STRATEGIC DECISION-MAKING IN A TURBULENT BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT: A DYNAMIC CAPABILITIES FRAMEWORK FOR QUANTITY SURVEYING PROFESSIONAL SERVICE FIRMS IN IRELAND

The construction industry contributes significantly to the socio-economic development of nations through infrastructure development, and job creation culminating into the growth of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Quantity Surveying Professional Service Firms (QSPSFs) play a critical role in the construction industry by ensuring that projects are delivered within cost, required quality and duration by providing technical and knowledge-intensive services to clients, contractors and stakeholders. Irish QSPSFs are facing challenges such as tender price inflation, intense competition, a skills shortage and disruptive technology. These challenges coupled with the cyclicality of the sector create a turbulent business environment for Irish QSPSFs, yet there remains a paucity of empirical evidence pertaining to how strategic decisions are made by these firms. Strategic planning is critical to addressing the challenges confronting business organisations such as the Irish QSPSFs; however, to date strategic planning has focused to a greater extent on manufacturing, oil and gas, retail, consumer products and light manufacturing, whereas there remains limited empirical investigation within the construction industry. This study aims to address this gap by examining the strategic decision-making process of Irish QSPSFs operating in the changing environment of the construction industry. What sets the research apart is that a Dynamic Capabilities (DC) perspective has been used with focus on sensing; seizing; and transformation, culminating into its integration into the development of a strategic decision-making framework. This study is entrenched in the pragmatist philosophical stance with emphasis on the positivist and interpretivist position and adopts mixed method by using quantitative and qualitative approaches over two phases. The first phase involves a survey administered with support from the Society of Chartered Surveyors Ireland (SCSI) to 350 member practices whereby a single senior Quantity Surveyors (QS) in each practice was invited to participate. Seventy-two usable survey questionnaires completed by respondents were prepared for data analysis. The second phase of the research comprised of interview with ten chief executives or managing directors of Irish QSPSFs. The study found the most preferred strategic choice at the corporate level of QSPSFs as the expansion of services to new markets and sectors. At the business level, the investigation discovered the differentiation of services as the main strategic choice of QSPSFs. Furthermore, participation in strategic decision-making is very critical to the success of strategy formulation in organisations. This study identifies the factors that drive participation in strategic decision-making as the knowledge and competence of staff; personality traits; and the ability of people to make decision at the operational level of the organisation. The investigation also found that strategic change has occurred in QSPSFs over the past ten years. This strategic change is attributable to turbulent environmental conditions such as economic recession, in particular reference to the prolong economic recession 2008-2013. The investigation identified the specific strategic changes that occurred in QSPSFs as growth and expansion into new markets; agglomeration, and changes in the ownership and management structure. The negative and positive impacts of economic recession on QSPSFs have also been identified in this investigation. For instance, a radical shift in strategic response from being proactive to reactive; and self-preservation of ownership structure are the ii adverse effects of economic recession identified by the study while knowledge acquisition; and risk profiling for identification and capturing of opportunities are the positive impacts of economic recession. The study found significant statistical evidence to confirm a strong relationship between the turbulent business environment and the strategic decision-making process characteristics of QSPSFs. A strategic decision-making framework was developed on the basis of field work undertaken which was subsequently validated by respondent practices. The framework is the first of its kind pertaining to construction PSFs

Proceedings of the GIS Research UK 18th Annual Conference GISRUK 2010

This volume holds the papers from the 18th annual GIS Research UK (GISRUK). This year the conference, hosted at University College London (UCL), from Wednesday 14 to Friday 16 April 2010. The conference covered the areas of core geographic information science research as well as applications domains such as crime and health and technological developments in LBS and the geoweb. UCL’s research mission as a global university is based around a series of Grand Challenges that affect us all, and these were accommodated in GISRUK 2010. The overarching theme this year was “Global Challenges”, with specific focus on the following themes: * Crime and Place * Environmental Change * Intelligent Transport * Public Health and Epidemiology * Simulation and Modelling * London as a global city * The geoweb and neo-geography * Open GIS and Volunteered Geographic Information * Human-Computer Interaction and GIS Traditionally, GISRUK has provided a platform for early career researchers as well as those with a significant track record of achievement in the area. As such, the conference provides a welcome blend of innovative thinking and mature reflection. GISRUK is the premier academic GIS conference in the UK and we are keen to maintain its outstanding record of achievement in developing GIS in the UK and beyond

Validation of design artefacts for blockchain-enabled precision healthcare as a service.

