Many organisations invest a considerable amount of capital and resources, implementing new techniques to improve their operating performance. Many approaches and techniques are available. New fashionable methods tend to displace older approaches, which may still have value. An effective strategy for selecting and implementing improvement initiatives is an important issue to ensure stakeholder satisfaction. This research aims to investigate quality management and continuous improvement practices, study and analyse several approaches leading to continuous improvement (CI), then construct a framework to assist senior management teams, by providing a decision aid for selecting improvement initiatives. Six key improvement approaches including Total Quality Management (TQM), Six Sigma, ISO9001, Business Process Reengineer (BPR), Lean production (Lean), Business Excellence framework (BE) were selected as the focus in this study. The research was carried out in three phases. Phase One established a conceptual background for the adoption of CI initiatives based on qualitative and quantitative studies of the literature. It described the two decision criteria of fashion setting and pay-offs. Phase Two provided empirical studies of the Quality Management (QM) approaches adopted in three case companies in Thailand. Different decision criteria for the selection of CI approaches were identified from these case studies, together with suggestions from fourteen quality experts and two additional case companies. In-depth analyses of each case study plus interviews with quality experts provided a context and guidance in development of the decision-aid framework for selecting CI approaches. Then in Phase Three the decision-aid framework was proposed, verified, and refined in testing with a multinational case company of four different plants in the Asia Pacific region and two groups of Small and Medium Size Enterprises (SMEs) using action research and assessment questionnaires. The primary outcome of this research is a decision-aid for selecting CI approaches, which demonstrated high utility in practice. The main contributions of this research are a decision-aid for selecting CI initiatives, which was developed and tested, and a number of advancements to the theory of QM and CI, the theory of management fashion, and the application of operations strategy in the QM context.

There are many factors influencing the sustainability of Closed-Loop Supply Chain (CLSC), in terms of industrial operation flows and environmental perspectives. This research aims to identify these factors in order to provide a better understanding of the process flows and interactions between the primary and secondary metal manufacturers and remanufacturers. In particular, it focuses on the influences of the Customer, Environment and Technology (CET) factors, with the intention of finding out “the specific approaches and techniques the Chinese metal manufacturers and remanufacturers adopt for sustainable development of the CLSC”. Qualitative case studies were performed in seven companies in the Pearl River Delta (PRD) region of South China. These companies are Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) of primary metal manufacturers, secondary metal remanufacturers, dismantlers, and third party reverse logistics providers. Data and information were collected through semi-structured interviews and observations on sites, in order to analyse the process flows in the supply chains. The key findings include the demonstration of the CLSC networks in the context of the Chinese metal industry, and the development of the process maps and Positioning Tool for case companies to identify themselves in the CLSC. These are theoretical and practical supports for academics and companies to understand the handling of various qualities and quantities of primary and secondary metals. Simultaneously, they assist companies in identifying and positioning themselves in the CLSC in order to define their direction for sustainable development in the long-term.

The goal of this dissertation is to motivate a Knowledge-Based View of Process Improvement. In doing so, it advocates that acquiring and exploiting knowledge is the key to achieving and sustaining competitive advantage. The heightened competitive landscape firms now operate in, is not only driving the need for process improvement in order for firms to stay competitive, but also the need to acquire knowledge from external sources as firms may no longer have the luxury of developing solely from internally generated ideas. With the understanding that knowledge resides in and is created by individuals, and in line with broader trends towards more micro-views of the firm, the research looks at process improvement and knowledge acquisition at the individual level. Based on a mixed methods design, founded on a comprehensive review of the knowledge-based view, process improvement, and social network literatures, eight case interviews were first employed. This qualitative work identified Absorptive Capacity, and notably Zahra and George’s (2002) interpretation, as the key underlying theory to this investigation. Furthermore, it identified three major dyads that govern the acquisition of knowledge: affective vs. competence-based trust; costs of searching vs. motivations for sharing; and individual attributes vs. firm culture. This conceptual framework was then empirically tested with a sample of 200 respondents. To analyse the quantitative data, the variance-based structural equation modelling approach of Partial Least Squares (PLS) was used in conjunction with three advanced techniques: higher-order formative measurement analysis, interaction analysis, and multigroup analysis. The resulting contributions to knowledge are five-fold. Firstly and arguably the largest contribution, the research identifies and empirically verifies the “social integration mechanisms”, the factors that convert potential absorptive capacity (PAC) to realised absorptive capacity (RAC) in Zahra and George’s (2002) conceptualisation of Absorptive Capacity. To the best of the author’s knowledge, this is one of the first empirical studies to do this and thus makes a significant contribution to this theory. Secondly, it empirically demonstrates the existence of three dimensions to our knowledge stocks: individually-held knowledge, network-based knowledge from strong ties, and network-based knowledge from weak ties. In doing so, it empirically illustrates the strength of weak ties hypothesis by Granovetter (1973) in addition to providing insight into the antecedents of Absorptive Capacity. Thirdly, following the trend towards the more micro- foundation view, this research contributes to the discourse on the individual-level view of Absorptive Capacity (iCAP). Fourthly, it extends the knowledge-based view of process improvement by beginning to fill the dearth of literature on the exploratory and socially embedded aspects of knowledge acquisition. In addition, it endorses Absorptive Capacity as a useful theoretical lens by which to view this perspective. Finally, the outcomes of process improvement, and thus the outcomes of knowledge acquisition, are contextualised as cognitive and behavioural changes, which are in high contrast to the more traditional tangible outcomes such as number of new products, or physical improvements in products such as quality or cost.

