Social Capital and Knowledge Integration in Digitally Enabled Teams

To understand the impact of social capital on knowledge integration and performance within digitally enabled teams, we studied 46 teams who had a history and a future working together. All three dimensions of their social capital (structural, relational, and cognitive) were measured prior to the team performing two tasks in a controlled setting, one face-to-face and the other through a lean digital network. Structural and cognitive capital were more important to knowledge integration when teams communicated through lean digital networks than when they communicated face-to-face; relational capital directly impacted knowledge integration equally, regardless of the communication media used by the team. Knowledge integration, in turn, impacted team decision quality, suggesting that social capital influences team performance in part by increasing a team’s ability to integrate knowledge. These results suggest that team history may be necessary but not sufficient for teams to overcome the problems with the use of lean digital networks as a communication environment. However, team history may present a window of opportunity for social capital to develop, which in turn allows teams to perform just as well as in either communication environment.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/116284/1/Robert et al., 2008.pd

How does intellectual capital align with cyber security?

Purpose – To position the preservation and protection of intellectual capital as a cyber security concern. We outline the security requirements of intellectual capital to help Boards of Directors and executive management teams to understand their responsibilities and accountabilities in this respect.Design/Methodology/Approach – The research methodology is desk research. In other words, we gathered facts and existing research publications that helped us to define key terms, to formulate arguments to convince BoDs of the need to secure their intellectual capital, and to outline actions to be taken by BoDs to do so.Findings – Intellectual capital, as a valuable business resource, is related to information, knowledge and cyber security. Hence, preservation thereof is also related to cyber security governance, and merits attention from boards of directors.Implications – This paper clarifies boards of directors’ intellectual capital governance responsibilities, which encompass information, knowledge and cyber security governance.Social Implications – If boards of directors know how to embrace their intellectual capital governance responsibilities, this will help to ensure that such intellectual capital is preserved and secured.Practical Implications – We hope that boards of directors will benefit from our clarifications, and especially from the positioning of intellectual capital in cyber space.Originality/Value – This paper extends a previous paper published by Von Solms and Von Solms (2018), which clarified the key terms of information and cyber security, and the governance thereof. The originality and value is the focus on the securing of intellectual capital, a topic that has not yet received a great deal of attention from cyber security researchers

The Digitalisation of African Agriculture Report 2018-2019

An inclusive, digitally-enabled agricultural transformation could help achieve meaningful livelihood improvements for Africa’s smallholder farmers and pastoralists. It could drive greater engagement in agriculture from women and youth and create employment opportunities along the value chain. At CTA we staked a claim on this power of digitalisation to more systematically transform agriculture early on. Digitalisation, focusing on not individual ICTs but the application of these technologies to entire value chains, is a theme that cuts across all of our work. In youth entrepreneurship, we are fostering a new breed of young ICT ‘agripreneurs’. In climate-smart agriculture multiple projects provide information that can help towards building resilience for smallholder farmers. And in women empowerment we are supporting digital platforms to drive greater inclusion for women entrepreneurs in agricultural value chains

SMEs: ERP or virtual collaboration teams

Small firms are indeed the engines of global economic growth. Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) play an important role to promote economic development. SMEs in the beginning of implementing new technologies always face capital shortage and need technological assistance. Available ERP systems do not fulfil the specific requirements of Small firms. SMEs has scarce resources and manpower therefore many SMEs don?t have the possessions to buy and operate an ERP System. On the other hand competition and competitiveness of SMEs have to be strengthened. This paper briefly reviews the existing perspectives on virtual teams and their effect on SMEs management. It also discusses the main characteristics of virtual teams and clarifies the differences aspects of virtual team application in SMEs. After outlining some of the main advantages and pitfall of such teams, it concentrates on comparing of ERP and virtual collaborative teams in SMEs. Finally, it provides evidence for the need of ?Software as a Service (SaaS)? where an application is hosted as a service provided to customers across the web for SMEs as an alternative of ERP. It has been widely argued that ERP disadvantage in SMEs such as administrative expenditure and cost, isolated structure, severe lack of software flexibility, insufficient support of SMEs business and high operating cost, lead SMEs to use virtual collaborative team which is net work base solution

Stickiness Impediments in Digital HRM

Realizing optimal value from digital HRM is a major challenge for most firms. This research adopts a practice lens to investigate how traditional HRM practice elements can constrain digital HRM practices. Findings from an interpretive case study suggest that constrained digital HRM practices emerge because employees and managers are embedded in sticky traditional work practices and not primarily because they are unwilling to adopt digital technologies. Conventional wisdom suggests that the quality of the digital HRM, meeting end-user performance expectations, and managing resistance to change can improve suboptimal digital practices. We propose that digital HRM transformation efforts should also change outdated routines rather than focusing only on technology improvements and individual behavioral change. The authors propose a model that explains stickiness in digital HRM practices and offers recommendations for HR practitioners to reduce stickiness

