bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Empowering learners as the owners of feedback while YouTube‐ing
Authors: Zher Ng Huey , Maznah Raja Hussain Raja
Published: December 2009

Purpose

The application of a new technology (YouTube) can help lecturers in solving some of the issues related to workload and shifts support to students by giving them more responsibilities in their assessment. The purpose of this paper is to re‐characterize the role of the students in the assessment process.

Design/methodology/approach

Reflection on open‐ended questions, observation on the feedback process which occurs in YouTube and interviews are used to approach the research objectives: to identify the occurred process when empowerment role is given to the students in the assessment process; and determine the possibility of using YouTube in addressing teacher workload and changing student roles.

Findings

The findings show that YouTube, when correctly utilized together with proper scaffolding and thorough groundwork, can help lecturers address workload problems as well as affecting change in student roles while bringing about technological change in productive ways.

Research limitations/implications

The paper shows that assessment can be made via YouTube, a social entertainment tool, and suggests methods on how to use the features in YouTube for feedback.

Practical implications

Since YouTube is a social tool, the research indirectly guides the students or users in the appropriate use of technology, teaching them to be responsible digital citizens.

Originality/value

The paper looks into the possibility of using YouTube as an assessment tool.
Enhancing maritime education and training
Authors: Murai Koji , Wakida Shin‐Ichi , Fukushi Keiichi , Hayashi Yuji , Stone Laurie C.
Published: December 2009

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to propose that the measurement of salivary amylase activity is an effective index to evaluate the stress of a ship navigator for safe navigation training and education.

Design/methodology/approach

Evaluation comes from the simulator and actual on‐board experiments. The subjects are real captains who have unlimited licenses and cadets who are senior students at Kobe University, navigation course. Stress is evaluated for several situations where a ship navigator makes a lot of decisions, in this case in a narrow passage, entering a port and leaving a port.

Findings

Salivary amylase activity occurs when a ship navigator makes a decision regarding ship handling and collision avoidance. By measuring salivary amylase activity when a student is under duress, cadets' ship‐handling training can be evaluated while onboard a vessel.

Research limitations/implications

Future research will develop cross‐indices with the salivary amylase activity and other physiological indices (nasal temperature and heart rate variability (R‐R interval)), complementary to each other. The salivary amylase activity registers the stress quickly on the spot. Then the nasal temperature and R‐R interval registers the trend and the quick response to the stress (mental workload).

Practical implications

The paper describes an effective index which is useful for evaluating a ship navigator's stress for safe navigation.

Originality/value

Ship navigator's skill and cadet's on‐board training have been evaluated according to performance and a questionnaire as a quantitative evaluation; moreover, stress is evaluated using salivary amylase activity.
Effective location‐guided overlay multicast in mobile ad hoc networks
Authors: Chen Kai , Nahrstedt Klara
Published: December 2009

Purpose

Group communication has become increasing important in mobile ad hoc networks (MANET). Current multicast routing protocols in MANET have been shown to incur large overheads due to dynamic network topology. To this end, this paper proposes an overlay multicast scheme in MANET that is more efficient.

Design/methodology/approach

The approach is to construct an overlay multicast tree based on the locations of the group nodes. The paper proposes several tree construction algorithms, namely, location‐guided k‐ary (LGK) tree, location‐guided directional (LGD) tree and location‐guided Steiner (LGS) tree. All of them rely on the geometric locations of the nodes as heuristics to construct the tree. The paper also introduces several mechanisms to enhance the proposed algorithms.

Findings

The simulation results show that the location‐guided heuristics is very effective in constructing low bandwidth cost overlay multicast trees in MANET. When location information is up‐to‐date, the bandwidth cost of a LGS tree is similar to that of an optimal router‐assisted Steiner multicast tree. When location information is out‐dated, LGD tree has the lowest cost.

Originality/value

This paper demonstrates the effectiveness of location‐guided heuristics in constructing overlay multicast trees in MANET. This study strongly suggests that location‐guided heuristics can be used to design many other algorithms in a mobile network.
Autonomous broadcast pruning in wirelessad hocnetworks using coverage estimation
Authors: Bae Kichan , Yoon Hyunsoo
Published: December 2009

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to find a practical method to minimize unnecessary rebroadcasts forad hocnetworks in a remote area.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors design a theoretical coverage estimation model for autonomous broadcast pruning. To verify the effect of the model, simulations are performed to evaluate the effect of confidence level and the actual performance by using ns2 network simulator.

