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1 – 10 of over 6000Ulrica von Thiele Schwarz, Kin Andersson and Carina Loeb
The purpose is explore an approach to acquire, analyze and report data concerning an organizational change initiative that combines knowledge generation and knowledge use, and…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose is explore an approach to acquire, analyze and report data concerning an organizational change initiative that combines knowledge generation and knowledge use, and contrast that with a method where knowledge generation and use is separated. More specifically, the authors contrast a participatory group workshop with individual interviews analyzed with thematic analysis, focusing on information about the change process and its perceived practical relevance and usefulness.
Design/methodology/approach
Participants were managers responsible for implementing a broad organizational change aiming to improve service quality (e.g. access and equity) and reduce costs in a mental health service organization in Sweden. Individual interviews were conducted at two points, six months apart (i1: n = 15; i2: n = 18). Between the interviews, a 3.5-h participatory group workshop was conducted, during which participants (n = 15) both generated and analyzed data through a structured process that mixed individual-, small- and whole-group activities.
Findings
Both approaches elicited substantive information about the content, purpose and process of change. While the content and purpose findings were similar across the two data sources, the interviews described how to lead a change process, whereas the workshop yielded concrete information about what to do. Benefits of interviews included personal insights about leading change while the workshop provided an opportunity for collective sense-making.
Originality/value
When organizational stakeholders work through the change process through a participatory workshop, they may get on the same page, but require additional support to take action.
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The purpose of this paper is to advance spatial studies of change interventions by conceptualizing them as liminal spaces and examining how these spaces are conceived, perceived…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to advance spatial studies of change interventions by conceptualizing them as liminal spaces and examining how these spaces are conceived, perceived and lived during the intervention process.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper explores change interventions as liminal spaces in the empirical context of LEGO serious play workshops through participant observations and interviews.
Findings
The study shows that in change interventions an abstract, conceived liminal space is created, maintained and closed down to enable the planned change to take place. While practicing the space, the change participants may indeed perceive this space as liminal, but the space is less manageable because of their both prescribed and unprescribed interpretations. Furthermore, as subjectively experienced, the space may hold a spectrum of liminal, liminoid and everyday (business as usual) notions.
Research limitations/implications
The study contributes to the research on (1) the spatiality of change interventions and (2) artificially created liminal spaces of organizing.
Practical implications
The paper reminds consultants and organizations embarking on change interventions to pay attention to the spatiality of such interventions. The study shows that it is not enough to plan how these spaces are to be used, but also it is equally important to consider how the participants use and experience them.
Originality/value
The study provides a novel insight into change interventions by examining them as liminal spaces that are simultaneously conceived, perceived and lived during the intervention process.
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Carla Oonk, Judith Gulikers, Perry den Brok and Martin Mulder
Sustainable development requires multiple stakeholders to work and learn across practices, in other words, it requires boundary crossing competence. To prepare students for their…
Abstract
Purpose
Sustainable development requires multiple stakeholders to work and learn across practices, in other words, it requires boundary crossing competence. To prepare students for their future sustainability professions, higher education should facilitate the development of boundary crossing competence in its curricula. This study aims to confirm whether boundary crossing learning can be stimulated by workshop-based support in multi-stakeholder projects.
Design/methodology/approach
This quasi-experimental intervention study (N = 122) investigates the effect of a series of supporting workshops on students’ boundary crossing learning in multi-stakeholder projects. The workshops allowed students to adopt four learning mechanisms (identification, coordination, reflection and transformation) theorised to stimulate learning across boundaries between practices. Students followed zero, one, or two workshops. By analysing the student learning reports, the study examines the effect of the workshop intervention on students’ self-efficacy for stakeholder collaboration, the number of reported student-stakeholder collaborative activities and the reported boundary crossing learning mechanisms.
Findings
The results show that a series of two workshops increase the number of reported collaborative activities and activates the students’ boundary crossing learning in terms of reflection and transformation.
Research limitations/implications
These findings support the evidence-based design of multi-stakeholder learning environments for sustainable development and contribute to the body of knowledge regarding learning across practices.
Originality/value
Boundary crossing competence receives increasing attention as an asset for sustainable development. The added value of this study lies in its confirmation that the boundary crossing theory can be translated into directed educational support that can stimulate students’ boundary crossing learning.
