Understanding the effect of IS change: A social capital perspective

This paper argues that by adopting a social capital perspective of the effects of Information Systems (IS) implementation we are able to provide insights into both human and technological aspects of change interventions. This theoretical paper is firmly embedded within socio-technical approaches and aims to conceptualise and address concerns relating to organisational issues of systems and technology management. IS implementation inevitably impacts upon the existing work and social relationships within organisations where there is the potential experience of reduced system effectiveness through a periodic lack of coordination and control. It is evident, in this respect, that the adoption of IS produces challenges to human collaboration which clearly add a social dimension to systems management. The paper broadly outlines how a social capital perspective may determine the areas of focus from IS-driven organisational change and provide indications about potential ways to improve system and technology adoption. This may support more appropriate designs for change interventions that enable organisations to accrue more value from IS

Knowledge management, absorptive capacity and organisational culture: A case study from Chinese SMEs

Copyright © 2008 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd. This is the author's accepted manuscript. The final published article is available from the link below.Based on the analysis of an innovative medium sized enterprise from mainland China, this paper investigated the Knowledge Management (KM) issues by focusing on its KM enablers and process. This paper attempts to investigate how Chinese enterprises absorb knowledge from external sources; how they developed culture to facilitate Knowledge Management Processes (KMPs) and what major challenges they raise for the future by looking at the case study of a Chinese Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs). The case study indicates that Chinese enterprises emphasised knowledge acquisition and the capacities of knowledge absorption, application, creation, sharing and integration as vital to sustaining competitive advantage for these firms. Corporative organisational culture also has significant impact on the KM in those enterprises

Business process simulation: An alternative modelling technique for the information system development process

This paper discusses the idea that even though information systems development (ISD) approaches have long advocated the use of integrated organisational views, the modelling techniques used have not been adapted accordingly and remain focused on the automated information system (IS) solution. Existing research provides evidence that business process simulation (BPS) can be used at different points in the ISD process to provide better integrated organisational views that aid the design of appropriate IS solutions. Despite this fact, research in this area is not extensive; suggesting that the potential of using BPS for the ISD process is not yet well understood. The paper uses the findings from three different case studies to illustrate the ways BPS has been used at different points in the ISD process. It compares the results against IS modelling techniques, highlighting the advantages and disadvantages that BPS has over the latter. The research necessary to develop appropriate BPS tools and give guidance on their use in the ISD process is discussed

A programme management approach for ensuring coherence in IS (higher) education

This paper examines IS higher education, concentrating on issues of ‘coherence’ in IS curricula. While curriculum coherence can be jeopardized by poor curriculum design, misalignment between module content and/or misalignment between module or course aims can cause serious coherence issues over time. Misalignment of this type is exacerbated by the traditional processes of curriculum (re)design, which rely heavily on the (singular) interpretation of highly abstract documents, such as module syllabi and course specifications – often produced by curriculum designers in isolation. To improve curriculum coherence, this paper examines the use of a programme management framework as a means of (a) ‘humanizing’ the abstract aims and goals of curricula schemes and (b) managing the delivery and evolution of curricula in relation to the stakeholders in the process of delivery. The practical use of the framework is examined in the context of a Masters-level course in ‘Information Systems Management’. An action research approach is used to demonstrate the practical utility of the framework in terms of (a) improving communication of curricula, (b) improving the coherence between modules and between modules and course and (c) removing content redundancy. Guidelines are presented that generalize the findings in order that key practices may be adopted by others

Cultivating knowledge sharing through the relationship management maturity model

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to present the development of the relationship management maturity model (RMMM), the output of an initiative aimed at bridging the gap between business units and the IT organisation. It does this through improving and assessing knowledge sharing between business and IT staff in Finco, a large financial services organisation. Design/methodology/approach - The objectives were achieved by undertaking ethnographic research with the relationship managers (RMs) as they carried out their activities, and developing the RMMM by visualizing the development of a community of practice (CoP) between business and IT. Findings - The RMMM demonstrates a learning mechanism to bridge the business/IT gap through an interpretive approach to knowledge sharing by defining knowledge sharing processes between business and IT and defining the tasks of the relationship managers as facilitators of knowledge sharing. Research limitations/implications - More research is necessary to determine whether the RMMM is a useful tool on which Finco can base the development of RM over the next few years. Practical implications - The RMMM acts as a practical knowledge management tool, and will act as a future reference for the RMs as they attempt to further develop the business/IT relationship. Originality/value - The findings provide an initial endorsement of the knowledge sharing perspective to understand the business/IT relationship. Also, the RMMM can be used to identify problematic issues and develop processes to address them