Findings

The algorithm used to predict the coverage area of broadcasts can minimize unnecessary rebroadcasts.

Originality/value

Autonomous broadcast pruning scheme based on the local prediction of a remained coverage area in the on‐going broadcast process brings us beneficial results in terms of energy savings and limited bandwidth preservation.
WShare: an instant secure collaboration workspace over ad hoc wireless LAN
Authors: Raniwala Ashish , Zhang Gefan , Sridhar Ashwini , Zheng Jian P. , Chiueh Tzi‐cker
Published: December 2009

Purpose

This paper aims to describe the design, implementation, and evaluation of a novel file and application sharing system that enables a group of mobile stations that do not have any prior security association and infrastructure support, to form a secure collaboration workspace, and share files and application content instantly with minimal human intervention.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper looks at the system implementation and experimentation.

Findings

WShare can automatically establish a peer‐to‐peer network among the participating mobile stations, and provides a transparent shared file repository through which the mobile stations can securely exchange files with simple drag‐and‐drop operations. This file sharing application can also be specialized to support the same file beaming service over wireless LAN as that provided by Palm PDAs over infrared links. On the application sharing front, WShare supports a general remote execution mechanism that can synchronize the state of multiple instances of a standard productivity application, such as PowerPoint, Excel, and Word, across different machines. Finally for sharing generic applications, WShare also integrates virtual network computing with reliable wireless broadcast to provide a user‐interface level sharing mechanism. Performance measurement on the fully operational WShare prototype shows that a collaboration workspace among five mobile nodes can be set up within 3.5 seconds.

Originality/value

This paper proposes a new communication paradigm and presents the design, implementation, and evaluation of a fully‐working prototype.
Design and evaluation of a security architecture for ad hoc networks
Authors: Kraft Daniel , Bechler Marc , Hof Hans‐Joachim , Pählke Frank , Wolf Lars
Published: December 2009

Purpose

Secure communication is very important for computer networks. Thereby, authentication is one of the most eminent preconditions. In ad hoc networks, common authentication schemes are not applicable since public key infrastructures with a centralized certification authority are hard to deploy in ad hoc networking environments. This paper aims to investigate these issues.

Design/methodology/approach

In order to overcome these issues, the paper proposes and evaluates a security concept based on a distributed certification facility. Thereby, a network is divided into clusters with one special head node each. These cluster head nodes perform administrative functions and hold shares of a network key used for certification. New nodes start to participate in the network as guests; they can only become full members with a network‐signed certificate after their authenticity has been warranted by some other members. Access to resources and services within the ad hoc network is controlled using authorization certificates.

Findings

The feasibility of this concept was verified by simulations. Three different models for node mobility were used in order to include realistic scenarios as well as to make the results comparable to other work. The simulation results include an evaluation of the log‐on times, availability, and communication overhead.

Originality/value

The paper introduces a cluster‐based architecture to realize a distributed public key infrastructure that is highly adapted to the characteristics of ad hoc networks.
Evaluating failure detection in mobilead‐hocnetworks
Authors: Friedman Roy , Tcharny Galya
Published: December 2009

Purpose

Mobilead‐hocnetworks (MANET) are networks that are formed in anad‐hocmanner by collections of devices that are equipped with wireless communication capabilities, such as the popular WiFi (IEEE 802.11b) standard. As the hardware technology and networking protocols for MANETs become mature and ubiquitous, the main barrier for MANETs to become widely used is applications. Like in other areas of distributed computing, in order to expedite the development of applications, there is a need for middleware services that support these applications. Failure detection has been identified as a basic component for many reliable distributed middleware services and applications. This paper aims to investigate this issue.

Design/methodology/approach

This paper presents an adaptation of a gossip‐based failure detection protocol to MANETs, and an evaluation by extensive simulations of this protocol's performance in such networks.

Findings

The results can be viewed as a feasibility check for implementing failure detection in MANETs, and the conclusions drawn from them can be used to motivate and improve future implementations of both a failure detection component and of applications and middleware services relying on such a component.