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Karen L. Angus-Cole, Robert Eaton and Matthew Dawes
Embedding citizenship and sustainability into higher education curricula is vital for ensuring that curricula remain up-to-date and support students with the skills and knowledge…
Abstract
Embedding citizenship and sustainability into higher education curricula is vital for ensuring that curricula remain up-to-date and support students with the skills and knowledge they need for our ever-changing world. But the conceptualisation of the term “sustainability” radically affects its perceived relevance for curriculum design, and hence the recognition of where education for sustainability is already embedded within a curriculum. Here we present a student-designed, freely accessible workshop, which can be used by colleagues off-the-shelf to challenge workshop participants to reconsider their understanding of sustainability and recognise its vast scope. The workshop is provocative yet encourages collaboration, drawing on participants' prior experiences to identify sustainability concepts already embedded within their course, and opportunities to further enhance the inclusion of sustainability in the curriculum. The workshop is also fully supportive of the increasing recognition of the value of engaging students, and others, as partners in curriculum development.
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Fury Maulina, Mubasysyir Hasanbasri, Jamiu O. Busari and Fedde Scheele
This study aims to examine how an educational intervention, using the lens of the LEADS framework, can influence the development of primary care doctors’ leadership skills in…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to examine how an educational intervention, using the lens of the LEADS framework, can influence the development of primary care doctors’ leadership skills in Aceh, Indonesia. In order to persevere in the face of inadequate resources and infrastructure, particularly in rural and remote settings of low- and middle‐income countries, physicians require strong leadership skills. However, there is a lack of information on leadership development in these settings.
Design/methodology/approach
This study applied an educational intervention consisting of a two-day workshop. The authors evaluated the impact of the workshop on participants’ knowledge and skill by combining quantitative pre- and post-intervention questionnaires (based on Levels 1 and 2 of Kirkpatrick’s model) with qualitative post-intervention in-depth interviews, using a phenomenological approach and thematic analysis.
Findings
The workshop yielded positive results, as evidenced by participants’ increased confidence to apply and use the information and skills acquired during the workshop. Critical success factors were as follows: participants were curiosity-driven; the use of multiple learning methodologies that attracted participants; and the use of authentic scenarios as a critical feature of the program.
Originality/value
The intervention may offer a preliminary model for improving physician leadership skills in rural and remote settings by incorporating multiple teaching approaches and considering local cultural norms.
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The purpose of this study is to share how the learning impact of a remote workshop was improved through action research practices, especially action inquiry and critical…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to share how the learning impact of a remote workshop was improved through action research practices, especially action inquiry and critical reflexivity.
Design/methodology/approach
Research design detailed herein consists of one complete cycle of action and reflection. Methods used include: journaling into four territories of experience, free-form journaling, individual and joint reflection using four parts of speech and extended ways of knowing.
Findings
Action inquiry and critical reflexivity have shown themselves to be a potent means of improving the learning outcomes of remote Playing Lean workshops. Drawing on early insight, the author suggests several venues for further inquiry.
Originality/value
This paper contributes a novel combination of action research practices that can be used for improving other learning initiatives as well, and an example of how to question the veracity of qualitative findings.
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Laura Tack, Mark Simon and Ruihua Joy Jiang
Social entrepreneurship literature acknowledges that social capital is vital to the success of social entrepreneurship efforts and trust is integral to the process of building…
Abstract
Social entrepreneurship literature acknowledges that social capital is vital to the success of social entrepreneurship efforts and trust is integral to the process of building social capital. However, there has been limited research on trust itself in social entrepreneurship literature. This article aims to begin filling this gap by utilizing a specific social entrepreneurship initiative to illustrate the role of trust in social entrepreneurship efforts. It describes the model of trust developed by Sheppard and Sherman and the social entrepreneurship initiative, Global Brigades. The article discusses the relationships between the parties involved in the initiative and applies Sheppard and Sherman's model to these relationships. It illustrates the importance of trust to social entrepreneurship efforts, as well as the need for additional research regarding social entrepreneurship and trust.