Healthcare systems around the globe are currently experiencing a rapid wave of digital disruption. Current research in applying emerging technologies such as Big Data (BD), Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning (ML), Deep Learning (DL), Augmented Reality (AR), Virtual Reality (VR), Digital Twin (DT), Wearable Sensor (WS), Blockchain (BC) and Smart Contracts (SC) in contact tracing, tracking, drug discovery, care support and delivery, vaccine distribution, management, and delivery. These disruptive innovations have made it feasible for the healthcare industry to provide personalised digital health solutions and services to the people and ensure sustainability in healthcare. Precision Healthcare (PHC) is a new inclusion in digital healthcare that can support personalised needs. It focuses on supporting and providing precise healthcare delivery. Despite such potential, recent studies show that PHC is ineffectual due to the lower patient adoption in the system. Anecdotal evidence shows that people are refraining from adopting PHC due to distrust. This thesis presents a BC-enabled PHC ecosystem that addresses ongoing issues and challenges regarding low opt-in. The designed ecosystem also incorporates emerging information technologies that are potential to address the need for user-centricity, data privacy and security, accountability, transparency, interoperability, and scalability for a sustainable PHC ecosystem. The research adopts Soft System Methodology (SSM) to construct and validate the design artefact and sub-artefacts of the proposed PHC ecosystem that addresses the low opt-in problem. Following a comprehensive view of the scholarly literature, which resulted in a draft set of design principles and rules, eighteen design refinement interviews were conducted to develop the artefact and sub-artefacts for design specifications. The artefact and sub-artefacts were validated through a design validation workshop, where the designed ecosystem was presented to a Delphi panel of twenty-two health industry actors. The key research finding was that there is a need for data-driven, secure, transparent, scalable, individualised healthcare services to achieve sustainability in healthcare. It includes explainable AI, data standards for biosensor devices, affordable BC solutions for storage, privacy and security policy, interoperability, and usercentricity, which prompts further research and industry application. The proposed ecosystem is potentially effective in growing trust, influencing patients in active engagement with real-world implementation, and contributing to sustainability in healthcare

A case study of survival and presentation of gastroesophageal cancer in local neighbourhoods

This thesis presents a quantitative case study on incidence, survival and presentation of patients diagnosed with gastroesophageal cancer to evaluate whether where people live affects how they present and survive with a gastroesophageal cancer diagnosis. The focus research evolved from studies on gastroesophageal cancer’s ‘geographic affiliation’ and a desire to review whether patient and population attributes could be harnessed to reveal potential ‘hotspots’ to inform targeted health intervention strategies. As the most crucial stage for intervention was associated with patients detecting symptoms early enough for intervention, the focus of this case study was narrowed to survival and presentation.This research analysed data from 2785 patients who presented to a regional referral specialist cancer treatment centre between the years 2000 and 2013. Cohort analysis revealed common attributes and survival, and data were merged with demographic information in a geographic information system to present findings in mapped format.Descriptive analysis revealed an association between later stage presentation and reduced survival outcome. Emergency presentations tended to have worse outcomes. Survival deteriorated with advancing age. Gastroesophageal cancer diagnoses in the under 54 age group was more common in lower socioeconomic groups and survival outcomes were marginally lower than in those patients from the least deprived areas. Spatial analysis revealed variation in incidence, presentation and survival across the region. Though this case study revealed several new findings on gastroesophageal cancer presentation and survival, there remains no single solution to informing and encouraging earlier diagnosis interventions. Though presenting data at finer scales of resolution is more clinically relevant, it threatens patient confidentiality

