THE IMPACT OF ORGANISATIONAL CONTEXT ON INNOVATION IN LIBYAN’s PUBLIC AND PRIVATE OIL SECTORS: THE ROLE OF SOCIAL CAPITAL AND KNOWLEDGE SHARING.

It has been recognised that the oil sector in developing countries is facing challenges from a dynamic environment characterised by rapid technological change and increased demand. As innovation becomes critical to the survival of organisations, organisational context including organisational culture (OC), structure (OS) and information technology (IT) has been found to have an important influence on innovation, leading to increase social relationships among employees and flow knowledge within organisation through face to face employees interaction and information system. Social capital and knowledge sharing are recognised as the most significant resources for competitive advantage and the key to enhancing innovation. It has long been argued that social capital, a concept represented by the value embedded in the social relationships of individuals and collectives constitute strategic resources for individuals and organisations. Social networks perceived by individuals are a key issue in generating and facilitating knowledge sharing among employees to enhance innovation within organizations. It has also been shown that knowledge management and the promotion of knowledge sharing among the members of an organisation are an important part of the learning process as they help to convert the tacit knowledge embedded in individuals into explicit knowledge through interaction. Prior literature has pointed out that organisational context is one of the most important factors affecting social capital and knowledge sharing and enhanced innovation in an organisation. However, there is a lack of models linking organisational context, social capital and knowledge sharing, and innovation within oil sectors in general within developing countries, particularly Libya. Against this background, the thesis investigates the impact of organisational context on innovation. Using social capital and knowledge sharing, the integrative and comprehensive conceptual model are developed in order to reveal the direct and indirect impacts of organisational context on innovation. The model is then tested with a sample of 418 employees from two sectors; namely, public and the private. These were analysed through a IV multivariate analysis using a variance-based statistical technique known as Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modelling. The findings of this thesis are three-fold. First, with respect to the direct effect of organisational context on innovation, the study finds that both public and private sectors’ innovation are positively affected by organisational context. Second, regarding the indirect impact of organisational context on innovation, the study confirms its indirect nature through the social capital and knowledge sharing in both sectors. Third, the results show that there are significant differences between the public and private oil sectors in terms of the effect of organisational context on social capital, knowledge sharing and innovation, product and process. These findings have both theoretical and practical implications in that the results have provided empirical evidence on the direct and indirect impact of organisational context and can serve as an indication in practice for both firm managers and policy makers who are looking to establish strategies for achieving innovation. These would benefit from expending their efforts on promoting social capital and knowledge-sharing practices among their employees

Design of Industrial Workplaces to relieve Workers when Interacting with Joint-Arm-Robots

A comprehensive understanding of the needs of the user is required to design adequate workplace systems in general, but especially in the highly digitised area of industry where operators are interacting with autonomously operating machines. There is little knowledge in design criteria for professionals to enable adequate developments of system design for Human-Machine Interaction, e.g. Human-Robot Collaboration regarding the effects of design decisions to all three levels of Human Factors, i.e. physiological, cognitive and organisational limitations. Moreover, there is little known about objective measurement procedures that evaluate whether the operator subjectively perceives the workplace system design as assistance and improvement. The research presented in the following is affiliated with the scientific discipline of Human Factors Engineering and focuses on the evaluation of Human Factor issues within the digitised industry. Based on broad theoretical and empirical investigations, the results of this research extend our knowledge of adequate Human-Centred Design by providing reliable, powerful design criteria for workplaces where operators interact with machines/collaborate with robots, but also an overall technique, the Objective Workload Detection Method, for evaluation of the effectiveness of design investigation focusing on cognitive stress relief. Through the application of this method within a controlled experiment, the validation of the derived design criteria was confirmed. The study significantly shows how the cognitive workload can be relieved by an assisting environment. This work also gives one best-practice design example of a self-adapting workplace system for hybrid Human-Robot Teams. Following the Human-Centred Design method, the concept of Assisting Industrial Workplace System for Human-Robot Collaboration has been successfully developed as a flexible hybrid unit design. The prototype is related to a real-world scenario from the aerospace industry and the demonstrator was implemented within a laboratory set-up. This work seamlessly applies techniques from interdisciplinary science fields, e.g. Engineering, Neuroscience, Gestalt theory, and Design. Equally, the design criteria and the evaluation method will support professionals from varied disciplines to succeed in the creation process of future system-designs by giving a clear indication of future Human-Centred Design research

"Sit Less at Work": exploring the contextual factors which influence intervention development, implementation and evaluation

Introduction Prolonged periods of sitting, a common feature of sedentary jobs, are associated with increased morbidity and mortality. Evaluation of interventions to reduce workplace sitting have shown mixed results, suggesting impact also depends on context. This research, therefore, aimed to explore contextual factors that influence the development, implementation and evaluation of interventions to reduce workplace sitting time. Methods An integrative systematic review assessed effectiveness of interventions to reduce workplace sitting and explored key considerations for intervention development and implementation. Phase 1 involved a qualitative study to explore how barriers and facilitators to reducing workplace sitting time differed in four organisations of varying size and sector. Phase 2 developed and planned the implementation of organisation-specific interventions using ecological approaches and co-production. Phase 3 comprised a mixed-methods “before and after” study to assess the feasibility of implementation and evaluation and explored contextual barriers and enablers in three of the participating organisations. Results The review produced an operational framework which was tested during the three phases and then refined. Phase 1 highlighted barriers and enablers that differed across organisations including: organisational culture, the idea of presenteeism and wider political and economic influences. Phase 2 produced four “Sit Less at Work” interventions which targeted multiple levels of influence. Phase 3 identified no change in workplace sitting time, however, process evaluation determined that interventions were not implemented as intended. Key contextual barriers to implementation included: organisational culture, social norms of sitting, and lack of management buy-in. Conclusion Successful development, implementation and evaluation of interventions to reduce workplace sitting time requires careful consideration of contextual factors, particularly organisational culture and ingrained social practices. The evidence-based operational framework developed in this thesis can be used to ensure consideration is given to these factors to develop and deliver more effective interventions

Factors Influencing Customer Satisfaction towards E-shopping in Malaysia

Online shopping or e-shopping has changed the world of business and quite a few people have decided to work with these features. What their primary concerns precisely and the responses from the globalisation are the competency of incorporation while doing their businesses. E-shopping has also increased substantially in Malaysia in recent years. The rapid increase in the e-commerce industry in Malaysia has created the demand to emphasize on how to increase customer satisfaction while operating in the e-retailing environment. It is very important that customers are satisfied with the website, or else, they would not return. Therefore, a crucial fact to look into is that companies must ensure that their customers are satisfied with their purchases that are really essential from the ecommerce’s point of view. With is in mind, this study aimed at investigating customer satisfaction towards e-shopping in Malaysia. A total of 400 questionnaires were distributed among students randomly selected from various public and private universities located within Klang valley area. Total 369 questionnaires were returned, out of which 341 questionnaires were found usable for further analysis. Finally, SEM was employed to test the hypotheses. This study found that customer satisfaction towards e-shopping in Malaysia is to a great extent influenced by ease of use, trust, design of the website, online security and e-service quality. Finally, recommendations and future study direction is provided. Keywords: E-shopping, Customer satisfaction, Trust, Online security, E-service quality, Malaysia

Education handbook

2003 handbook for the faculty of Educatio

Education handbook

2002 handbook for the faculty of Educatio