressions, we constructed a path analysis model linking key social practices and emotions that lead to positive evaluations of branded videos. The model provides strategic direction for the makers of online branded video.

This study aims to identify the trend and sources of inefficiency of the construction sector in Indonesia causes expensive infrastructure development. The basic model was built on the basis of the intermediate input coefficients of Input–Output Table. The sources of inefficiency were metal goods industry, mining and other quarries, the non-metal goods and minerals industry, the cement industry, petroleum refining, building and business services companies, wood, land transportation, manufacture of rubber and plastic goods, financial institutions and machinery, electrical equipment and equipment industries. Indonesia needs a strong upstream industry on raw and supporting materials of iron-steel, wood and cement.