1,720,992 research outputs found
Fostering Transformative Learning and Change in IBM Teams - An Action Research Inquiry
Get PDFResearch Aim
During the research period I was an Organisation Development consultant in the Talent Transformation unit of IBM’s Global Business Services (business consulting) division. Having undergone a personal Transformative Learning experience due to working within a new form of operating model called IBM Garage, I became interested in exploring Transformative Learning in a team context.
Research Approach and Methodology
Building off of the foundation of a critical literature review, this research study uses an Action Research (AR) approach to foster a Team Transformative Learning (TTL) experience for IBM practitioners using the WeValue In Situ (WVIS) (Harder et al., 2021) method and process. Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) was used to understand the lived experience of participants and whether this process might foster TL in the daily work of teams of IBM and clients, both as a catalyst for organisational change and as an improvement to the IBM Garage Operating Model.
Findings
WeValue In Situ (WVIS) has previously been tested by the authors (Harder et al., 2021) in a variety of different organisational models and structures, and now for this Action Research paper within IBM. WVIS may have generalisability to other organisations, with a few caveats:
• the process is adhered to, as applied by qualified WVIS facilitator/s
• the scale is small – 4 to 6 participants is optimal, or more (up to a maximum of ~20) if the WVIS workshop is held face-to-face, not virtually.
Deep personal learning throughout the Action Research project resulted in a more reflective praxis, and a deeper understanding of the organisational political landscape, ultimately resulting in a move out of the IBM organisation in order to be able to effect organisational change better
‘I am part of the problem and the problem is part of me’ - A self-inquiry driven action research study on overcoming the negative effects of derailment behaviour in a higher education branch
Get PDFThis thesis intends to investigate whether it is possible to detect one’s own derailment potential by self-inquiry and first-person action research. Career derailment can be seen as the end result of dysfunctional and destructive leadership behaviour with a very disruptive impact. Derailing leaders exhibit typical personality flaws and managerial issues which have been studied for more than forty years (McCall & Lombardo, 1983; Bentz, 1985; Hogan, Hogan & Kaiser, 2010). Derailment can become a very costly affair with high impact on different levels within the organisation (Furnham, 2010) and therefore this thesis focused on preventive measures and problem solving in action.
The hypothesis is that the researcher is derailing and has either enabled the organisational problem or has become part of the problem due to her responses. Secondary, it is investigated which measures an individual can take, by self-regulation or in collaboration with their organisation, to prevent derailment from happening.
The critical literature review uncovered the complexity of leadership derailment and was complemented by investigations of themes related to the organisational context of the researcher, such as cultural, social, academic and gender constructs. The hypothesis was investigated by a qualitative and interpretative research design, applying first-person action research as the main methodology complemented by autoethnography, using diaries, journals and case studies as sources for scientific analysis and data gathering. Throughout the immersive action research cycles, during which she experimented with coaching, personality assessment and case writing, the researcher always ensured academic rigour by adopting a distant meta-analytic view alongside a first-person narrative for self-inquiry. Limitations of the study were the risk of confirmation bias, accessibility to information and the boundaries found in the organisation such as lack of sponsorship and leadership support.
The outcome of the study based on first-person action research is a deeper understanding into the complexity of self-diagnosis, self-regulation and self-initiated behavioural change. The research findings have led to an application of recommended activities by the development of a toolkit for business education and education management
More Important Than Their Money Offering: The Application of Action Research, ANP and TOPSIS to Real Estate Investing
Get PDFThis thesis examines the supplier selection process of non-institutional financial capital suppliers by small-scale real estate investing organizations and focuses specifically on the key criterion that real estate investing companies should seek when selecting and evaluating potential suppliers to promote an ideal partnership. These partnerships can provide the real estate investing organizations with vital capital access that allows business growth, larger transaction sizes, and greater volume but can be detrimental if the partners are ill-matched. Without a reputation or industry experience, many novice real estate investors are unaware of what qualities are most important to pursue when forming these critical relationships and simply accept any partner willing to provide capital. By using Action Research and quantitative methodologies of Analytical Network Process (ANP) and TOPSIS, this thesis documents the development of a start-up, solo-entrepreneurial investing organization and the actionable creation of an organizational supplier onboarding tool. The study surveys nineteen real estate industry expert participants and ultimately highlights six criterions as most important when selecting and evaluating potential financial capital suppliers: trustworthiness, motivation, quality of past experience, collateral and capacity, risk tolerance and risk appetite, and responsiveness. Using these findings, the entrepreneurial organization successfully develops and launches a free, online personalized questionnaire service for the benefit of both the future potential financial suppliers and the investing organization that strengthens partner communication, clarifies organizational culture and business development, and promotes overall service supply chain growth
A study of self-interest biases of self-initiated expatriates in Dubai, UAE
Get PDFThis thesis investigated the causes and consequences of self-interest biases of self-initiated expatriates (SIEs) working in Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE). SIEs are professionals who have voluntarily left their home countries seeking employment in a host country in order to further their careers and financial standing while all the while maintaining an intention to ultimately repatriate.
