title: Combining Capabilities: A Resource Based Model of ICT Advantage

authors: Rastrick, Karyn Christine

subjects: resource based view

abstract: Significant levels of interest and organisational spending on information and communication technologies (ICT's) have triggered debate as to whether these investments are worthwhile.  While there has been some acknowledgement that investments result in positive returns, little is known about how ICT's may lead to competitive advantage.  This thesis starts to inform this gap, by investigating how ICT's are combined with other organisational resources in the context of an exemplar organisation.  The resource based view (RBV) is used as a framework to guide this study.  The RBV is an appropriate lens to guide this research due to its focus on resources and capabilities as sources of advantage.  This research employs an interpretive case study design based in an organisation with a long history of innovation and success with regard to ICT's.  

A grounded integrated model of advantage is presented based on two distinct groupings of integrated capabilities: lifecycle and embedded foundational capabilities.  The integrated model of advantage, along with key actions outlined to support such capabilities, provides researchers and practitioners with a new way of understanding ICT based advantages.  In essence, this research demonstrates how the total ownership of ICT's, within the case studied, presents a potential advantage.  The advantage is realised through the combination of capabilities and the inclusive approach to ICT development employed in the case organisation.  The research finds support from propositions of the RBV, in that the model demonstrates sources of advantage are based on organisational capabilities which are valuable, firm specific, and socially complex.  As such, the integration of capabilities evident in the integrated model of advantage is a likely source of sustained competitive advantage.  This means advantages gained from the integration of capabilities are not easily imitated or competed away.  Furthermore, advantages have an even greater potential to be a source of sustained advantage than any single resource or capability.  The research has important implications for theory and practice.  While many individual sources of advantage have been empirically examined, this research provides one of the first in-depth case studies which identify integrated capabilities.  Understanding such sources of advantage will help practitioners better understand and protect key organisational capabilities to sustain or extend competitive advantages.

text: Combining Capabilities: A Resource Based Model of ICT Advantage Significant levels of interest and organisational spending on information and communication technologies (ICT's) have triggered debate as to whether these investments are worthwhile.  While there has been some acknowledgement that investments result in positive returns, little is known about how ICT's may lead to competitive advantage.  This thesis starts to inform this gap, by investigating how ICT's are combined with other organisational resources in the context of an exemplar organisation.  The resource based view (RBV) is used as a framework to guide this study.  The RBV is an appropriate lens to guide this research due to its focus on resources and capabilities as sources of advantage.  This research employs an interpretive case study design based in an organisation with a long history of innovation and success with regard to ICT's.  

A grounded integrated model of advantage is presented based on two distinct groupings of integrated capabilities: lifecycle and embedded foundational capabilities.  The integrated model of advantage, along with key actions outlined to support such capabilities, provides researchers and practitioners with a new way of understanding ICT based advantages.  In essence, this research demonstrates how the total ownership of ICT's, within the case studied, presents a potential advantage.  The advantage is realised through the combination of capabilities and the inclusive approach to ICT development employed in the case organisation.  The research finds support from propositions of the RBV, in that the model demonstrates sources of advantage are based on organisational capabilities which are valuable, firm specific, and socially complex.  As such, the integration of capabilities evident in the integrated model of advantage is a likely source of sustained competitive advantage.  This means advantages gained from the integration of capabilities are not easily imitated or competed away.  Furthermore, advantages have an even greater potential to be a source of sustained advantage than any single resource or capability.  The research has important implications for theory and practice.  While many individual sources of advantage have been empirically examined, this research provides one of the first in-depth case studies which identify integrated capabilities.  Understanding such sources of advantage will help practitioners better understand and protect key organisational capabilities to sustain or extend competitive advantages.

year: 2008

title: Higher-order one-many problems in Plato’s Philebus and recent Australian metaphysics

authors: Gibbons, Stephanie

subjects: Philebus

abstract: We discuss the one-many problem as it appears in the Philebus and find that it is not restricted to the usually understood problem about the identity of universals across particulars that instantiate them (the Hylomorphic Dispersal Problem). In fact some of the most interesting aspects of the problem occur purely with respect to the relationship between Forms. We argue that contemporary metaphysicians may draw from the Philebus at least three different one-many relationships between universals themselves: instantiation, subkind and part, and thereby construct three new ‘problems of the one and the many’ (an Eidetic Dispersal Problem, a Genus-Species Problem, and an Eidetic Combination Problem), which are as problematic as the version generally discussed. We then argue that this taxonomy sheds new and interesting light on certain discussions of higher-order universals in recent Australian analytic philosophy.

text: Higher-order one-many problems in Plato’s Philebus and recent Australian metaphysics We discuss the one-many problem as it appears in the Philebus and find that it is not restricted to the usually understood problem about the identity of universals across particulars that instantiate them (the Hylomorphic Dispersal Problem). In fact some of the most interesting aspects of the problem occur purely with respect to the relationship between Forms. We argue that contemporary metaphysicians may draw from the Philebus at least three different one-many relationships between universals themselves: instantiation, subkind and part, and thereby construct three new ‘problems of the one and the many’ (an Eidetic Dispersal Problem, a Genus-Species Problem, and an Eidetic Combination Problem), which are as problematic as the version generally discussed. We then argue that this taxonomy sheds new and interesting light on certain discussions of higher-order universals in recent Australian analytic philosophy.

year: 2013

title: Māori education as justice and reckoning

authors: Hemi, Keakaokawai Varner

abstract: Hypothetical musings on what constitutes justice have been taking place at least since the ancient Greek philosopher Plato recorded the above debate between Socrates and Cephalus in Republic circa 380 BCE. Modem philosophical notions of justice have also often been heady stuff relying on heuristic "device[ s] of representation"², "thick and thin"³ theories and other abstract conceptions to untangle real-world inequalities. In comparison, current questions of access to justice are earthy, grunty and real. Increasingly vociferous access to justice claims cite the actual injustice-laden histories of particular groups, speak in terms of harm already inflicted and call for reparative, restorative or healing justice. Indigenous peoples, African-Americans and other disenfranchised, excluded and oppressed groups quote dates, casualty numbers and the legislative section or treaty responsible. For many indigenous people, any single incident is always just one among many in the collective memory; there are always more dates, cases,⁴ facts and figures in the "litany of injustices"⁵ which evidence denial of justice. Gritty statistics in one area of well-being flow into another and over generations. This is justice in the trenches, a place where numbers and statistics are what they are.

text: Māori education as justice and reckoning Hypothetical musings on what constitutes justice have been taking place at least since the ancient Greek philosopher Plato recorded the above debate between Socrates and Cephalus in Republic circa 380 BCE. Modem philosophical notions of justice have also often been heady stuff relying on heuristic "device[ s] of representation"², "thick and thin"³ theories and other abstract conceptions to untangle real-world inequalities. In comparison, current questions of access to justice are earthy, grunty and real. Increasingly vociferous access to justice claims cite the actual injustice-laden histories of particular groups, speak in terms of harm already inflicted and call for reparative, restorative or healing justice. Indigenous peoples, African-Americans and other disenfranchised, excluded and oppressed groups quote dates, casualty numbers and the legislative section or treaty responsible. For many indigenous people, any single incident is always just one among many in the collective memory; there are always more dates, cases,⁴ facts and figures in the "litany of injustices"⁵ which evidence denial of justice. Gritty statistics in one area of well-being flow into another and over generations. This is justice in the trenches, a place where numbers and statistics are what they are.

year: 2017