A Critical Investigation of Knowledge Management as a Determinant of New Product Development Success

This thesis investigates the relationship between Knowledge Management Activities (KMAs), New Product Development drivers (NPDd), and New Product Development (NPD) process success in organisations that rely on new products for competitive survival. The literature review highlights that while KMA is in 2008, a common part of the practice of NPD, it is not included in any of the lists of wellknown success factors. Given that research in the KM field claims KMAs are a significant driver of success, this omission in the NPD literature seems worthy of further investigation. This thesis details the method and results of an empirical investigation examining the claim that KMAs are an independent influence on NPD process success. Data was collected in 2006 using survey methods and a classic positivistic research philosophy. The sample was taken from 124 UK-based projects, chosen from private organisations in the Department of trade and Industry's Research Development Index. The data was analysed using multivariate techniques, notably comparing NPD drivers, KMAs and their individual contribution to success based on stepwise regression analysis. Statistics indicate that while well-known NPDd account for much of the variance in NPD process success, KMAs are also significant. The unique contribution of this thesis is two fold: first empirical evidence that some KMAs can act as independent drivers of success in the NPD environment; and second a model detailing the relationship between the test elements, updating the existing high-level research in the field with a more detailed analysis of the relationships implied. The conclusions highlight for private sector managers that some KMAs make a distinct and measurable addition to NPD process success. Public sector managers may also find the results of interest as they add a finer level of detail to understanding the "systems" view of NPD, information worth sharing within the burgeoning UK knowledge economy

Prediction of academic success on college freshman english theme grades from (a) and (t) personality factors of the Guilford-Zimmerman temperament survey

The purpose of this study was to investigate the hypothesis that individuals who scored high on both the A and T factors of the Guilford-Zimmerman Temperament Survey are those who would receive high grades on English class compositions, when other major variables were held constant or eliminated

A multi-level perspective on trust, collaboration and knowledge sharing cultures in a highly formalized organization

Purpose The purpose of this study is to investigate organizational culture’s perceived importance and practice as it unfolds across hierarchal layers of a formalized organization. Organizational culture is important in innovation and change and becomes significant if its importance and practice are shared across all levels of an organization. Highly formalized organizations are not an exception to this. Yet, there is a shortage of empirical evidence on how the organizational culture’s perceived importance and practice unfold across the senior-management, middle-management and operational levels of a formalized organization. Design/methodology/approach Applying a theoretical frame incorporating information asymmetry, knowledge sharing and cultural participation, this paper examined three important facets of culture, namely, trust, collaboration and knowledge-sharing. Using a Jordanian bank’s case study, this paper collected data using a mixed-methods approach; quantitative to identify variations across levels and, subsequently, qualitative to explore the nuanced patterns in the perceived importance and practice of the three facets across different organizational levels in the context of a formalized organization. Findings The findings suggest that the importance and practice of the three cultural facets are shared, as well as differentiated across organizational levels based on purposiveness, person/situation-dependency and nature of work and nature/relevance of knowledge. Originality/value Using a multi-level lens provided insight not yet gained by current work in the field. This allowed us to unearth nuanced differences in the perception of organizational culture across organizational hierarchies. The paper contributes to the scholarship on organizational culture in the context of formalized organizations and to managerial practice by offering insights on how a shared practice of trust, collaboration and knowledge sharing is distributed across organizational levels, not captured before. This paper also suggests propositions related to each of three cultural facets, not spelled out before. </jats:sec

Understanding the UK hospital supply chain in an era of patient choice

Author Posting © Westburn Publishers Ltd, 2011. This is a post-peer-review, pre-copy-edit version of an article which has been published in its definitive form in the Journal of Marketing Management, and has been posted by permission of Westburn Publishers Ltd for personal use, not for redistribution. The article was published in Journal of Marketing Management, 27(3-4), 401 - 423, doi:10.1080/0267257X.2011.547084 http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0267257X.2011.547084The purpose of this paper is to investigate the UK hospital supply chain in light of recent government policy reform where patients will have, inter alia, greater choice of hospital for elective surgery. Subsequently, the hospital system should become far more competitive with supply chains having to react to these changes as patient demand becomes less predictable. Using a qualitative case study methodology, hospital managers are interviewed on a range of issues. Views on the development of the hospital supply chain in different phases are derived, and are used to develop a map of the current hospital chain. The findings show hospital managers anticipating some significant changes to the hospital supply chain and its workings as Patient Choice expands. The research also maps the various aspects of the hospital supply chain as it moves through different operational phases and highlights underlying challenges and complexities. The hospital supply chain, as discussed and mapped in this research, is original work given there are no examples in the literature that provide holistic representations of hospital activity. At the end, specific recommendations are provided that will be of interest to service to managers, researchers, and policymakers

Preserving the underground: The creation of Carlsbad Caverns National Park, 1922–1930

Abstract not availabl

A tongue set free from fashionable lies

"A Tongue Set Free from Fashionable Lies"; a collection of lyric and narrative poems, explores human relationships with place, nature, and one another. The collection’s title states succinctly its aesthetic: to express plainly and accessibly the feelings and truths of experience, of a life lived and made meaningful. Each of the collection’s sections explores and celebrates the joys and sorrows of one aspect of human experience: the domestic world and its debts to nature, nature and its mortal dangers, the promise of Heaven. As a collection, the poems praise the contradictions and paradoxes of a life lived and loved in its entirety.</p

A critical investigation of knowledge management as determinant of new product development success

This thesis investigates the relationship between Knowledge Management Activities (KMAs), New Product Development drivers (NPDd), and New Product Development (NPD) process success in organisations that rely on new products for competitive survival. The literature review highlights that while KMA is in 2008, a common part of the practice of NPD, it is not included in any of the lists of well-known success factors. Given that research in the KM field claims KMAs are a known success factors. Given that research in the KM field claims KMAs are a significant driver of success, this omission in the NPD literature seems worthy of further investigation. This thesis details the method and results of an empirical investigation examining the claim that KMAs are an independent influence on NPD process success. Data was collected in 2006 using survey methods and a classic positivistic research philosophy. The sample was taken from 124 UK-based project chosen from private organisations in the Department of trade and Industry's Research Development Index. The data was analysed using multivariate techniques, notably comparing NPD drivers, KMAs and their individual contribution to success based on stepwise regression analysis. Statistics indicate that while well-known NPDd account for much of the variance in NPD process success, KJMAs are also significant.EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo