Serendipity and Organizational Capability

We clarified the concept of serendipity through discriminating the five types of serendipity by using three classification criteria, together with through illustrating the case of each type of serendipity. Then, based on our view that serendipity can be regarded as organizational capability, a key concept of the resource-based view of strategy research, we explored the organizational capability required for the serendipitous innovation by reviewing two recent research papers. As a result, we found that the properties of the organizational capability for increasing and facilitating the serendipitous innovation are not so different from those for the non-serendipitous innovation. The essential facilitating factor for the serendipitous innovation is the realization and penetration of the idea that the unexpected information is one of the important sources of innovations.

Practitioners' learning about healthcare supply chain management in the COVID-19 pandemic: a public procurement perspective

PurposeThe procurement and supply of crucial healthcare products in the early stages of the COVID-19 emergency were chaotic. To prepare for future crises, we must be able to describe what went wrong, and why, and map out ways to build agility and resilience. How can this be done effectively, given the highly complex and diverse network of actors across governments, care providers and supply chains, and the extreme uncertainty and dynamism in the procurement system and supplier markets? The purpose of this study was to capture learning from practitioners in “real time” in a way that could frame and inform capacity building across healthcare systems with varying procurement and supply management maturity.Design/methodology/approachThis exploratory study involved interviews with 58 senior public procurement practitioners in central and regional governments, NGOs and leaders of professional organizations from 23 countries, very early in the COVID crisis. Following the first, inductive phase of analysis leading to five descriptive dimensions, the awareness-motivation-capability (A-M-C) framework was applied in a further round of coding, to understand immediate challenges faced by procurement practitioners, how the complex, multi-level procurement system that shaped their motivations to respond and critical capabilities required to face these challenges.FindingsDevelopments across 23 countries and practitioners' learning about procurement and supply in the pandemic crisis can be captured in five overarching themes: governance and organization, knowledge and skills, information systems, regulation and supply base issues. Together these themes cover the strengths and gaps in procurement and supply capability encountered by procurement leaders and front-line personnel. They highlight the various facets of structure, resource and process which constitute organizational capability. However, to account better for the highly dynamic situation characterized by both unprecedented rivalry and cooperation, analysts must also pay attention to actors' emerging awareness of the situation and their rapidly changing motivations.Originality/valueThe application of the A-M-C framework is unique in the healthcare supply chain and disaster management literature. It enables a comprehensive overview of healthcare procurement from a system perspective. This study shows how increasing system preparedness for future emergencies depends both on developing critical capabilities and understanding how awareness and motivation influence the effective deployment of those capabilities.

Mindset Trek

Abstract—Throughout the world today, the capacity to innovate is no longer an option. It’s a necessity for any organization that hopes to survive and find success. However, innovation is not just an organizational capability. A crucial piece is the personal capabilities of those who are called on to enable that innovation. That’s arguably everyone.Mindset Trek elearning is designed to develop the mindset needed to be an effective innovator, in a wide range of settings. Settings that include universities and startup incubators and accelerators, as well as corporate, R&D, government and non-profit. By focusing on the underlying mindset that is common to all types of innovation, this approach transcends those boundaries.

Human-related capabilities in big data analytics: a taxonomy of human factors with impact on firm performance

This study intends to provide scholars and practitioners with an understanding of human resource challenges in the context of Big Data Analytics (BDA). This paper provides a holistic framework of human-related capabilities that organizations must consider when implementing BDA to facilitate decision-making. For this purpose, the authors conducted a systematic literature review adapted from Tranfield et al. (BJM 14:207–222, 2003) to identify relevant studies. The 75 publications reviewed provided the sample for an inductive, and systematic data evaluation following the well-known and accepted approach introduced by Gioia et al. (ORM 16:15–31, 2012). The comprehensive review uncovered 33 first-order concepts linked to human-related capabilities, which were distilled into 15 s-order themes and then merged into five aggregated dimensions: Personnel Capability, Management Capability, Organizational Capability, Culture and Governance Capability, and Strategy and Planning Capability. The study is, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, the first to categorize all relevant human-related capabilities for successful BDA application. As such, it not only provides the scientific basis for further research, but also serves as a useful overview of the critical factors for BDA use in decision-making processes.

Building Perspective-Taking as an Organizational Capability: A Change Intervention in a Health Care Setting

Perspective-taking, or engaging with the viewpoints of others, has been linked to a range of positive and negative interpersonal outcomes. However, it has only been researched infrequently in organizations, and questions remain about how it might be developed as a multidimensional cooperative process and problem-solving capability more widely. To better understand this, this article presents findings from a 2-year change intervention with 10 US hospitals. Interview data from three time points (393 interviews, 197 staff members) reveal dimensions and levels of understanding underpinning the development of organizational perspective-taking. Actors’ accounts suggested several major interrelated dimensions of perspective-taking operating at local and system levels, through affective concern, cognitive understanding, and motivational efforts to improve the sharing and interpretation of diverse perspectives. The study has implications for how organizations can better foster perspective-taking by building ecological structures and processes that assemble perspectives supportively, holistically, and frequently.

Connecting Key Organizational Dimensions for Creating Value Focused on Service in the New Era

This is an era of profound changes in the businesses management and in people’s life. Many companies need to survive, recover and find new ways to create value for stakeholders. A focus on service is an imperative for that purpose, but it is necessary to harmonize this focus with a right understanding about the creation of value in the organizational reality according to the new era. As new technologies are replacing, facilitating and complementing the work of service employees more than ever, it is crucial reorienting the value that service can add. Our task is rethinking the main forces for establishing a focus on service in order to create consistent value. We focus on service culture and climate as the forces that need to be integrated for conveniently connecting with the organizational dimensions for creating value. Through an anthropological analysis and the case methodology we can understand the connection among the key organizational dimensions and the value they create: (a) to obtain sufficient incentives and resources-economic value, (b) to develop the organizational capability-social value and (c) to forge trust and commitment to the mission-ethical value. We extend current conceptualizations about climate and culture focused on creating value and share our reflections about the required connections for consolidating an integrated value, suggesting some managerial implications for that purpose.

Effect of Organizational Capability on Firms Growth: Implications on SMEs in Anambra State, Nigeria

Organizational capabilities are seen as the firm context in which the organization members work in order to contribute to growth of the firm. Thus, inadequate organizational capabilities have resulted to numerous problems for many Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) with growing difficulties in their ability to perform and attain sustainable growth. Numerous researches relating to organizational capabilities and firm’s growth have been conducted in the literature but none of these have examined the implications of organizational capability on firm’s growth. This research therefore examined the implications of organizational capability on firm’s growth, its implications of SMEs in Anambra State. The research employed a descriptive research design. The study population was one hundred and fifty-two business owners and managers of selected SMEs in Anambra State. Complete enumeration was used. Primary data was used and was collected using questionnaires. The questionnaire was validated using face and content validity. Reliability of the instrument was done with Cronbach Alpha indicates high internal consistency. Data collected was analyzed using correlation analysis. Findings from the study indicated that research and development capability have no significant positive relationship on firm’s growth, while human resource capability has a significant positive relationship on firm’s growth. The study concluded that organizational capabilities are key success factor for driving firm’s growth among SMEs in Anambra State, Nigeria. The study recommended that for SMEs to achieve sustainable growth, business owners and managers should increase their degree of firm’s interaction with the environment and add more value to human resources capability.