Originality/value

This paper presents an adaptation of a gossip‐based failure detection protocol to MANET environments, and presents an extensive simulation‐based performance study of this protocol in MANETs with various parameters.
A structural, content‐similarity measure for detecting spam documents on the web
Authors: Soledad Pera Maria , Ng Yiu‐Kai
Published: December 2009

Purpose

The web provides its users with abundant information. Unfortunately, when a web search is performed, both users and search engines must deal with an annoying problem: the presence of spam documents that are ranked among legitimate ones. The mixed results downgrade the performance of search engines and frustrate users who are required to filter out useless information. To improve the quality of web searches, the number of spam documents on the web must be reduced, if they cannot be eradicated entirely. This paper aims to present a novel approach for identifying spam web documents, which have mismatched titles and bodies and/or low percentage of hidden content in markup data structure.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper shows that by considering the degree of similarity among the words in the title and body of a web docuemnt D, which is computed by using their word‐correlation factors; using the percentage of hidden context in the markup data structure within D; and/or considering the bigram or trigram phase‐similarity values of D, it is possible to determine whether D is spam with high accuracy

Findings

By considering the content and markup of web documents, this paper develops a spam‐detection tool that is: reliable, since we can accurately detect 84.5 percent of spam/legitimate web documents; and computational inexpensive, since the word‐correlation factors used for content analysis are pre‐computed.

Research limitations/implications

Since the bigram‐correlation values employed in the spam‐detection approach are computed by using the unigram‐correlation factors, it imposes additional computational time during the spam‐detection process and could generate higher number of misclassified spam web documents.

Originality/value

The paper verifies that the spam‐detection approach outperforms existing anti‐spam methods by at least 3 percent in terms of F‐measure.
Maintaining web application: an ontology‐based reverse engineering approach
Authors: Mohamed Benslimane Sidi , Malki Mimoun , Bouchiha Djelloul
Published: December 2009

Purpose

Web applications are subject to continuous changes and rapid evolution triggered by increasing competition, especially in commercial domains such as electronic commerce. Unfortunately, usually they are implemented without producing any useful documentation for subsequent maintenance and evolution. Thereof, the maintenance of such systems becomes a challenging problem as the complexity of the web application grows. Reverse engineering has been heralded as one of the most promising technologies to support effective web application maintenance. This paper aims to present a reverse engineering approach that helps understanding existing undocumented web applications to be maintained or evolved.

Design/methodology/approach

The proposed approach provides reverse engineering rules to generate a conceptual schema from a given domain ontology by using a set of transformation rules. The reverse engineering process consists of four phases: extracting useful information; identifying a set of ontological constructs representing the concepts of interest; enriching the identified set by additional constructs; and finally deriving a conceptual schema.

Findings

The advantage of using ontology for conceptual data modeling is the reusability of domain knowledge. As a result, the conceptual data model will be made faster, easier and with fewer errors than creating it in usual way. Designers can use the extracted conceptual schema to gain a better understanding of web applications and to assist in their maintenance.

Originality/value

The strong point of this approach is that it relies on a very rich semantic reference that is domain ontology. However, it is not possible to make a straightforward transformation of all elements from a domain ontology into a conceptual data model because ontology is semantically richer than data conceptual models.
Automation of post‐exploitation
Authors: Tabatabai Irani Mohammad , Weippl Edgar R.
Published: December 2009

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to describe the improvements achieved in automating post‐exploit activities

Design/methodology/approach

Based on existing frameworks such as Metasploit and Meterpreter the paper develops a prototype and uses this to automate typical post‐exploitation activities.

Findings

Using a multi‐step approach of pivoting this paper can automate the cascaded attacks on computers not directly routable.

Practical implications

Based on the findings and developed prototypes penetration tests can be made more efficient since many manual exploitation activities can now be scripted.

Original/value

The main contribution of the paper is to extend Metapreter‐scripts so that post‐exploitation can be scripted. Moreover, using a multi‐step approach (pivoting), it can automatically exploit machines that are not directly routable
Discourse analysis and corporate social responsibility: a qualitative approach
Authors: Ocler Rodolphe
Published: December 2009

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to examine how firms build and develop corporate discourse in the field of corporate social responsibility (CRS). The paper has two main objectives: to clarify notions that are used when analyzing discourse; and to provide a qualitative methodology to analyze how the discourse is used to construct a CRS strategy.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper presents a qualitative methodology, deconstructing four CRS reports using a story‐telling approach.

Findings

The analysis shows that firms construct their environment while marketing the report on social responsibility, in order to make of it an asset in an institutional communication system.

Research limitations/implications

Further attention should be devoted to the specificity of qualitative approach and to discourse analysis (selection of the corpus, validity and triangulation, etc.).