Hesborn Wao, Clement Oduor Otendo, Jackline Syonguvi, Petronilla Muriithi, Damazo T. Kadengye and Eva M. Brodin
This study aims to understand master’s students’ experiences of service-learning, following their participation in a workshop with local social innovators whose activities had…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to understand master’s students’ experiences of service-learning, following their participation in a workshop with local social innovators whose activities had contributed to combating poverty in East Africa and to determine how this participation affected work on the students’ theses. The authors also explored possible gender differences in this context.
Design/methodology/approach
The study was based on pretest–posttest mixed methods research design. Data were collected from master’s students within the social sciences and science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) disciplines, respectively, in Kenya and Uganda, via surveys and interviews before the workshop, immediately afterwards and six months later.
Findings
Students’ immediate experience was that the workshop contributed to increased critical awareness, adoption of transdisciplinary community-serving approaches and strengthened self-confidence. Six months later, most had related their projects to social problems (e.g. poverty) in their communities. Moreover, the results motivated integration of gender-sensitive curricula based on service-learning in East Africa.
Practical implications
Based on the results, the authors suggest a framework for gender-sensitive curriculum development that can stimulate service-learning in master’s students. Implementation of such a curriculum could eventually contribute to community development, including, e.g. poverty reduction.
Originality/value
Studies on service-learning are rare in Africa, especially in postgraduate education. Gender-sensitive studies on service-learning are generally scarce and the same holds for studies on encouraging STEM students to integrate social innovation into their thesis work. By combining these aspects, this study presents an original contribution to existing research.
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While tourism scholars have increasingly recognized the significance of collaboration as an essential element in tourism development, there is a lack of theoretical and empirical…
Abstract
Purpose
While tourism scholars have increasingly recognized the significance of collaboration as an essential element in tourism development, there is a lack of theoretical and empirical research centering on (trans)local collaboration as a central means for future tourism development in Greenland. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the conceptual and analytic potentials and challenges of collaboration in an explorative case study.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper applies a case study approach to scrutinize collaboration in the setting of a tourism workshop in South Greenland. This research approach is exploratory in nature and focuses on collaborative activities among participants from different research institutions and countries, from Campus Kujalleq in Qaqortoq, from small-scale enterprises and businesses, managers of destination marketing organizations and local fishermen.
Findings
Four “collaborative configurations” emerged during the workshop. These inspire and challenge ways of (re)conceptualizing collaborative tourism development in South Greenland and call for the reconsideration of the present approach toward tourism development for shaping new possible future(s) of tourism in the Greenlandic context.
Originality/value
The relevance of this paper emerges from the crucial significance that tourism actors in Greenland credit collaboration. Moreover, by approaching development issues from within and mutually developing possible practice solutions through collaboration with local tourism actors, the paper aims to give voice to the local community, which currently is lacking in the debate on tourism development in Greenland.
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Clemens Harten, Matthias Meyer and Lucia Bellora-Bienengräber
This paper aims to explore drivers of the effectiveness of risk assessments in risk workshops.
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to explore drivers of the effectiveness of risk assessments in risk workshops.
Design/methodology/approach
This study uses an agent-based model to simulate risk assessments in risk workshops. Combining the notions of transactive memory and the ideal speech situation, this study establishes a risk assessment benchmark and then investigates real-world deviations from this benchmark. Specifically, this study models limits to information transfer, incomplete discussions and potentially detrimental group characteristics, as well as interaction patterns.
Findings
First, limits to information transfer among workshop participants can prevent a correct consensus. Second, increasing the required number of stable discussion rounds before an assessment improves the correct assessment of high but not low likelihood risks. Third, while theoretically advantageous group characteristics are associated with the highest assessment correctness for all risks, theoretically detrimental group characteristics are associated with the highest assessment correctness for high likelihood risks. Fourth, prioritizing participants who are particularly concerned about the risk leads to the highest level of correctness.
Originality/value
This study shows that by increasing the duration of simulated risk workshops, the assessments change – as a rule – from underestimating to overestimating risks, unraveling a trade-off for risk workshop facilitators. Methodologically, this approach overcomes limitations of prior research, specifically the lack of an assessment and process benchmark, the inability to disentangle multiple effects and the difficulty of capturing individual cognitive processes.
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