Towards learner-centric pedagogies: Technology-enhanced teaching and learning in the 21st century classroom

Effective professional development contributes to improved teacher knowledge and practice as well as deep, meaningful student learning. Despite professional development being cited by the South African Department of Basic Education as a priority goal, teacher professional development activities have been inadequate. In lieu of the teacher knowledge and practice gaps, this paper used a socio-cultural lens to investigate the pedagogical affordances of digitalisation and technology integration. This study is part of a larger mixed method study but focuses solely on the qualitative results. This was done in an effort to understand teachers’ best practices with digital technologies and how they are being used in transformative ways in the classroom to inform the 21st century classroom and encourage a learner-centric environment. The findings reveal the weaknesses of the professional development activities on digital pedagogies and learner-centric pedagogies, which are generally episodic, one-size-fits-all events largely focused on technical knowledge. The chief impediment towards learner-centric pedagogies and the implementation of technology-enhanced teaching and learning is the misalignment between teachers’ digital abilities and the demands of the 21st century technology equipped classrooms. Our recommendation is the continuous situated professional development of teachers, including the creation of professional learning communities and harnessing digital technologies to provide an effective, hybrid approach to teacher learning and instructional delivery in the 21st century

Leveraging BI Systems to Overcome Infobesity: A Comparative Analysis of Incumbent and New Entrant firms

Infobesity is a condition whereby firms collect more information than they need or more information than they can efficiently use. As both incumbent firms and new entrant firms face different information-rich technological and economic environments, they are at a greater risk of infobesity which can compromise their innovation outcomes. In this study we leverage a research design that integrates inductive analytics and abductive discovery to uncover how incumbent and new-entrant firms leverage Business Intelligence systems and digital collaboration activities to innovate in the face of infobesity. We find that new entrant firms encounter a threshold effect governed by the use of BI systems to filter information from their customer network. On the other hand, we found that while most incumbents are able to innovate, there are uninventive incumbents that are unable to develop new products when they deploy only moderate levels of BI systems to filter their supplier data

Exploring the determinants of digital transformation in its different stages in Dutch SMEs: A digital dynamic capabilities perspective

Digital transformation (DT) has become a crucial strategic imperative for organizations seeking to thrive in the rapidly evolving business environment. While digital transformation has been extensively studied in large organizations, there remains a need for more available evidence in the context of (Dutch) SMEs and how organizations go through different DT phases. This dissertation aims to address this gap by adopting a digital dynamic capabilities perspective to explore the determinants of digital transformation in Dutch SMEs and investigate how these determinants change over the different digital transformation phases. This thesis has met these aims by integrating an extensive review of the relevant literature and implementing a qualitative study. The latter includes nine interviews with experts from different Dutch SMEs and an expert panel to validate these findings. The primary conclusions produced by this study include five internal determinants, five external determinants, three sub-capabilities, each of the sensing, seizing, transforming, and safeguarding digital dynamic capability clusters, and five desired digital transformation outcomes. ‘Digital safeguarding’ has emerged as a novel capability cluster focusing on skills required from the implementation onwards. In conclusion, this study has contributed to a deeper understanding of the differences in the digital transformation determinants and capabilities between large organizations and SMEs. Moreover, this thesis has identified that boundaries between the different digital transformation phases could be fading due to the continuity of digital transformation. Simultaneously, this research has practical relevance as these findings could support Dutch SMEs in navigating their digital transformations. Alternatively, the study could help Joanknecht, a Dutch financial advisory firm, improve its consultancy services. Looking ahead, future researchers should seek to validate and expand upon the presented findings.

The complex interaction between Global Production Networks, Digital Information Systems and International Knowledge Transfers

Traditionally many studies of knowledge in economics have focused on localized networks and intra-regional collaborations. However, the rising frequency by which firms collaborate within the context of global networks of production and innovation, the increasingly intricate divisions of labor involved and the extensive use of the Internet to facilitate interaction are all relatively novel trends that underline the importance of knowledge creation and flows across different locations. Focusing on this topic, the present chapter examines the complex interactions between global production networks (GPN), digital information systems (DIS) and knowledge transfers in information technology industries. It seeks to disentangle the various conduits through which different kinds of knowledge are transferred within such networks, and investigate how recent generations of DIS are affecting those knowledge transfers. The paper concludes that the dual expansion of GPN and DIS is adding new complexity to the practice of innovation: To access knowledge necessary for sustained creativity firms often have to link up with remote partners in GPN, but to be able to absorb and utilize this knowledge, they also frequently have to engage in local interactive learning processes. These local- global linkages - and the various skills necessary to operate them - are strongly interdependent, mutually reinforcing and critical for the development and maintenance of innovation-based competitiveness.