SPARC 2017 retrospect & prospects : Salford postgraduate annual research conference book of abstracts

Welcome to the Book of Abstracts for the 2017 SPARC conference. This year we not only celebrate the work of our PGRs but also the 50th anniversary of Salford as a University, which makes this year’s conference extra special. Once again we have received a tremendous contribution from our postgraduate research community; with over 130 presenters, the conference truly showcases a vibrant PGR community at Salford. These abstracts provide a taster of the research strengths of their works, and provide delegates with a reference point for networking and initiating critical debate. With such wide-ranging topics being showcased, we encourage you to exploit this great opportunity to engage with researchers working in different subject areas to your own. To meet global challenges, high impact research inevitably requires interdisciplinary collaboration. This is recognised by all major research funders. Therefore engaging with the work of others and forging collaborations across subject areas is an essential skill for the next generation of researchers

Strategic implications of e-business in the construction industry

Electronic Business (e-Business) is recognised as being able to help organisations in the construction industry to achieve competitiveness and substantial benefits. However, the uptake of e-business in the construction industry has been relatively limited and ineffective. Previous research covers the body of knowledge about how to identify the value of e-business once it has been created or how to identify the capabilities that can create value. There is no guidance available to help organisations to maximise their leverage by investing intelligently and matching the size of their demand for e-business solutions to the size of the market they plan to supply. This research aims to identify the strategic e-business needs and requirements of organisations in the construction industry; it helps them to scan or position their current situation, and provide a holistic approach to assist them in developing an executable e-business strategy. In order to achieve the aim and the formulated objectives, a multi-methodological research design and a pragmatic mixed-methods approach, involving a combination of both quantitative and qualitative datasets, were adopted to investigate the e-business practices of organisations in the industry. These include an exploratory investigation (an industry survey with 250 industry organisations), and an explanatory investigation (four case studies with specific industry end-user companies). The collected data was analysed and problems were identified; the elements for a holistic approach to manage e-business implementation emerged. Subsequently, a Strategic e-Business Framework was developed to provide a holistic approach for organisations in the construction industry to plan, execute and review their e-business strategies. The Framework enables organisations to consider the medium term (three to five years), long-term (over five to ten years), and emergent needs to derive business value. The key features of the Framework include six phases and phase gates, five functional factors, and 23 activities. The six phases include Analyse Situation, Establish Vision, Define Critical Success Factors (CSFs), Develop Action Plan, Implement Action Plan, and Review Strategy. The phases were defined to guide the IT leaders in carrying out consistent e-business planning. The outputs of each phase (phase gates) were defined to assist IT leaders in the review of procedures during their e-business implementation. The functional factors include management, people, process, technology and external environment. The factors were identified to address every facet of an organisation, and obtain collaboration efforts from both internal and external. They also ensure organisations have the opportunities to improve capabilities in these areas, and make them ready for immediate e-business implementation. Five groups of people or teams were assigned to the activities. The five groups were the Senior Management Board, IT Managers and their teams, Middle Level Management, Lower Level Management and other End-users, and external collaborators. The activities were categorised in order to provide a basis for organisations to utilise their resources, specifically human resource. Finally, a feedback loop was defined to enable the Framework to act as a cycle for going through repeatedly, which makes the continuous improvement of e-business implementation possible within organisations and provides a learning and feedback function that ensures lessons to be learned from past e-business implementation. The evaluation of the Framework was conducted via six structured interviews with industry practitioners. The findings indicated that the industry practitioners welcomed the Framework and considered it as a positive step towards e-business management

Dynamic Capability Building through partnering: An Australian Mobile handset case Study

Dynamic capabilities are increasingly seen as an organisational characteristic for innovation and are regarded as a source of competitive advantage. In a quest for sustainability, service organisations are partnering with their stakeholders, and subsequently are aptly bringing innovation in services to market. Most of existing empirical research regarding dynamic capabilities seeks to define and identify specific dynamic capabilities, as well as their organizational antecedents or effects. Yet, the extent to which the antecedents of success in particular dynamic capabilities, contribute to innovation in service organisations remains less researched. This study advances the understanding of such dynamic capability building process through effective collaboration, and highlights the detailed mechanisms and processes of capability building within a service value network framework to deliver innovation in services. Deploying a case study methodology, transcribing interviews with managers and staff from an Australian telco and its partnering organisations, results show that collaboration, collaborative organisational learning, collaborative innovative capacity, entrepreneurial alertness and collaborative agility are all core to fostering innovation in services. Practical implications of this research are significant, and that the impacts of collaboration and the dynamic capabilities mentioned above are discussed in the context of a mobile handset case study