Originality/value

The paper shows how discourse can be used to provide competitive advantage. It also provides a clear framework while using discourse analysis and identifies the major pitfalls that should be avoided when using such a methodology.
From folk‐tales to shareholder‐tales: semiotics analysis of the annual report
Authors: Breton Gaétan
Published: December 2009

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to explore the use of semiotics analysis to better understand the annual report. It starts with the idea that the annual report is telling stories to the reader. As a form of novel, it can be analysed with the same instrument.

Design/methodology/approach

The goal here is methodological. It is to propose an organized body of techniques that will allow anybody to conduct analysis from it. Therefore, one example is used uniquely to illustrate the method. The advantages of semiotics over content analysis are numerous. Content analysis remains quite trivial (counting words), while semiotics analysis takes into account the structure of the story at many levels.

Findings

Framed by the categories of Aristotle's rhetoric, a method is developed that is replicable with a limited background in the source disciplines. The results suggest that the annual report is clearly telling stories and respond quite positively to this kind of approach.

Originality/value

Although it is often discussed as a general issue, there has so far been no proposal of an integrated method for analysing accounting narratives over content analysis.
A discourse analysis of the disciplinary power of management coaching
Authors: Ellerup Nielsen Anne , Nørreklit Hanne
Published: December 2009

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to analyse the control assumptions embedded in some textbooks on management coaching with a view to uncovering the potentialities and constraints applying to the individual's self‐realisation project.

Design/methodology/approach

By means of a qualitative discourse analysis of selected works on management coaching, the paper examines the rhetorical articulation of the management coaching concept in terms of established discourses of managing and controlling the individual.

Findings

As a result of the findings, the paper categorises the management coaching literature into two types: employee and executive coaching, respectively. It demonstrates that employee coaching seems to involve action control and direct monitoring, while executive coaching involves control of the spirit as well as results/achievements, thereby generating tight constraints on the individual's self‐realisation project. It concludes that coaching can be a stronger disciplining technique than control by numbers.

Originality/value

The paper provides insight into how writing on management coaching may help to construct power structures and social relationships reflected in society. There have been other studies analysing, for example, how performance measurements produce power structures and social relationships, but to the best of one's knowledge none of these has focused on management coaching – nor have they drawn on discourse analysis, which allows one to discern the social orders of popular management practices.
Anti‐corporate activist anger: inappropriate irrationality or social change essential?
Authors: Simola Sheldene K.
Published: December 2009

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to identify the false distinction often drawn in both philosophy and social movement research between rationality of thought and the emotion of anger. By demonstrating that anger may represent something other than irrationality, the adequacy of common management responses to anti‐corporate activist anger is questioned.

Design/methodology/approach

Dominant western perspectives, in which anger is negatively constructed as a socially inappropriate irrationality in need of control, are contrasted with alternative viewpoints in which anger is conceptualized as an essential political mechanism through which judgments of injustice occur. Consonance between the latter view and “framing processes”, through which anger enters into social movements, is demonstrated.

Findings

Negative social constructions of anger reflected in corporate strategies for managing anger may serve important political functions, including suppression of moral agency and judgments of injustice among those who are disfranchised.

Practical implications

In order to validate citizen claims to moral equality, worth and community membership, managers should engage in authentic dialogue to openly evaluate and either agree on or challenge claims of injustice. Managers should also proactively involve peripheral (disfranchised) stakeholders in order to understand and incorporate their perspectives into sustainable and just business models.

Originality/value

Although anger has long been recognized as a central feature of anti‐corporate activism, it has received almost no scholarly attention. The false distinction often drawn between anger and rationality is described and, based on this, the adequacy of common corporate strategies for managing activist anger are questioned.
Sustainable development: a vague and ambiguous “theory”
Authors: Pesqueux Yvon
Published: December 2009

Purpose

The notion of “sustainable development” has had a short and tumultuous history, including a departure from economic reductionism by focusing on a multidimensional aspect and addressing the issues of its scope across many disciplines. It has become a project enabling a rethinking of capitalism based on the concept of a reformed type of capitalism. The purpose of this paper is to study this issue.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper is based on the following arguments: the presentation of sustainable development as a “vague” theory, an empirical proof of this vagueness with regard to corporate actions whose justification is based around the notion of sustainable development, and finally the ambiguities of the notion.

Findings

The notion of sustainable development raises the question of an apparent consensus on its correlates: solidarity, responsibility, equity, etc. It tends to establish a protean sense of the firms' responsibility, particularly the larger ones. The largely political dimension of the notion has today consequences on its usage. Sustainable development as addressed in the firm tends to take on the dimension of a management issue, which is likely to persist due to its larger political dimension.

