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This study aims to investigate how firm capability can be accumulated with the inputs of learning efforts targeted at resolving barriers existing in the imitative innovation process. This paper takes imitative innovation as a process involving a few stages during which learning efforts are targeted at overcoming barriers existing within each process.

The multiple case study approach has been adopted to explore how Chinese manufacturing small and medium enterprises (SMEs) learn and increase their technological capabilities through a continuous process of product refinement and improvement based on imitative innovation. In particular, the authors accentuate the learning efforts that firms must make to cope with various technological barriers

It is revealed that during the initial stages of imitative innovation, the organizational learning of Chinese manufacturing SMEs is highly constrained by the limitations of their technological resources and capabilities. It is also found that original equipment manufacturers can play an important role in providing Chinese learners with both explicit and tacit technological knowledge.

This study investigates how firm capability can be accumulated with the inputs of learning efforts targeted at resolving barriers existing in the imitative innovation process. The multiple case study approach has been adopted to explore how Chinese manufacturing SMEs learn and increase their technological capabilities through a continuous process of product refinement and improvement based on imitative innovation that could add new and great value to this research area.

New technology‐based ventures (NTBVs) gain access to beneficial social capital through their affiliation with technology incubators, organizations created to facilitate learning leading to the successful development of nascent firms. Scillitoe and Chakrabarti (2005, 2) identified three sources of beneficial social capital within human networks, “historical ties, organizational facilitation, and trustbased shared pursuit of common goals”, with organizational facilitation identified as the primary source of beneficial social capital for ventures within technology incubators. The current study extends this prior research investigating the development of social capital of NTBVs through incubator facilitation, focusing on the influence of female founders. Results are based on surveys collected from fifty‐four technology‐based firms affiliated with technology incubators in the United States and Finland. The results from this exploratory study show that the speed of technological learning is negatively affected by the interpersonal network access in firms with female founding management team members. Technological learning includes acquiring knowledge of legal protection of intellectual property, complex technological and scientific knowledge, and design and production skills that enable the development and commercialization of NTBV products and services (Deeds, DeCarolis, and Coombs, 1999). This finding contradicts prior research that suggests technological development of ventures is positively influenced by interpersonal network access through incubators (Hansen, Chesbrough, Nohria, and Sull 2000; Scillitoe and Chakrabarti 2005). Implications for technology incubator managers, NTBV founders, and economic development agencies that support technology incubators are discussed.

As a means of better understanding learner success, higher education institutions, training providers, and corporate learning and development teams are contemplating the opportunities learning analytics affords. Simply put, learning analytics is the collection, analysis, and reporting of learner data, for the principle means of enhancing learning. It is argued that learning analytics – when available in a consistent and digestible format – not only provides educators with a clear view of the learners “footprint” but also allows for the means of navigating the broad spectrum of possible learning interventions. This brief paper outlines a clear definition of learning analytics and provides some suggestions on how learning analytics can assist in informing the decision-making relating to learning interventions for learning designers and educators via an evidence-based approach, one in which learner success is at the forefront.

Viewpoint paper

This paper has found that the collecting, reporting, predicting, and acting on learning analytics are more effective means of targeting adjustment to learning material, including interactive aspects, videos, text, discussion board activities, collaborative group work, assessment tasks, quizzes, branching scenarios, and teacher facilitated learning interventions.

This is not a research paper, and as such so no limitations/implications are presented.

This paper explores how this is undertaken using an evidence-based approach, one in which learner success is at the forefront.

This paper provides some practical strategies for trainers, educators, and learning designers.

Viewpoint paper

Aim of the present monograph is the economic analysis of the role of MNEs regarding globalisation and digital economy and in parallel there is a reference and examination of some legal aspects concerning MNEs, cyberspace and e‐commerce as the means of expression of the digital economy. The whole effort of the author is focused on the examination of various aspects of MNEs and their impact upon globalisation and vice versa and how and if we are moving towards a global digital economy.