Lean thinking in healthcare services: learning from case studies

JEL: D22, I12Healthcare organisations, especially in public sector, have been adopting Lean management practices with increasing outcomes’ evidences in several parts of the world, since the beginning of this century. However, Lean deployment in Healthcare services has been addressed in the literature in a surgical way by an array of case reports addressing the “hard” side of Lean deployment, sometimes with no result’s consistency or even follow-up analysis. This thesis seek to add to the operational side of Lean deployment in Healthcare, a complementary understanding of Lean deployment approaches, addressing both “hard” and “soft” sides, identifying the real constraints of Lean in Healthcare sector and the sustainability factors. Supported by two main literature reviews and a multi-case approach, a deep research on the eligible Portuguese cases was conducted answering the questions: (i) What are the different outcomes from Lean deployment in Healthcare?; (ii) What are the barriers to Lean implementation in Healthcare?; (iii) What enables Lean implementation in Healthcare?; (iv) What are the risks of Lean in Healthcare?; (v) How to measure Lean achievements in Healthcare services?; and (vi) How to develop a sustainable Lean culture? This contribution to the academic debate on Lean deployment in Healthcare creates clarity on what can be called Lean practices in Healthcare settings under the light of the concept’s founders; what pattern of a Lean deployment journey was followed by Healthcare organisations; and how different cultural (organisational and national) contexts can influence the pace in pursuing that pattern.As organizações de saúde, nomeadamente públicas, têm vindo a adoptar práticas de gestão Lean com crescente evidência de resultados em várias partes do mundo, desde o início deste século. Contudo, a aplicação do Lean em serviços de saúde tem tido um tratamento cirúrgico na literatura, recaindo apenas nos aspectos “hard” e sem grande consistência ou seguimento de resultados . Esta tese pretende acrescentar aos aspectos “hard” do Lean, um entendimento complementar juntando os aspectos “hard” e “soft”, identificando as restrições e factores de sustentabilidade da aplicação do Lean no sector da saúde. Tendo por base duas revisões bibliográficas primordiais e uma abordagem empírica multi-caso a partir de casos portugueses elegíveis, esta tese fornece respostas às questões: (i) Quais os diferentes resultados da aplicação do Lean na Saúde?; (ii) Quais as barreiras à aplicação do Lean na Saúde?; (iii) Quais os facilitadores da implementação do Lean na Saúde?; (iv) Quais os riscos do Lean na Saúde?; (v) Como medir a implementação do Lean na Saúde; e (vi) como desenvolver uma cultura Lean sustentável? Este contributo para o debate académico sobre a aplicação do Lean na Saúde introduz clareza sobre o que pode ou não ser chamado de práticas Lean na Saúde tendo como referência os conceitos dos fundadores; que padrão de implementação é seguido pelas organizações; e de que forma diferentes contextos culturais (nacionais e organizacionais) influenciam o ritmo desse padrão de implementação

Analysis domain model for shared virtual environments

The field of shared virtual environments, which also encompasses online games and social 3D environments, has a system landscape consisting of multiple solutions that share great functional overlap. However, there is little system interoperability between the different solutions. A shared virtual environment has an associated problem domain that is highly complex raising difficult challenges to the development process, starting with the architectural design of the underlying system. This paper has two main contributions. The first contribution is a broad domain analysis of shared virtual environments, which enables developers to have a better understanding of the whole rather than the part(s). The second contribution is a reference domain model for discussing and describing solutions - the Analysis Domain Model

Understanding SE Growth: The Case of Bangladesh

This thesis seeks to explore the hybrid nature of Social Enterprises (SEs) by investigating how they incorporate co-existence of social and economic goals and embed in multiple institutional domains. By synthesising insights from three literature domains - hybrid organisations, institutional views and strategic management - this thesis advances the understanding about the hybrid nature of SEs mainly in two ways. First, it examines the extent to which managerial tensions may result in hybrid SEs due to co-existence of values and influences from pluralistic institutional domains. Second, it explores how such organisations mobilise resources and capabilities in order to respond to internal tensions. The three research questions addressed in the thesis are: i) What is the nature of SE growth in Bangladesh?; ii) How does the institutional context influence SE growth in Bangladesh? and iii) What role do SEs’ resources and capabilities play in responding to the institutional influences? The study adopts a multiple case study approach, collecting data from eleven Bangladeshi SEs. With rapid rise of hybrid forms of SEs in Bangladesh, the findings of the study have both practical and policy implications. The insights on SEs’ internal tensions can enable Bangladeshi policy makers to realise the needs and challenges of hybrid SEs in the country. This may aid the development of customised policies, incentives and support systems that are required to facilitate the growth of such organisations. The insights on the management of tensions can aid the leaders and managers in hybrid SEs to respond to their internal tensions more appropriately.The study identifies six operational models through analysis of the social goal, economic mission, income source, governance structure and institutional setting of the studied cases. These models are: SEs that are fully reliant on grant, NGOs with trading elements, NGOs with full reliance on trading, social business es, public and private limited corporations, and NGOs with conventional subsidiary enterprise. The findings further showed that the studied SEs have pursued social and economic goals simultaneously through adoption of four growth strategies: expansion, diversification, autonomous growth and partnership. The study identifies a number of competing pressures originating from multiple institutional domains which have affected the way they accomplished their social and economic goals. This interplay between SEs’ dual goals and institutional influences led to ten different tensions inside the studied cases. The management of these tensions, at the functional level, involved orchestration of SEs’ resources and capabilities in a particular way. The specific ways of mobilisation of resources and capabilities ultimately led the SEs towards five different growth paths: i) forced adoption/coercive adoption, ii) proactive response, iii) adapt, iv) influence, and v) side-stepping