Originality/value

The paper provides insight on the catch‐all dimension of the notion and its appealing rhetorical character and bases the ambiguity related with references to an “in‐between.” On the institutional level, it refers to a social and fair economy that stands arguably in between the state and the market. On the methodological level, it refers to heuristics of fear and hope.
Is an ethical society possible?
Authors: Isaac Mostovicz E. , Kakabadse Nada K. , Kakabadse Andrew
Published: December 2009

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to outline concepts that can build an ethical society.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper examines selected literature on citizenship through the lens of theory building‐blocks. It identifies the role of leadership in society and its importance in developing society into an ethical one.

Findings

The paper distinguishes between a ruler, which is defined socially as a hierarchical position, and a leader, which describes a personal quality and is embedded in psychology. Leadership is a developmental process, which is based on the type of choice a leader makes, which implies that two good options are always available from which to select. Nevertheless, one should make choices in accordance with his worldview, looking for affiliation (i.e. the Theta worldview), or looking for achievement (i.e. the Lambda worldview). Consequently, the choices leaders make for societal activities have to fit their own worldview. Pursuing the fit between one's worldview and planned societal or citizenship activities ensures that society continuously improves its ethical behaviour. The paper concludes with examining the meaning of citizenship and the state in modern times.

Research limitations/implications

Being a theory‐based exploration, the paper does not provide empirical examples of how this theory might be applied in practice.

Originality/value

The paper fills a gap in explaining why current theories could not provide an ethical theory of citizenship. It follows by distinguishing between the definitions of a ruler and a leader. In addition, it questions the viewing of a state as a long‐term entity.
Regional cooperation towards trans‐country natural gas market
Authors: Shukla P.R. , Dhar Subash
Published: December 2009

Purpose

India began gas imports since 2004 through liquified natural gas (LNG) route. Imports through trans‐country gas pipelines could help in bringing gas directly into the densely populated Northern part of India, which are far from domestic gas resources as well as coastal LNG terminals. The purpose of this paper is to report scenarios, which quantify the impacts for India of regional cooperation to materialize trans‐country pipelines. The analysis covers time period from 2005 to 2030.

Design/methodology/approach

The long‐term energy system model ANSWER‐MARKAL is used for the analysis.

Findings

Trans‐country pipelines could deliver direct economic benefit of US$310 billion for the period 2010‐2030. Besides these, there are positive externalities in terms of lower greenhouse gas emissions and improved local environment, and enhanced energy security. However, the benefits are sensitive to global gas prices as higher gas prices would reduce the demand for gas and also the positive externalities from using gas.

Practical implications

Trans‐country pipelines are of great importance to India as they add 0.4 per cent to gross domestic product over the period besides yielding positive environmental externalities and improved energy security.

Originality/value

Quantification of benefits from trans‐country pipeline proposals till 2030.
Effective market monitoring for surveillance of the Indian electricity market
Authors: Bajpai Prabodh , Niwas Singh Sri
Published: December 2009

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to introduce a prospective market monitoring system (MMS) for surveillance of Indian power market using a set of new market monitoring indices.

Design/methodology/approach

It is necessary for the system regulators and policy makers to identify the potential market power and find ways to mitigate them to improve the market efficiency. The simple way to curb market power is the capping of bidding price to several times the average price of electricity. However, this approach is not ideal as it could mask the real market trading situation. The best way for the regulator is to identify which particular generators are exercising market power and deal with them individually.

Findings

Identification of major activities under MMS and effectiveness of new market indices have been established through quantitative analysis.

Practical implications

The MMS will provide in‐time warning signals and identify the suppliers taking maximum unfair advantage which needs intense scrutiny by monitoring unit.

Originality/value

Very few works have discussed detail market monitoring issues for the markets those are in their early stages of development like Indian electricity market. Indian Energy Exchange as a first power exchange in India became operative from June 2008, therefore, it is very important to develop an effective MMS.
Informal markets for electricity: economics of lighting for hawkers in India
Authors: Singh Anoop
Published: December 2009

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the economics of supplying energy needs for illumination requirements by hawkers using alternatives like compact fluorescent lamps battery lamps, liquefied petroleum gas mantle lamps or supply from mini‐grids supported by local diesel generators. Further, the prevailing business models like the lamp rental and the mini‐grid models, which epitomise informal electricity markets, are also analysed.

Design/methodology/approach

Three localities in Kanpur city are identified and data on techno‐economic characteristics of illumination options used by hawkers are collected. To compare the available options with varying capital life‐span, equivalent annual cost approach is utilized. This is used to calculate the levelised cost of 1 kiloWalthour energy used for providing illumination.

