3,166 research outputs found

    Strengthening Social Ties via ICT in the Organization

    Get PDF
    Knowledge work increasingly relies on the \ utilization of information and communication \ technology (ICT). However, communication and \ knowledge sharing via ICT may be challenging due \ the lack of physical face-to-face interaction. The \ strength of social ties is critical to the success of an \ organization, since it determines how deeply \ individuals interact with each other. Prior research \ has paid only limited attention to the role of ICT in \ the strengthening of social ties within an \ organization. To address this research gap, we have \ conducted a qualitative study outlining different tie \ strengthening characteristics of ICT. The results of \ this study suggest that especially asynchronous and \ synchronous text based interaction and \ communication history forms an effective mechanism \ for an organization to facilitate social ties. As a \ theoretical contribution, we develop a new \ theoretical model representing the intra- \ organizational characteristics of ICT in relation to \ media synchronicity and tie strength. This theoretical \ model also includes new tie-strength components for \ ICT-mediated interaction

    Smart device interactivity’s impact on value co-creation in the sport industry

    Get PDF
    Resumen: El propósito de este estudio es investigar el impacto que tienen los dispositivos inteligentes en la interactividad del cliente y la co-creación de productos valiosos en la industria deportiva a través de la implementación del capital social y la eficacia colectiva. Una muestra de 262 estudiantes participaron en este estudio, y un modelo de ecuaciones estructurales (SEM por sus siglas en inglés) fue calculado para medir la relación entre las variables en el modelo conceptual. Los resultados revelaron que la interactividad que consiste de control del usuario, sensibilidad, y sincronización tiene un impacto significativo en el capital social. Además, ambas la interactividad tecnológica y el capital social son asociados positivamente con la eficacia colectiva. Finalmente, la eficacia colectiva tiene una influencia positiva en la co-creación de productos de valiosos, pero el capital social no aparenta afectar directamente la co-creacioón de productos de valor. Basado en estos resultados, este estudio sugiere la necesidad de aprovechar las nuevas plataformas que apoyen la co-creación de productos valiosos con los clientes en un ambiente de mercadeo constantemente cambiante. Abstract: The purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of smart device's interactivity on customer value co-creation in the sports industry through bridging social capital and collective efficacy. A sample of 262 students participated in the study, and a structural equation modeling (SEM) was carried out to measures the relationship between variables in the conceptual model. The results revealed that interactivity consisting of user control, responsiveness, and synchronicity had a significant impact on bridging social capital. In addition, both technological interactivity and bridging social capital were positively associated with collective efficacy. Lastly, collective efficacy had a positive influence on co-creation value, but bridging social capital did not appear to directly affect co-creation value. Based on these results, this study suggests the need to take advantage of new platforms that can build value co-creation with customers in the rapidly changing marketing environment

    Bridging the gap between communities at risk of flooding and flood risk communication agencies : developing effective flood risk communication strategies