Closing the Business-IT \u27Gap\u27: A Trust-Building Approach

This paper argues that inadequate levels of trust underlie the poor relationship between cross-functional groups, such as business and IT in organizations and suggests trust-building guidelines for tackling persisting issues of cross functional conflict to leverage organizations productivity and performance. The paper begins with re-interpreting existing literature on the business-IT ‘gap’ to highlight why it is sustained by an underlying issue of trust deficit in the relationship and why a trust-building approach is appropriate for creating sustainable change in the system. It then critiques available trust-building advice and suggests an alternative approach to trust building. The paper builds on this by providing guidelines for action aiming to close the Business-IT ‘gap’

Evaluating Interactive teaching on conceptual understanding on medium enrolment classes

Interactive learning is increasingly being valued as an ideal environment that promotes critical thinking, conceptual understanding, intellectual development and success. The beneficial effects of interactive lectures though very well established for small classrooms are often debated for larger classes. My hypothesis is that interactive lectures can easily be introduced to large classrooms and that students’ engagement understanding and academic achievements can be greatly improved by constructively aligned interactive lectures. The purpose of my project is to evaluate the effect of interactive teaching on students’ engagement, conceptual understanding, as well as academic achievement and performance on medium enrolment(~55 students) classes. This is particular important for me as up to now I have been successfully implementing interactive lectures in small enrolment classes (<20 students) and now faced with the challenge to teach by myself a medium enrolment class (50 students) of the 2nd year students. To test my hypothesis I applied a series of actions on the course Nanobio 1 of the Nanoscience education some of which are shortly mentioned here: A) Interview with group of students after the end of the course. B) compare their understanding (using online tools) between subject taught using classical lecturing/preaching and subjects taught by interactive discussions C) compare students performance (grades) on subjects that are “preached” in theform of classical lectures, subject interactively discussed in the class and 338 Nikos S. Hatzakis subjects that are both interactively discussed and applied during practical exercises. My results showed a remarkable increase in correctly answering the exam question, from 45% for subjects only lectured to 70% for subjects interactively discussed and 87% for subjects interactive discussed and applied in practical exercises. Similarly online quizzes using Student Response Systems (SRS) like Socrative showed an increase from <30% to often more than 90% in students ability to apprehend and interactively discussed subject and correctly answer a multiple choice question when knowledge is attained in the form of interactive processing of information

A participatory qualitative analysis of barriers of public transport by persons with disabilities from seven European cities

Although there is literature published by a considerable number of scientific publications regarding disability and transport, the affected persons are only very rarely involved in the research. The paper presents the results of two qualitative studies conducted jointly with persons with different forms of disabilities: i) a social media content analysis and ii) peer-to-peer interviews with persons with disabilities (N = 49). The studies aimed to identify barriers that persons with access needs face during their trips with public transport. In line with a participatory approach, persons with disabilities from seven European cities were involved in conducting the research allowing for new interpretations of transport equity issues. Qualitative content analysis of both studies revealed barriers clustered into eight categories: regulations, public awareness and assistance, information provision and communication, infrastructure, vehicles, general service quality, stops and stations and emotional barriers. The two studies highlight important factors that influence disabled users’ experiences of public transport. Upon reflection, the paper derives research hypotheses and demonstrates the value of involving people with disabilities in the analysis of disability research to derive in-depth insights about equity in transport.Peer Reviewe

Multi-objective evolutionary methods for time-changing portfolio optimization problems

Thesis (S.M. in Ocean Systems Management)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Mechanical Engineering, 2007.Includes bibliographical references (p. 77-79).This thesis is focused on the discovery of efficient asset allocations with the use of evolutionary algorithms. The portfolio optimization problem is a multi-objective optimization problem for the conflicting criteria of risk and expected return. Furthermore the nonstationary nature of the market makes it a time-changing problem in which the optimal solution is likely to change as time advances. Hence the portfolio optimization problem naturally lends itself to an exploration with multi-objective evolutionary algorithms for time-changing environments. Two different risk objectives are treated in this work: the established measure of standard deviation, and the Value-at-Risk. While standard deviation is convex as an objective function, historical Value-at-Risk is non-convex and often discontinuous, making it difficult to approach with most conventional optimization techniques. The value of evolutionary algorithms is demonstrated in this case by their ability to handle the Value-at-Risk objective, since they do not have any convexity or differentiability requirements. The D-QMOO time-changing evolutionary algorithm is applied to the portfolio optimization problem. Part of the philosophy behind D-QMOO is the exploitation of predictability in the optimal solution's motion. This problem however is characterized by minimal or non-existent predictability, since asset prices are hard to forecast. This encourages the development of new time-changing optimization heuristics for the efficient solution of this problem. Both the static and time-changing forms of the problem are treated and characteristic results are presented. The methodologies proposed are verified through comparison with established methods and through the performance of the produced portfolios as compared to the overall market. In general, this work demonstrates the potential for the use of evolutionary algorithms in time-changing portfolio optimization as a tool for portfolio managers and financial engineers.by Iason Hatzakis.S.M.in Ocean Systems Managemen