Findings

The daily user cost of illumination ranges from Rs 6.1 to 17 (for four hours) across the four existing models studied in the paper. This translates to Rs 31.3 to 312.5 per kWh of electricity use. The technology choice by hawkers is influenced by lack of initial capital and inconvenience associated with cheaper options than overall economics of the alternative option is found.

Practical implications

The paper highlights the absence of financial and institutional intervention that can help significantly reduce the cost of electricity access by such users and also help adoption of greener options like solar lanterns or solar battery bank charging stations. A practical solution may include a greater role of micro‐finance institutions. Greater awareness and capacity building needs of local entrepreneurs as well as of end‐users also need attention.

Originality/value

This is perhaps one of the few attempts to unravel the informal electricity markets in India and help identify issues that need attention so as to address needs of millions of consumers at the margin of the electricity grid in the country.
Improvisation and agile project management: a comparative consideration
Authors: Leybourne Stephen A.
Published: December 2009

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to examine two aspects of the increasing body of research in the field of project management, namely improvisational working and agile project management (APM).

Design/methodology/approach

This is a comparative paper, considering the extant literature on improvisational working within projects and APM. The paper is essentially conceptual, and concludes with a comparative table of constructs, and their segregation into components and outputs. The growth in the recognition of improvisation as a useful addition to the armoury of the project manager stems from the shift that is taking place within the body of project knowledge generally, in that historically the greater proportion of the project management literature has been the epitome of planning in the prescriptive mode, but that a shift has taken place over the last decade or so towards a more behavioural, and as a result of this, a less structured and more improvisational focus. The second area of scrutiny within this paper seeks to position the limited emerging literature on APM within the wider project literature, and to examine overlaps and commonalities with improvisational working within projects.

Findings

Common areas across the two working styles are exposed and documented, and there is analysis of recent attempts to combine them with more traditional models. Linkages with complexity theory and complex adaptive systems are also briefly addressed.

Practical implications

There is growing awareness amongst practitioners of the potential benefits of improvisational working and “agile” methods, and some potential benefits are identified.

Originality/value

This paper moves further from the “traditional” project‐based paradigm of “plan – then execute”, offering insights into potential emerging best practice for practitioners in some organisational contexts.
Systematising knowledge management in projects
Authors: Davidson Paul , Rowe Jillian
Published: December 2009

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to provide a practicable systems‐based approach to knowledge management (KM) in a project environment, to encourage organisations to unlock the value in their review processes. It relies on knowledge capture and storage at decision review points, to enrich individual, team and organisational learning during the project life cycle. The project's phases are typically represented horizontally with deliverables (objectives) or project “promises” as the desirable outcomes. The purpose of this paper is to give expression through introducing a vertical dimension to facilitate the KM process. A model is proposed that conceptualises project‐specific knowledge drawing on and feeding into the organisation's knowledge management system (KMS) at tactical and strategic levels.

Design/methodology/approach

This conceptual paper links concepts from systems theory with KM, to produce a model to identify, collate, and optimise project‐based knowledge and integrate it into the management process.

Findings

The application of the system theory approach enriches the knowledge generated by a project, and feeds it into the next phase of that project. At the same time, it contributes to the individual's and project team's KM, specifies possible courses of action, together with risks, costs and benefits and thus it expands the organisation's higher level KMS.

Research limitations/implications

The concept suggests that the knowledge capture, storage and sharing process may best be undertaken holistically, in view of the systems relationships between the tasks. Systems theory structures this process. Research opportunities include studying the interfaces between levels of KM, in relation to the project's progress.

Practical implications

Reconceptualisation of the project as a knowledge creation process may improve the project's progress as well as add to the individual's, project team's, and wider organisation's knowledge base. An example is given.

Originality/value

This paper illuminates the broader potential of under‐utilised opportunities in well‐known management approaches to add dimension to the business project, of knowledge creation, storage and sharing.
Coaching IT project teams: a design toolkit
Authors: Rezania Davar , Lingham Tony
Published: December 2009

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to provide a detailed explanation of a design toolkit for coaching project teams.

Design/methodology/approach

It is first explained that approach to coaching teams using a measure that captures the real and ideal interactions for the 12 information technology (IT) project teams in this paper.

Findings

Based on the analysis of data from the coaching sessions, characteristics of a design toolkit are proposed for coaching IT project teams.