    Get PDF
    form of governance which is built through a multi-layered web of horizontally and vertically aligned stakeholders and has been termed as Sustainable Flood Risk Management (SFRM) in Scotland. SFRM in Scotland aims to promote community empowerment to build resilience against flooding, including through flood risk communication. Flood risk communication involves raising awareness of flood risk among communities and issuing flood warnings to them when needed. Although flood risk communication between agencies of the government and communities living in the areas identified to be at risk of flooding has long been a subject of policies and legislation, literature on flood risk communication indicates that a substantial gap in perspectives on flood risk remains between these social actors. Similarly, although media hold a central position in flood risk communication as conveyers of messages, literature indicates that the role of media has not been appraised satisfactorily so that it can inform media selection for flood risk communication. This thesis presents research which was aimed at addressing both these needs. Accordingly, the aim of this thesis was to identify gaps in flood risk perspectives between ‘communicating agencies’ and ‘communities at risk of flooding’, and to evaluate the suitability of various media types for flood risk communication. Correspondingly, the objectives of the research were: i)to understand community knowledge, expectations, and media usage and preferences related to flood risk communication; ii) to review communication objectives and efforts of the responsible agencies; iii) to identify differences between community knowledge, expectations, media usage and preferences, and the communication efforts of the responsible agencies; iv) to appraise the role of Habermas’s Theory of Communicative Action and Media Synchronicity Theory in supporting the development of flood risk communication strategies; and iv) to consider the implications of the findings for developing effective flood risk communication strategies by the relevant agencies and make appropriate recommendations. The research entailed investigations into flood risk perspectives of the communities living in areas identified to be at risk of flooding (termed as ‘emic’ perspective) and that of the agencies responsible for flood risk communication (termed as ‘etic’ perspective) in order to generate shared understanding on flood risk, especially on community knowledge, expectations, media usage and preferences, and the communication efforts of the responsible agencies. Habermas’s Theory of Communicative Action and Media Synchronicity Theory proposed by Dennis et al. were selected for investigating their applicability in supporting development of flood risk communication strategies and formulating policy recommendations. The research adopted an inductive research stance, with interpretivism as the epistemological paradigmatic position and constructionism as the ontological paradigmatic position. Data relating to the perspectives, experiences and communication needs of members of the communities living in areas identified to be at risk of flooding were collected through postal surveys, one-to-one interviews and focus groups in three locations in Scotland: Edinburgh, Stirling and Callander. The research also carried out interviews with representatives of government agencies which were endowed with statutory responsibilities for flood risk communication with the communities, including the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA), The City of Edinburgh Council, Stirling Council, Central Scotland Police, Lothian and Borders Police and Central Scotland Fire & Rescue Services. The research found substantial gaps in terms of knowledge, levels of preparedness, understanding of responsibilities and sources of information in the field of flood risk communication in Scotland at the levels of legislation, policy and practice; and these contrasted sharply with the societal goal of SFRM. Furthermore, the expectations of the communities on flood risk communication differed significantly from the understandings of the communicating agencies. The research also found serious gaps in terms of media use and preferences between communicating agencies and the concerned communities at risk of flooding. These gaps in communication appeared to have contributed to loss of trust and credibility of the agencies amongst the communities. The research also found that practicing ‘communicative action’ proposed by the Habermas’s Theory of Communicative Action, which entails stakeholder engagement to reach agreements on issues of concern, contributes to development of understanding and generation of strategies which are oriented towards reducing gaps between agencies and the communities at risk of flooding. However, it was found that none of the agencies practiced ‘communicative action’. It was also found that Habermas’s Theory of Communicative Action has limited applicability for addressing flood risk communication, principally pertaining to its inability to fulfil the subtask of flood warning. Other limitation of the theory relates to inability of the theory to account for the need for ‘audience segmenting’ for flood warning to ensure reach to all members of the communities who may belong to different segments, such as, based on age, language and disabilities. The principal limitation of this theory, which is related to the subtask of flood warning, was found to be similar to the limitation of the Media Synchronicity Theory. It was found that Media Synchronicity Theory, in its current form, has only partial or limited applicability in informing media selection for flood risk communication, especially flood warning. It was also found that it relies only on capability of media and fails to account for the factors influencing media preference and choice of institutions and communities. Based on the findings of the research, the thesis makes many recommendations to the agencies and Scottish Government for changes in flood risk communication policies and strategies, specifically aimed at improving flood risk communication in Scotland. Among these are an amendment to The Flood Risk Management (Scotland) Act 2009 to include a requirement to hold dialogue with communities, to review and monitor communication activities of the agencies and empower agencies by capacity building. Other policy recommendations relate to development of agency-specific flood risk communication strategies, building up of trust, emphasis on raising awareness, and most importantly, tailoring of messages for media and audience and usage of the most appropriate media

    Computer-Mediated Communication and Innovation: Do Communication Media Properties Influence Innovative Thinking Processes?

    Get PDF
    This paper concerns potential impacts that characteristics of communication media in computer-mediated problem solving in groups have on group-members’ innovative thinking. Different processes involved in effective idea generation and problem solving are presented, and we discuss how three characteristics of communication media relevant for group collaboration aiming at producing innovative ideas might influence the group process. A research model is presented, and hypotheses regarding the effects of affordances on innovative thinking are put forth. We finally describe a possible methodological approach that might be applied in order to test the proposed hypotheses

    Rethinking Media Synchronicity Theory: Examining the Cooperative Assumption

    Get PDF
    Much of information systems (IS) literature assumes team members have completely aligned goals. In practice, people interpret goals to suit personal agendas, even when they are collaborating. This motivates our examination of the cooperative assumption in Media Synchronicity Theory (MST)-”a leading IS theory of communication performance. We assess the boundaries of MST by relaxing the assumption of cooperation. Our results support MST for explaining communication and task performance in a cooperative context. However, MST was insufficient to capture how media capabilities influence performance in a non-cooperative context. Our study shows that relaxing the assumption of cooperation changes MST in profound ways-”altering which media capabilities are central to the model and the very processes that underlie communication