Artificial Intelligence in Supply Chain and Operations Management: A Multiple Case Study Research

Artificial intelligence (AI) is increasingly considered a source of competitive advantage in operations and supply chain management (OSCM). However, many organisations still struggle to adopt it successfully and empirical studies providing clear indications are scarce in the literature. This research aims to shed light on how AI applications can support OSCM processes and to identify benefits and barriers to their implementation. To this end, it conducts a multiple case study with semi-structured interviews in six companies, totalling 17 implementation cases. The Supply Chain Operations Reference (SCOR) model guided the entire study and the analysis of the results by targeting specific processes. The results highlighted how AI methods in OSCM can increase the companies' competitiveness by reducing costs and lead times and improving service levels, quality, safety, and sustainability. However, they also identify barriers in the implementation of AI, such as ensuring data quality, lack of specific skills, need for high investments, lack of clarity on economic benefits and lack of experience in cost analysis for AI projects. Although the nature of the study is not suitable for wide generalisation, it offers clear guidance for practitioners facing AI dilemmas in specific SCOR processes and provides the basis for further future research

Sustainable product development in the industrial gas sector

In the midst of the global recession many companies struggled to bring new products to market. There was a focus on cost optimisation, consumer searched for lower cost options in an effort to maintain profits while manufacturers responded by driving production costs down. The continuation of this short term approach is not sustainable. A new way of working is needed to develop sustainable products and to continue developing products. Some industries have reacted to this call and have found benefits in transitioning to sustainability. In the industrial gas industry a trend of lower costs has resulting in commoditisation of the market. This work investigates if there is a redirection can be found in moving towards sustainable practices. An initial question asked in this work is if a more sustainable product can be beneficial to the industrial gas industry. A trial is conducted to investigate increasing the useable life of a gas cylinder. Two technical approaches are explored which deliver significant increases in life, upwards of 30%. To achieve the products, new mathematical models are developed for product design work which along with a focus on performance parameters leads to new developments in equipment and test methods. Business case models are developed to identify benefits for the manufacturer and consumer. The result provide potentially transformational changes in performance, identifying that sustainability can have strong benefits and be technically achieved. However it is found that the methodologies for development are a limiting factor, ultimately restricting the launch of new products. The trial finds the product development methods used need to be addressed if sustainable development is to be achieved. Sustainable product development methods have been considered previously. The intent is that products are designed to be of low environmental impact, provide fairness in the supply chain and provide benefits to the consumer. However, the use of methods is not prevalent, typically due to an over focus on environmental impact, complex systems of assessment and methods. Investigations into best practices in product development highlight integrated techniques, disruptive innovations and portfolio management. A combination of knowledge in sustainable development and best in class product development methods provides the basis of a new sustainable product development methodology. The aim is to create and develop a system that enables sustaining product developments. The new methodology developed uses an integrated product development framework merged with a definition of sustainability. The methodology is described by a framework, a process map and a guideline such that it can be easily followed and implemented. The framework introduces a strategic segment in technology to address a gap identified in the literature and in industrial gases of continued technical development. The work also includes an assessment method. This takes the form of a matrix which links the framework to sustainability factors. A rating method is developed for performance assessment and the calculation of a new indicator, the sustain index. The outputs are visualised and used for decision making at an individual development level and for portfolio management. The new methodology developed focuses on a balanced approach to efficiency, equity, and the environment. Application of new technologies are explored in the industrial gas industry in order to test the technology strategy developed. A research approach is developed using three separate cases studies. The case studies investigate if similar benefits can be achieved in the application of new technologies as observed in other industries. The hypothesis is addressed along with queries on specific benefits and drawbacks identified for the industrial gas industry. It is shown that the application of new technologies can create step changes in products and processes. The results are seen in three pioneering products. The strategy enables differentiation and gives a competitive edge. Implementation of the methodology is explored. A specific approach is developed from a literature search and interviews. Interviews are used to deepen knowledge on process change in research and development. A seven step action plan for transformational change is proposed. An example is then conducted. An increase in performance is observed, the sustainability measures improve, and the product development time halves. In summary this work finds shortfalls of sustainable product development methods through literature and practice. It then considers the best processes for product development and creates a new methodology. This is achieved through a framework, a guideline, an assessment method and an implementation method. Developed areas are then tested. A strategy of new technologies is shown to promote sustainability. The methodology is then implemented though a case study and the transformation documented