This study aims to investigate the dynamic influences of clustered barriers that hinder electronic procurement technology (EPT) implementation in construction procurement, using the neuro-fuzzy system.

A comprehensive literature review was conducted and 21 barriers to EPT implementation within construction projects were identified. Based on an expert survey, 121 datasets were gathered for this study. Using mean and normalization analysis for the datasets, 15 out of the 21 barriers were deemed to have critical influences in EPT barriers phenomenon. Subsequently, the critical barriers were classified into five groups: human-related; technological risk-related; government-related; industry growth-related; and financial-related. The relationships and influence patterns between the groups of barriers to EPT implementation were analyzed using the neuro-fuzzy system. Furthermore, sensitivity analysis was performed to examine the dynamic influence levels of the barriers within the hindrance level composition.

The results reveal that addressing one barrier group does not reduce the high levels of hindrances experienced in EPT implementation. However, addressing at least two barrier groups mostly tends to reduce the hindrance levels for EPT implementation. Further, this study revealed that addressing some barrier group pairings, such as technological risk-related and government-related barriers, while other barrier groups remained at a high level, still resulted in high levels of hindrances to EPT implementation in construction procurement.

This study provides insights for researchers to help them contribute to the development of theory with contemporary approaches based on the influence patterns of barrier interrelationships.

This study provides a model that would help practitioners and decision makers in construction procurement to understand and effectively determine the complex and dynamic influences of barrier groups to EPT uptake, for the development of suitable mitigation strategies.

This study provides novel insights into the complex influence patterns among grouped barriers concerning EPT adoption in the construction industry. Researchers and practitioners are equipped with knowledge on the influence patterns of barriers. This knowledge aids the development of effective strategies that mitigate the combined groups of barriers, and promote the wider implementation of EPT in the construction industry.

Research reveals that the built environment graduates are not matching the needs of the 21st century construction industry. Evidence shows that the built environment academics (BEA) struggle to reskill and upskill to meet the industry's demand. Studies about Nigeria's BEA's perceived barriers in meeting the 21st-century industry demands are scarce. Thus, the paper investigated the perceived barriers and measures to improve BEA in Nigeria's 21st-century world of teaching. The outcome intends to enhance teaching practices and increase employability in the built environment disciplines.

Data were sourced from elite virtual interviews across Nigeria. The participants were well informed about Nigeria's built environment education and the possible barriers hindering 21st-century teaching from improving employable graduates in the built environment professionals (BEP). The researchers adopted a thematic analysis for the collected data and supplemented the data with secondary sources.

The study shows that BEA needs to improve BEA's teaching mechanism. Improving BEA will enable the built environment graduates to meet the minimum standards expected by the 21st-century industry. Findings categorised the perceived 22 barriers facing BEA into internal stakeholders-related barriers, external stakeholders-related barriers, and common barriers. Also, findings proffered practicable measures to improve BEA in the workplace via improved industry collaboration and technological advancement.

The research is restricted to the perceived barriers and measures to improve BEA in 21st-century teaching in Nigeria via a qualitative research design. Future research should validate the results and test the paper's proposed framework.

The paper confirms that the BEA requires stakeholder collaboration and technological advancement measures to improve teaching in the 21st century, leading to enhanced employability graduates. The paper would stir major stakeholders, especially BEA, and advance the quality of employable graduates in the Nigerian built environment professions.

The thematic network and proposed framework could be employed to stimulate Nigeria's BEA for better service delivery. This intends to create an enabling environment that will enhance stakeholders' collaboration and technological advancement for the BEA to produce better employable graduates in the 21st century.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the strategy for latecomers in large developing countries under globalization. The relationship between innovation and learning is deeply studied.

The paper formulates an in‐depth case study on the digital video player industry through consideration of government documents, reports, and research papers; intensive interviews; and questionnaire study.

