bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Illusion or delusion – Lean management in the health sector
Authors: McIntosh Bryan , Sheppy Bruce , Cohen Ivan 
Published: July 2014

Purpose– There has been considerable interest in the implementation of practices imported from manufacturing into healthcare as a solution to rising healthcare spending and disappointing patient safety indicators. One approach that has attracted particular interest is Lean management and the purpose of this paper is to engage with this topic.Design/methodology/approach– Secondary research.Findings– Despite widespread enthusiasm about the potential of Lean management processes, evidence about its contribution to higher organisational performance remains inconsistent.Research limitations/implications– This paper engages with the major Lean concepts of operations management and human resource management, including just-in-time, total quality management, total productive maintenance and does not engage in-depth with concepts related to employee empowerment, and training.Practical implications– This paper contributes to the organisational management literature in healthcare by showing that although Lean management seems to have the potential to improve organisational performance it is far from a panacea against under performing hospitals.Social implications– It informs policy making by suggesting that a progressive managerial philosophy has a stronger impact on healthcare performance than the adoption of practices from any particular managerial approach.Originality/value– This paper provides a critical evaluation of the impact of Lean practices in informing healthcare policy. The paper contributes to the organisational management literature in healthcare by showing that even though Lean management in healthcare appears to have the potential to improve organisational performance; there remain problems with its application.
Essentials of total quality management: a meta-analysis
Authors: Mohammad Mosadeghrad Ali 
Published: July 2014

Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to identify critical successful factors for Total Quality Management (TQM) implementation.Design/methodology/approach– A literature review was conducted to explore the critical successful factors for TQM implementation between 1980 and 2010.Findings– A successful TQM implementation need sufficient education and training, supportive leadership, consistent support of top management, customer focus, employee involvement, process management and continuous improvement of processes.Research limitations/implications– The review was limited to articles written in English language during the past 30 years.Practical implications– From a practical point of view, the findings of this paper provide managers with a practical understanding of the factors that are likely to facilitate TQM implementation in organisations.Originality/value– Understanding the factors that are likely to promote TQM implementation would enable managers to develop more effective strategies that will enhance the chances of achieving business excellence.
Exploring barriers in lean implementation
Authors: R. Jadhav Jagdish , S. Mantha Shankar , B. Rane Santosh 
Published: July 2014

Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to present an analysis of research on lean focusing on barriers in its implementation through a systematic literature survey.Design/methodology/approach– A literature survey of peer-reviewed journal articles, survey reports, master theses, doctoral theses and paradigmatic books with managerial impact is used as the research methodology.Findings– The findings derived from the evaluation of the publications analyzed have led to the identification of 24 lean barriers. The success of lean implementation will not be entirely based on application of appropriate tools and techniques alone but also on the top managements' involvement and leadership, workers' attitude, resources and the organizational culture.Research limitations/implications– This literature survey is primarily focused on lean implementation in the manufacturing sector.Practical implications– This paper explores barriers for successful lean implementation and provides a concise description of the barriers that will be helpful for further studies in the domain of lean manufacturing.Social implications– Government of many countries around the world is encouraging and helping small- and medium-scale industries to understand and implement lean systems by preparing accessible database of lean consultants, providing financial assistance for training by professionals and establishing professional associations. However, many industries experienced failure in lean implementation. This research work provides a launching pad to develop a strategy to tackle barriers for successful lean implementation.Originality/value– This paper puts forward the key barriers that should be tackled for successful lean implementation. It might represent new opportunities for rigorous and relevant research that would contribute to more translucent knowledge of lean being gained.
Employability of higher education graduates in Europe
Authors: Pavlin Samo , Svetlik Ivan 
Published: July 2014

Purpose
– The purpose of this paper is to introduce the special issue on “Employability of higher education graduates in europe” from the perspective of global changes.

Design/methodology/approach
– The empirically based papers of the special issue address six main areas related to the transition of graduates from education to the labour market: employment and employability, job (mis)match, development of particular areas of competency, new certificates of higher education, along with the disciplinarity and status of the self-perceived role of academics in supporting graduates’ careers.

Findings
– This issue provides empirical findings relevant to various stakeholders of higher education systems which are essential for strategic development in the area.

Originality/value
– The selection of papers proposes an interdisciplinary scientific approach in the areas of bridging (higher) education with the labour market.
Employability of young graduates in Europe
Authors: Laetitia Garrouste Christelle , Rodrigues Margarida 
Published: July 2014

Purpose
– The purpose of this paper is to measure the potential role of the field of education and the fact of having worked during studies on the employability of the higher educated (ISCED 5-6) cohort targeted by the ET2020 graduates’ employability benchmark.

Design/methodology/approach
– Using the same data source as the benchmark (i.e. the annual LFS microdata from 2004 to 2010), and exploring the additional transition questions collected in the LFS 2009 ad hoc module, the authors define and test four hypotheses using a probit approach on each EU country.

Findings
– The degree plays a significant role in the employability of young graduates across countries and time. In terms of probability of employment, the leading field is health and welfare. In terms of type of contracts, the leading fields are social sciences and engineering. Moreover, what labour markets seem to value the most is the capacity of higher educated students to combine high-level studies and work, i.e. a high workload capacity and intellectual flexibility.

Practical implications
– Reaching the new European target of a minimum of 82 per cent of employment of young graduates will require countries to invest wisely in the most “employable” fields of education. This analysis will help policy makers in their future orientations towards that target.

Originality/value
– The originality of this work lies in its exploration of the exact same extraction of microdata used for the computation of the ET2020 Benchmark indictor and in its immediate political implications for the monitoring of this benchmark.
Association between performance measurement systems and organisational effectiveness
Authors: Upadhaya Bedanand , Munir Rahat , Blount Yvette 
Published: July 2014

Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to investigate the role of performance measurement systems in organisational effectiveness in the context of the financial services sector within a developing country.Design/methodology/approach– Using the mail survey method data were collected from 69 financial institutions operating in Nepal. Multivariate analysis, in particular multiple regression analysis was employed to test the hypotheses.Findings– The results suggest that non-financial measures and feedback are tightly intertwined with organisational effectiveness. While institutions are focused on using the performance measures concerning internal business process perspective, less emphasis is placed on using customer and employee-related performance measures because they are considered less significant to organisational effectiveness. The findings also reveal that strategy-related feedback is considered more critical by management, as opposed to performance and staff. The study also provides evidence that 40.58 per cent of the financial institutions in Nepal had implemented the Balanced Scorecard, which is considered to be high when compared with other developing countries.Practical implications– The findings provide managers with valuable insights pertaining to the role of non-financial performance measures and the importance of feedback in improving organisational effectiveness, which could assist them in (re) aligning their performance measurement practices.Originality/value– The findings of this study contributes to the limited management accounting literature on performance measurement and the impact on organisational effectiveness by providing evidence from the financial services sector within the context of a developing country.
Fighting the fire: improvisational behavior during the production launch of new products
Authors: Gross Uwe 
Published: July 2014

Purpose– Short-term problem solving during production launch may result in extended lead times and increased overall costs of new product development, thereby reducing the overall profitability of a new product. While the previous literature suggests formalized procedures and systematic problem solving approaches, empirical analyses indicate improvised, non-systematic, and ad hoc responses actually being used in firms’ real world problem solving processes. The purpose of this paper is to explain the role of such non-systematic approaches for the efficiency and effectiveness of problem solving processes during production launch.Design/methodology/approach– The paper empirically explores the impact of improvisational problem-solving behavior on a firm's production launch efficiency and on the success of new products. Moreover, the paper investigates the moderating role of technology familiarity, project complexity, and the number of occurring problems during production launch.Findings– The paper finds evidence for a positive curvilinear effect of improvisational problem-solving behavior on new product success and production launch efficiency. Additionally, the paper finds that improvisation is especially reasonable in complex and familiar projects or in the case of many unplanned changes during production launch.Research limitations/implications– The study provides evidence for the relevance of routinized and improvisational behavior during production launch.Practical implications– Improvisational behavior decreases the performance of the production launch and the financial performance of a new product in the case of frequent product changes or complex projects.Originality/value– For the first time behavioral theory is applied to the phenomenon of production launch and problem solving.
Three conceptualizations of hybrid management in hospitals
Authors: Byrkjeflot Haldor , Kragh Jespersen Peter 
Published: July 2014

Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to bring the discussion on the relationship between management and medicine a step forward by focussing on: first, how the notion of hybrid and hybridity has been used in the literature on healthcare management. Second, the authors have mapped the alternative ways that the concept have been used in order to conceptualize a more specific set of possible combinations of managerial and professional roles in healthcare management. Hybrid management is a topic that ought to be important for training, communication among researchers and for identifying areas of future research: in management, in healthcare reforms, in sociology of professions and in theory of organizations.Design/methodology/approach– The authors provide a systematic literature review in order to map the various conceptualizations of hybrid management. The authors have searched for “hybrid leadership,” “hybrid management” combined with hospitals and health care in a whole range of journals, identified in Google scholar, Academic Search Premier, Academic Research Library and Sage Publication. The authors have also used already existing literature reviews. The search has resulted in more than 60 articles and book titles that have been classified according to whether they make a fit with three alternative ways of conceptualizing hybrid management. The authors are aware that they might have missed some relevant literature but the literature included is quite comprehensive.Findings– In the literature the authors have found three conceptualizations of management. The clinical manager who combines professional self-governance with a general management logic. The commercialized manager who combines professional self-governance with an enterprise logic. The neo-bureaucratic manager who combines self-governance with a neo-bureaucratic logic.Originality/value– In most analyses of hybridity in management and organization the notion of hybrid has been used in a rather superficial way. By mapping the various uses of hybrid in the literature and suggest how a professional logic may be combined with a set of alternative logics of management the authors provide a platform for developing the concept of hybrid management into a more useful tool for analyses of changes in healthcare management.
Organizational form and efficiency of franchise chains
Authors: Piot-Lepetit Isabelle , Perrigot Rozenn , Cliquet Gérard 
Published: July 2014

Purpose
– The purpose of this paper is to develop a new model allowing the implementation of a benchmarking process that jointly measure the efficiency of franchise chains and determine their optimal organizational form.

Design/methodology/approach
– The methodology is based on a non-econometric technique developed by management scientists on economic concepts for evaluating the performance of decision-making units and implementing a benchmarking process. An extended model is developed in the paper for evaluating the efficiency and determining the optimal percentage of company-owned outlets (PCO) of each franchise chain.

Findings
– First, results showed that the PCO has a positive impact on franchise chain efficiency; even if other chain characteristics have a larger impact. Second, the optimization of the PCO allows for additional improvements in efficiency.

Research limitations/implications
– Even though this study has some limitations (e.g. sample and variable selection), it contributes to the literature on franchising by providing an approach allowing us to answer to the question of Shane (1998) on the optimal proportion of franchised units given other firm characteristics.

Practical implications
– By developing a model that allows for the joint evaluation of franchise chain efficiency and optimal PCO, this study offers to franchisors a new benchmarking process allowing for both a competitive and functional benchmarking.

Originality/value
– The originality of this research can be found in the new model developed for allowing a benchmarking of franchise chains that allows an evaluation of efficiency jointly with a determination of their optimal organizational form.
Exploring the urban consumer's perception of local food
Authors: Penney Ursula , Prior Caroline 
Published: July 2014

Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to explore the perception and attitudes of urban consumers in the UK towards local food.Design/methodology/approach– Four focus groups were conducted with participants from Birmingham, UK. A pre-focus group questionnaire was issued to participants to gather demographic data and to provide participants with the “Making Local Food Work” definition of local food. Following on from the focus groups, participants were e-mailed to enquire whether they had any additional comments to provide.Findings– The results of the study revealed that despite urban consumer interest in local food, this did not necessarily translate in to purchase behaviour. Convenience of the “one-stop” offered by supermarkets along with availability, price and food labelling were found to be key barriers to the purchase of local food. Alternatively, key drivers were identified as freshness, health benefits and improved quality.Research limitations/implications– The findings are limited with respect to the lack of male participants and younger consumers (pre 45 years old) within the sample whose perceptions of local food may differ from those studied.Practical implications– Findings support the need for supermarkets to increase their offering of local food for the urban consumer. In addition, supermarkets should improve merchandising, signposting and labelling of local food to encourage increased levels of purchase behaviour from the urban consumer.Originality/value– The paper explores the somewhat “disconnected” urban consumers’ perceptions and attitudes towards local food. On the whole, previous studies of local food have not specifically explored this particular group of consumers.
ICTs and maternal healthcare utilization. Evidence from Ghana
Authors: Abekah-Nkrumah Gordon , Guerriero Marta , Purohit Purnima 
Published: July 2014

Purpose
– Traditionally, the role of technology on health services has been argued from the supply side. The purpose of this paper is to use a demand side perspective to examine the effect of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) on the use of maternal health services in Ghana.