    Managerial interventions in multicultural virtual teams: A review and synthesis of the literature

    Get PDF
    Teams distributed across cultural, geographic and temporal boundaries, also known as multi-cultural virtual teams (MVTs), have been prevalent in international organizations. To provide guidance for MVT managers and support accumulation of prior experience, we establish a management model based on the extended adaptive structuration theory (EAST) and verify the model with 55 empirical studies from leading publications in related fields. The findings contribute a comprehensive set of empirically verified managerial intervention in MVTs and suggest that managers can improve MVT outcomes through manipulating five sets of struc-tural characteristics (i.e., organization, team, individual, technology and task) before and dur-ing the task process. Based on the findings, we generate a holistic view of managerial inter-vention, which explains the mechanisms of managerial intervention in MVTs

    Enterprise Social Media Impact on Human Resource Practices

    Get PDF
    Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to investigate how individual attitudes towards using enterprise social media (ESM) impacts trust, explicit and tacit knowledge sharing as well as work performance in emerging economies. Design/methodology/approach: The authors use data from a survey of 293 employed individuals in Lagos, Nigeria that work at organizations that have ESM systems. Findings: The authors find enterprise social media usage are significantly associated with trust. However, ESM use does not impact explicit or tactic knowledge transfer. Practical implications: The paper provides empirical evidence that individuals who perceive high levels of performance expectancy will engage in ESM usage which in turn increases trust amongst colleagues. Human resource managers can argue that by adopting ESM, they can facilitate improved trust and collaboration through online engagement amongst employees. This is important for multinational organizations wanting to expand into emerging economies where the organization and local workforce need to foster trust in knowledge sharing. Originality/value: There has been little evidence regarding HRM use of ESM in emerging economies. By understanding individual attitudes towards ESM and how the use impacts knowledge sharing, the academic discussions concerning use of technology to enhance knowledge sharing can continue to evolve

    A Multi-Level View of the Antecedents and Consequences of Trust in Virtual Leaders

    Get PDF
    Although trust is widely acknowledged as critical to virtual teams, little is known regarding the causes and consequences of trust in leaders of virtual teams. This paper examines the antecedents and consequences of trust in virtual team leaders. Using survey and archival data from a massively multiplayer online game (MMOG), this study’s findings show that trust in the leader is affected by team members’ use of synchronous communication and breadth of communication with leaders as well as team members’ distance from each other. Furthermore, reasoning that team size and culture create a shared context qualifying team members’ experiences, we found that team size and collectivistic values diminished the benefits of synchronous communication and breadth of communication, respectively. The findings also revealed that trust in leaders had a positive relationship to team performance. Detailed discussion of the findings is provided in the conclusion of the paper

    Synchronous communication technologies for language learning: Promise and challenges in research and pedagogy

    Get PDF
    We propose a definition of synchronous communication based on joint attention, noting that in certain mediated communication settings joint attention is a matter of perception rather than determinable fact. The most salient properties of synchronous computer-mediated communication (SCMC) are real-time pressure to communicate and a greater degree of social presence relative to asynchronous communication. These properties underlie the benefits and challenges of SCMC for language learning, which we discuss under three headings: (1) SCMC as learning tool; (2) SCMC as target competence; and (3) SCMC as setting for learner dialogue, intracultural and intercultural. We survey research themes in SCMC and preview the contributions of the Special Issue. Finally, we identify questions for future research

    Examining the Effect of Social Media Tools on Virtual Team Conflicts: A Process Model

    Get PDF
    This research investigates how the use of social media tools affects virtual team conflicts. The novel concept of “feature richness”, which is understood as affordances of social media tools, is theorized. Feature richness distinguishes social media tools from other commonly used communication tools in virtual teams. The researchers propose a process model which suggests that operationally, feature richness is understood as the process nature of social media tools. The primary data was collected at corporate organizations in form of a Likert questionnaire. The research findings reveal that social media tools lead to effective communication, which encourages the development of trust, team cohesion and satisfaction in virtual teams. This further reflects in form of reduced virtual team conflicts
    corecore