The firms in developing countries might be able to innovate before they can match the firms in advanced countries in technological capabilities, and innovation is the most effective way of learning. The firms can achieve competitive advantage owing to the effect of the national value network, the nature of architectural technology, and the relationships between them in product development. The national market should be deliberately taken as a strategic asset for the technological learning and latecomers should learn how to exploit the advantage of globalization.

The paper tries to understand how firms in developing countries conduct learning by innovating to build their competitive advantages.

E-learning has gained much focus from educators and researchers, with many extolling e-learning over traditional learning. Despite this focus, implementation of e-learning systems often fails. The purpose of this paper is to consider a range of barriers, impacting the success of e-learning implementations, yet to the best of the authors’ knowledge no conceptual framework is able to consolidate existing research.

This paper undertook an in-depth review of literature concerning e-learning implementation barriers. Papers were extracted from established peer-reviewed journals and open sources. Articles not related to e-learning implementation barriers were discarded. A total of 259 papers were identified, published between 1990 and 2016. Hermeneutics and data-driven qualitative content analysis was used to define 68 unique barriers.

The 68 unique barriers were thematically grouped into four conceptual categories, i.e. Technology (T), Individual (I), Pedagogy (P), and Enabling Conditions (EC). These four categories led to the conceptualization of “TIPEC” framework, which highlights the key concepts hindering e-learning implementation and delivery. Results show that most articles only consider a narrow range of success barriers.

The proposed TIPEC framework acts as a guide for education practitioners, system developers, policy makers, and researchers. It provides stakeholders with a summary of e-learning barriers.

This paper fulfils an identified need for a conceptual framework that consolidates all current research related to e-learning implementation barriers.

The purpose of this paper is to compare the effects of organizational and technological barriers to knowledge sharing between large and small firms through the lens of attribution theory.

The structural equation modeling approach was applied to estimate the conceptual model by using survey data from a list of Taiwan’s top 1,000 manufacturing and 500 service companies. A total of 229 valid questionnaires were collected.

The empirical results show that both organizational and technological barriers have relationships with an individual’s effort and ability with regard to knowledge sharing behavior. When organizational barriers occur, the perceived lack of effort has a direct effect on knowledge sharing behavior for large firms, while negative sharing behavior among employees of small firms is influenced by the perception of low ability through the perceived lack of effort.

A review of the literature reveals organizational and technological barriers that lead to the negative influences of internal attributions on knowledge sharing. This study, therefore, contributes to a comprehensive perspective on how to encourage knowledge sharing behavior at different sizes of firms.

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has had global repercussions on use of e-learning solutions. In order to maximise the promise of e-learning, it is necessary for managers to understand, control and avoid barriers that impact learner continuance of e-learning systems. The technology, individual, pedagogy and enabling conditions (TIPEC) framework identified theoretical barriers to e-learning implementation, i.e. grouped into four theoretical concepts (7 technology, 26 individual, 28 pedagogy and 7 enabling conditions). This study validates the 26 theoretical individual barriers. Appreciating individual barriers will help the e-learning implementation team to better scope system requirements and help achieve better student engagement, continuation and ultimately success.

Data were collected from 344 e-learning students and corporate trainees, across a range of degree programs. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis was used to define and validate barrier themes. Comparison of results against the findings of Ali et al. (2018) allows comparison of theoretical and validated compound factors.

Results of exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis combined several factors and defined 16 significant categories of barriers instead of the 26 mentioned in the TIPEC framework.

Individual learner barriers, unlike technology and pedagogy barriers which can be directly identified and managed, appear abstract and unmanageable. This paper, considering implementation from the learner perspective, not only suggests a more simplified ontology of individual barriers but presents empirically validated questionnaire items (see Appendix) that can be used by implementation managers and practitioners as an instrument to highlight the barriers that impact individuals using e-learning factors. Awareness of individual barriers can help the content provider to adapt system design and/or use conditions to maximize the benefits of e-learning users.