The study aimed to qualify and explore the workplace problem of SIEs in Dubai being materially biased by self-interest. The biases were considered to be a consequence of a range of interacting stressors arising from, inter alia, variability in decision making processes, ethical conflicts, cross and multi-cultural contexts, expatriate expectations and adjustment, the relationship between leaders and followers and, the local labour and residential laws. It was hypothesised that these organisational and social contexts could lead to SIEs having a negative perception of organisation support which in turn predisposed them to ethical malpractices and underperforming decisions. The research aimed to identify practical organisational development interventions that would ameliorate these tensions and so improve the working environment.
A Cooperative Inquiry approach was chosen as the research methodology based on a literature and research review. A learning set of eleven consenting SIEs was established in the researcher’s organisation to study the problem in context. The set met six times over a period of 18 months to explore the underlying issues. Time between sessions was used for reflection and implementation of their insights. At the end of the program, all of the participants reported both personal and professional development that they had operationalised.
Data were analysed using a Thematic Analysis approach which delivered a thematic map and a suite of key themes. The data themes and research observations that emerged aligned with and corroborated the literature. The research reached the conclusion that the self-interest biases of SIEs in Dubai was a valid and real organisational problem that is under appreciated and needs to be addressed. Job insecurity and the variability of ethics and ethical leadership in a cross-cultural context were identified as the main contributing factors. Secondary factors were cross cultural dynamics and communications, a SIE’s ongoing adaptation & culture shock, and the consequences of weak perceived organisational support.
The main contribution to professional management’s knowledge was a process model, Self-Initiated Expatriate Self-Interest Model (SIESIM), that described the interactions and consequences of the stressors faced by SIEs in Dubai. The SIESIM provided a tool to explain how workplace and social pressures progressively predisposed and cumulatively nudged a SIE, as they adjust to and accommodate the local context, towards self-interest biases and thence onward to moral disengagement and biased decision-making. The model provided a readily useable and practical platform for organisations to systematically understand and address the issues as part of a holistic change plan. Finally, based on peer interviews, it appeared that the research findings maybe generalizable to other work contexts and employment categories (including millennials) that have similar stressors and work-life environments
COPING WITH SUDDEN AND SHARP REVENUE LOSSES WITHIN BAHRAIN’S ECONOMIC CRISIS: ACTION RESEARCH AS A MEANS TO UNDERSTAND WRONG TRAITS AND TO IDENTIFY AND OVERCOME THE HIDDEN ROOTS
Get PDFThis DBA research investigates why Organisation A (Org. A), a specialised consultancy service provider of business processes and strategic Information Technology (IT), had experienced revenue losses from June 2014 onwards and continuously during 2015 and 2016. In 2008, Org. A commenced its operations in Bahrain when oil prices were fluctuating between US40 in June 2014, creating severe economic hardships on Bahrain’s small- and medium-sized organisations (macro-economic conditions). The drop in oil prices drove the government to stall large and new infrastructure projects worth over US$350–400 million (assess outer-world influences). An additional cost-cutting step was to withdraw government-sponsored utility subsidies to the community. This environment compelled Org. A to presume that the drop in oil prices and the economic crisis (outside causes) were the reasons behind its revenue losses. Org. A also presumed that the government would favour locally owned organisations over foreign-owned organisations, and this perception hindered Org. A from seeking advice and financial help from the primary government funding organisation (meso-economic conditions).
To explore the reasons behind Org. A’s revenue losses, this DBA research applied an Action Research (AR) strategy with a four-step AR cycle (constructing, planning action, taking action, and evaluating action). In addition to the core, underlying AR strategies, three other qualitative research strategies were employed to collect data. These efforts included the action research set with seven comparable, independent and diversified small and medium organisations and Org. A.
At the beginning of this DBA research, a prevailing presumption within Org. A had been that ‘outside causes’ associated with the drop in oil prices and the economic crisis were the primary causes of its revenue losses. However, as this DBA research discovered, such focus on the ‘outside causes’ was a barrier for Org. A to detect the ‘inside causes’ within the organisation that had been primarily responsible for its revenue losses.
Findings suggest that ‘outside causes’ were conditions that imposed challenges to any of the investigated seven comparable, independent and diversified organisations and Org. A. Similarly, the findings do not show that Org. A’s revenue losses had been caused by the government’s discriminatory practices over foreign-owned organisations. The findings showed that, unlike the other seven comparable organisations, Org. A had experienced a lack of organisational knowledge, competencies, and self-efficacies, leaving it incapable of responding to the economic crisis.
This understanding developed through this DBA research allowed taking jointly built strategies within Org. A to resolve the situation together with whom the problem relates to within Org. A, as shown through: (Table 43), (Table 44), (Table 45), (Table 46), (Table 47) and (Table 48) to respond to similar future economic crises
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Get PDFThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
- …