Research limitations/implications

A more comprehensive picture of team learning that takes into account non‐measurable dimensions of interaction might be of value in the kernel theories. More cases are required to verify the design theory in other contexts.

Practical implications

Project managers and team leaders can benefit form this design toolkit to approach coaching their teams.

Originality/value

This approach complements current models of team coaching.
On productivity in project organizations
Authors: Blomquist Tomas , Wilson Timothy L.
Published: December 2009

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to look at the underlying unit cost considerations in project conduct at the firm level and an established business unit concept is extended to multi‐project organizations. The approach and background are described along with apparent implications.

Design/methodology/approach

The methodology developed by Gold is extended to cover multi‐project organizations. The adaptation of the productivity network is demonstrated using a hypothetical case.

Findings

The focus of the paper is on demonstrating an approach. Generally, productivity in an organization is found not to be dictated by a single input, but by the multiplicative outcome of each together. In particular, the number of projects handled each year appears to be of strategic importance in productivity.

Research limitations/implications

The paper is conceptual, so applicability depends upon the nature of the particular organization to which it is applied. Implications, of course, will depend upon the degree to which actual data match the model.

Practical implications

The approach permits managers to get a handle on productivity in their organizations. It is particularly attractive insofar as it largely depends upon available accounting information for input. This paper seeks to fuel greater interest and debate by practitioners and project management academics about the topic.

Originality/value

Although the paper is conceptual, the authors believe that it may among the first to quantitatively treat productivity in multi‐project organizations. The approach can be used to understand the productivity as well as some elements of effectiveness of multi‐project organizations.
Innovation and attitude
Authors: Brewer Graham , Runeson Goran
Published: December 2009

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to report upon a doctoral thesis within the context of temporary project organisations that was driven by the question: “what really influences decision makers when considering whether or not to adopt an innovation?” This paper describes the philosophy, methodology and findings of the study, and illustrates the usefulness of the findings for application in construction and other project‐driven industries.

Design/methodology/approach

The attitude of decision makers is discernible in their behaviour, which is an observable phenomenon. It has been observed from outside using a Delphi study of “experts”, providing an etic perspective, and reported upon first‐hand through multiple in‐depth interviews with “experienced practitioners”, thereby providing an emic counterpoint. Both perspectives have been further abstracted to develop a synthesised model of the attitudinal profile of information and communication technology (ICT) decision makers in the construction industry.

Findings

The adoption of innovative ICT‐driven business practices by a firm is determined in large part by the attitude of the decision maker, which changes over time, in response to technological push and cultural pull. Moreover, attitudes can be mapped against three exogenous issues: human, business process and technological. At the heart of these lies a domain of endogenous issues that are personal and, therefore, unique to the individual decision maker. All of these issues have an intra‐firm and inter‐organisational dimension, and these vary in response to the context within which they are considered.

Practical implications

Successful use of ICT in a temporary project organisation context requires consideration and accommodation of the attitudes of the various project team members. This may entail preparatory auditing of trading partners using an appropriate diagnostic tool.

Originality/value

The attitude of decision makers has not previously been mapped in relation to ICT innovation adoption. Moreover, it is likely that with innovation‐specific modification the model will be applicable to other innovations deployed in a similar context.
Mechanisms of deviations: observations of projects in practice
Authors: Hällgren Markus
Published: December 2009

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to describe and summarize a PhD thesis that contributes to the understanding of how unexpected events (deviations) are handled. It explores the reality of project manager's attempts to address loosely coupled components of tightly coupled projects from a projects‐as‐practice approach.

Design/methodology/approach

Research reported here is based upon a qualitative data gathering approach adopting an ethnographic research approach, gathering data from 12 weeks of participant observations, 59 interviews and studying supporting documentation with the offices under study. This approach is warranted by the projects‐as‐practice approach which puts emphasis on the situated actions.

Findings

Rather than reducing uncertainty, project management action through coping with deviations to expectations provides mechanisms that thrive on the uncertainty of the situation. Project managers can cope with unexpected deviations to plan in a logical and rigorous way that is currently poorly recognized as an official project management “skill”.

Practical implications

More space for action is created to solve the specific deviation by enhancing the seriousness of the deviation. The longer the project manager is able to emphasize the structures of a deviation, the more time the project manager has to find a suitable solution.