Capabilities for Big Data: An Empirical Study in a Global Pharmaceutical Company

The increasing availability of large quantities of digital data (Big Data) and advanced analytic tools is driving many industries to change their practices. Currently there are limited theoretically informed, in depth empirical studies of the processes and activities that needed to leverage Big Data strategically. This research is a response to calls by international scholars for more in depth and theoretically informed studies of on Big Data (e.g. Brynjolfsson et al., 2011; McAfee et al., 2012; Wamba et al., 2015; Braganza et al., 2017; Mikalef et al., 2017). The study frames Big Data as a new resource and adopts the Resource Based View (RBV) and the Dynamic Capabilities (DC) perspective in order to explore the enhancement of existing capabilities and development of new capabilities required to leverage this new resource. The empirical context of this study is a global pharmaceutical company. Employing a qualitative in-depth case-study approach, this research investigates why a Multinational Corporation (MNC) in the pharmaceutical industry adopted Big Data adoption and how it identified and developed capabilities for this new resource. Data from 24 in-depth interviews and observations of Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA) and Global managers in two project teams were analysed and synthesised using thematic analysis methods. The findings from this study show that the use of Big Data required new and enhanced capabilities that were developed through the action of dynamic capabilities, which operated as mediators between existing capabilities and the new and enhanced capabilities. Although some elements of these dynamic capabilities were embedded in the organisational processes, the activities of senior managers played a crucial role in their development and use. Further, the findings show that the organisation’s cultural transformation was critical for the operation of the dynamic capabilities identified and the new and enhanced Big Data capabilities. In the case study company the development of a Big Data capabilities was found to be an incremental, extended process. The study makes a number of contributions. It provides an in-depth case study of Big Data preparation in the specific context of a MNC pharmaceutical company that is of value to both academics and practitioners. It provides a theoretically based and empirically validated model of the development of capabilities associated with Big Data adoption. Finally, it makes a contribution to academic theory by contributing to the ongoing discussion in the academic literature of the utility of the concept of Dynamic Capabilities

Ethnic group affiliation and social exclusion in Cornwall; analysis, adjustment and extension of the 2001 England and Wales Census data

This thesis provides a critical understanding of the size and relative position of the Cornish in Cornwall, a county in the south-west of the UK. Cornwall is a region which has experienced increased levels of disadvantage for a prolonged period of time. The indigenous people, whilst seeing a rise in their inclusion in ethnicity variables in the region, have remained under-researched in terms of their socio-economic position relative to the non-Cornish in the same geographic area. This thesis addresses this gap in the literature and represents the first in-depth examination of the group. The 2001 Census included an option to ‘write-in’ a Cornish ethnic identity, however whilst accurate in the responses it recorded the result was almost certainly an under-enumeration due to the lack of a dedicated tick-box selection. This thesis is a rigorous examination of the Cornish, starting with these data, estimating their size and socio-economic position (in terms of social exclusion) relative to non-Cornish individuals. Three stages of primary analysis sought to; analyse, adjust and extend the 2001 Census result to broadly estimate the size, links with exclusion and the causal processes behind these links. Firstly, an accurate picture of the size of the Cornish population was estimated using an innovative weighting strategy, developed to collate all other data referring to the Cornish and to derive weights for application to the raw Census data. Secondly, a stage of primary survey research examined this group more directly for links with social exclusion factors; and thirdly, a stage of qualitative interviews with knowledgeable individuals in the region lent depth to the findings and provided a more coherent explanatory framework. The results indicate that the Cornish are certainly more numerous than the 2001 Census had indicated. The proportion of individuals self-identifying as Cornish is likely to be closer to a quarter of the population rather than the 6.7% indicated in the 2001 ii data. There was some discrepancy in the data between the belief amongst the group of social exclusion and the reality. In order to explain the discrepancy, a model was used which explores the difference between personal-level experience and group level discrimination (Taylor et al 1990). The results of this thesis highlight the complex and multi-dimensional processes inherent in, firstly, the methodological and practical process of ethnicity measurement and, secondly, its use as an explanatory variable for social exclusion experience. Overall, this thesis represents the first and most comprehensive examination of the indigenous people of Cornwall and their relative lived experience compared to non-Cornish in the same area

Current Management Issues in Health Information Technology

Health information technology can improve quality care delivery, thereby boosting the healthcare business reputation. However, it can negatively affect quality care delivery and lead to a negative business reputation if not efficiently managed. This single qualitative study aimed to explore the causes of the inefficiencies in managing health information technology and strategies that healthcare organizations use to ensure its efficiencies. In a purposive sample, the researcher conducted telephone interviews with twenty-one participants from Lancaster General Hospital. The participants comprised medical doctors, Doctor of Nursing practitioners, managers of health informatics, and informatics specialists working in various divisions and E-health operations. Other participants included the director of quality improvement within Epic Solutions and clinical applications, the director of health information management, the entity and privacy officer, the risk department manager, the executive director of ACO inter-community care, the pharmacist, and the director of operations. Data collected and analyzed yielded four themes: Users face various management challenges leading to HIT management efficiencies, primarily due to a need for adequate training. Strategies used to ensure the efficient management of health information technology comprised the use of robust policies and procedures, Management issues leading to the disruption of health information technology due to the issues with the design of tools of HIT, and Users reported more potential than actual impact on business reputation as judged through external organization ratings. This study could positively impact social change by fostering efficiencies in its adoption, implementation, and use, which could enhance better care delivery