Design/methodology/approach
– Study used data from the 2008 Ghana Demographic and Health Surveys and binary response regression models to examine the effect of women's access to ICTs on maternal healthcare utilization in Ghana. Three variables on maternal healthcare utilization were employed: use of contraception, antenatal care and place of delivery.

Findings
– Results from the study show that the effect of the use of technology is both positive and significant. In particular, among the other ICTs (i.e. landline phone, listening to radio, watch television, color television in household, computer in household), the coefficients of mobile phone ownership tends to be consistently significant across all four reproductive health services. Therefore, ICTs have a good capacity to influence women's demand of health information. This needs to be taken into account when designing maternal health policies and interventions.

Originality/value
– This is one of the few papers examining the effect of ICTs on utilization of maternal health services from the demand side compared to the popular supply side argument often found in the literature.
Internationalisation patterns of border firms: speed and embeddedness perspectives
Authors: J.B. Jørgensen Eva 
Published: July 2014

Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to provide new insight concerning a relatively understudied phenomenon in the medium sized enterprise (SME) internationalisation and international entrepreneurship literature; the internationalisation of firms crossing the border to only one adjacent foreign country. These firms are called border firms. This study explores the variety of internationalisation patterns of border firms.Design/methodology/approach– The study is based on theoretical perspectives related to speed of internationalisation and country embeddedness, and uses empirical data from seven Norwegian case companies operating across the border between Norway and Russia.Findings– Three different internationalisation patterns of border firms are empirically identified and described; an early single-country path, a born-again border path and a born border path. Then, a model of the distinctive cross-border pathway is developed.Research limitations/implications– Several limitations of this study have implications for further research, such as sample size and setting, the new perspective on country embeddedness and questions related to generalisation of the findings.Practical implications– The study has implications for both entrepreneurs and policy-makers. It demonstrates that internationalisation is not always about “going global” and is sometimes simply a matter of “hopping” across the nearest border. The model demonstrates different possible patterns for how to achieve or support this in practice.Originality/value– This study contributes to theory-building in the field of SME internationalisation and international entrepreneurship in three ways. First, it identifies and defines an interesting but neglected type of international venture; border firms. Second, it explores the different start-up patterns of these firms, their speed and embeddedness. Third, it offers a theoretical framework of the distinct cross-border pathway of internationalisation.
The ethics of “smart” advertising and regulatory initiatives in the consumer intelligence industry
Authors: L. Finn Rachel , Wadhwa Kush 
Published: July 2014

Purpose
– This paper aims to study the ethics of “smart” advertising and regulatory initiatives in the consumer intelligence industry. Increasingly, online behavioural advertising strategies, especially in the mobile media environment, are being integrated with other existing and emerging technologies to create new techniques based on “smart” surveillance practices. These “smart” surveillance practices have ethical impacts including identifiability, inequality, a chilling effect, the objectification, exploitation and manipulation of consumers as well as information asymmetries. This article examines three regulatory initiatives – privacy-by-design considerations, the proposed General Data Protection Regulation of the EU and the US Do-Not-Track Online Act of 2013 – that have sought to address the privacy and data protection issues associated with these practices.

Design/methodology/approach
– The authors performed a critical literature review of academic, grey and journalistic publications surrounding behavioural advertising to identify the capabilities of existing and emerging advertising practices and their potential ethical impacts. This information was used to explore how well-proposed regulatory mechanisms might address current and emerging ethical and privacy issues in the emerging mobile media environment.

Findings
– The article concludes that all three regulatory initiatives fall short of providing adequate consumer and citizen protection in relation to online behavioural advertising as well as “smart” advertising.

Originality/value
– The article demonstrates that existing and proposed regulatory initiatives need to be amended to provide adequate citizen protection and describes how a focus on privacy and data protection does not address all of the ethical issues raised.