Originality/value

There are two main areas of conclusion that are given attention. First, uncertainty is inherent in projects which can be used when dealing with deviations in projects because while all deviations do not have great consequences, they follow the same basic pattern when managed. Project management in this sense becomes the management of deviations. Second, in terms of the theory of loosely coupled systems, a practice‐based analysis has been largely missing in the project management literature. The study reported upon investigates and explains this inner life of loose coupling mechanisms.
Women leaders as agents of change in higher education organizations
Authors: López Yáñez Julián , Sánchez Moreno Marita
Published: December 2009

Purpose

This paper seeks to point out the relationship between women leadership and their role in the transformation of university organizations, on the basis of eight case studies analysed in the framework of a broader research on women who occupy high‐managerial posts in Spanish universities.

Design/methodology/approach

Two of the eight cases studied are more deeply described and discussed in terms of the relationship among the organizational context in which these women leaders perform their managerial functions, the leadership styles that they deploy, as well as the transformations they promoted in critical moments of the organizations that they head.

Findings

Even though the differences in all these aspects between the two cases studied do not allow a single and homogeneous “feminine style” of management to be identified, a flexible and adaptive common orientation in terms of leadership was found, which leads one to suggest that leadership style is not a relevant issue when managing loosely coupled organizations. Furthermore, some conclusions were established about the ability of these woman managers both to read organizational culture and to drive such changes, preserving social cohesiveness and the workplace climate. To achieve this, they adopted a flexible leadership style on the basis of a wide range of power sources.

Originality/value

The findings support the idea that the loosely coupled structures characteristic of a higher education organization need “soft” ways of power management, oriented more towards informal social networks than formal issues. This allows one to discuss the innovative role that women potentially and actually play in higher education organizations.
Shared identity and strategic choice in dual‐career couples
Authors: Budworth Marie‐Hélène , Enns Janelle R. , Rowbotham Kate
Published: December 2009

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to introduce the concept of a couple‐level shared identity as forming the basis for the development of dual‐career couples' strategies regarding involvement in work and family roles. A model is developed that is intended to help researchers in this area conceptualize the relationship between career choices and career progression between members of a dual career couple. Examining career development at the couple‐level extends one's understanding of how the decisions made by one member of the dyad influence the career of the other.

Design/methodology/approach

In order to develop this model, the theories of cognitive interdependence and gender role ideology are examined and applied to the formation of a shared identity.

Findings

Development of the model, as well as a review of the extant literature, revealed that career decisions in dual career couples are made at the level of the dyad.

Practical implications

The findings demonstrate that organizations cannot view their employees in isolation, but that important transitions such as relocation, and taking on more responsibility are decisions that increasingly are made at the couple level. Employers may need to consider the dyad when offering career advancement opportunities and when implementing work‐life balance programs.

Originality/value

The career progression of one member has implications for the other. Therefore, it is insufficient for an individual to have a career in isolation when the individual is part of a dual career couple. Examination of career at the dyad level will advance one's knowledge of how careers unfold.
Entrepreneurship and SMEs in Ethiopia
Authors: Singh Gurmeet , Belwal Rakesh
Published: December 2009

Purpose

This paper attempts to identify the problem areas and developmental issues attached to women's entrepreneurship related to small medium enterprises (SMEs) particularly in Addis Ababa, the capital city of Ethiopia. It also attempts to devise certain stratagems for ensuring women's entrepreneurial growth and SMEs' advancement in the region.

Design/methodology/approach

The study was conducted in two phases. The first phase attempted to identify the problem areas in terms of nature, needs, desire, motivations and problems of women entrepreneurs in Ethiopia by an extensive review of the existing literature. The second phase incorporated a ground survey and focused interviews with groups of female entrepreneurs for assessing the factors related to entrepreneurship. The data pertaining to these issues were collected using 90 personally administered “schedules” in eight areas in Addis Ababa on the basis of stratified sampling. Basic level statistical analysis was performed using SPSS statistical package.

Findings

The focused interview identified problems in the areas of securing finances for establishing and running SMEs, lack of entrepreneurial and management competence and exposure, problems in finding the markets and distribution networks; limited opportunities for promotion and participation; limited amount of government and institutional support; absence of technological know‐how and integration mechanism; and rampant corruption in an undisguised or disguised form, as major bottlenecks.

Originality/value

The paper is one of the important studies taken in the context of women entrepreneurship in Ethiopia. No such studies have been undertaken in the past that assess the women entrepreneur in the context of overall SME development. Only a few exist but give more importance to microfinance and micro‐enterprises. So the paper is original in context as well as in research terms. Proper attention to the issues raised and recommendations made could give a significant boost to entrepreneurial activities in the region.