In today’s global and competitive markets selling products at competitive prices, coordination of supply chain configuration, and environmental and ecological consciousness and responsibility become important issues for all companies around the world. The price of products is affected by costs, one of which is inventory cost. Inventory does not give any added value to products but must be kept in order to fulfill the customer demand in time. Therefore, this cost must be kept at the minimum level. In order to reduce the amount of inventory across a supply chain, coordination of decisions among all players in the chain is necessary. Coordination is needed not only for a two-level supply chain involving a manufacturer and its customers, but also for a complex supply chain of multiple tiers involving many players. With increasing attention being placed to environmental and ecological consciousness and responsibility, companies are keen to have a reverse supply chain where used products are collected and usable components remanufactured and reused in production to minimize negative impacts on the environment, adding further complexity to decision making across a supply chain. To deal with the above issues, this thesis proposes and develops the mathematical models and solution methods for coordinating the production inventory system in a complex manufacturing supply chain involving reverse logistics and multiple products. The supply chain consists of tier-2 suppliers for raw materials, tier-1 suppliers for parts, a manufacturer who manufactures and assembles parts into finished products, distributors, retailers and a third party who collects the used products and returns usable parts to the system. The models consider a limited contract period among all players, capacity constraints in transportation units and stochastic demand. The solution methods for solving the models are proposed based on decentralized, semi-centralized and centralized decision making processes. Numerical examples are used by adopting data from the literature to demonstrate, test, analyse and discuss the models. The results show that centralised decision making process is the best way to coordinate all players in the supply chain which minimise total cost of the supply chain as a whole. The results also show that the selection of the length of limited horizon/ contract period will be one of the main factors which will determine the type of coordination (decentralised, centralised or semi-centralised) among all players in the supply chain. We also found that the models developed can be viewed as generalised models for multi-level supply chain by examining the models using systems of different tiers from the literature. We conclude that the models are insensitive to changes of input parameters since percentage changes of the supply chain’s total cost are less than percentage changes of input parameters for the scenarios studied.

This study focuses on critical design practice. The research challenges the colloquial understanding of ‘critical design.’ It problamatises, defines and reassesses the concept of ‘critical design’ situating it among other forms of critical design practice. The research reviews the field of activity from a historical perspective. It reviews contemporary activity in contexts of design research and the gallery system to establish domain authorities and theoretical perspectives that inform critical design practice. The research draws from a body of literature relating to design theory and critical design practice to identify several important themes by which to discuss the practice. The research employs a hermeneutic methodology and engages expert ‘critical’ designers through a series of conversational interviews. The interviews are analysed using code to theory methods of inductive qualitative analysis and subjected to hermeneutic analysis that draws on the extensive contextual review. Salient concepts found in the discourse are extracted, theorised and organised to create taxonomy of critical design practice. In the taxonomy, the field of critical design practice is categorised by three types of practice: Associative Design, Speculative Design and Critical Design. These three practices are differentiated by topics addressed in each and further differentiated by the type of Satire, Narrative and Object Rationality used in each practice. The original contribution of this research is a Taxonomy of critical practice in product design, which consists of a written and visual dimension. The taxonomy acts as a discursive tool to chart design activity and it illustrates the diversity in critical design practice beyond the colloquial understanding of ‘critical design’. The taxonomy presents three distinct types of critical design practice; it outlines the design methods used to establish the critical move through design and identifies the contexts where critical design is practiced. It can be used to compare projects, chart designers’ activity over time, illustrate trajectories of practice and identify themes in practice. The taxonomy provides theoretical apparatus to analyse the field. Such analysis contributes towards a discussion on critical design within design studies.

Demand planning (DP) is important for business performance. DP depends both on managers and on supporting systems. Managers are known to increase uncertainty by systematically overriding the systems and making unnecessary judgemental adjustments. This is a behavioural problem. Systems are assumed to be represented by different policies and individual differences by measurable traits and characteristics. The contribution of individual differences and policy parameters to DP performance is not clear. A framework is proposed based on the cumulative prospect theory (CPT) and myopic loss aversion (MLA). Methodology of decision making experiment based on the newsvendor is used. Individual differences are collected using previously validated psychometric scales and demographic questions. The sample (N=339) includes three main groups: professional planners (N=84), naïve students (N=166), logistics and supply chain management (L&SCM) students (N=56). The MLA hypothesis is supported. Longer planning horizons (less frequent decisions) outperforms short planning horizons. Regarding individual differences, only experience/knowledge and naïve interventionism are significant predictors of DP performance. L&SCM students with theoretical knowledge but without practical experience perform the best. No significant difference in performance is found between professional planners and naïve students. Naïve interventionism (plan instability) contributes negatively to DP performance. Personality (Big Five), impulsiveness, propensity to plan, decision-making style or demographics (e.g. age, sex, and years of experience or managerial level) are not significant for DP performance. The view that there is a ‘right’ mind-set (personality) to be a good planner is challenged. DP policy can offset individual differences. A MLA informed policy can reduce uncertainty introduced by behaviour. System restrictiveness (binding policy for long commitment) outperforms decisional guidance (non-binding policy for optional commitment). This is one of the first applications of CPT and MLA to DP decisions.

Hides and skins have been a resource that has created a wide range of activities such as clothing and footwear of all types, saddlery and riding equipment, travel goods and upholstery were amongst many industries using leather. This dissertation uses historical documentation to investigate the interactions of a small UK company working mostly in the USA that had a pivotal role in the transformation of the network surrounding the production, distribution and use of leather in the late 19th century. As an extended historical analysis it offers a particularly wide perspective on the complex and continuing network outcomes of that networking and the innovations to which it leads. This historical research location also provides an opportunity to examine innovation within the context of network evolution over many decades.

Although the ‘endogenous growth’ theory links macroeconomic growth to firms’ R&D, still, there is no comprehensive and conclusive research showing how undertaking R&D affects individual firm performance. Using several market indicators such as size, exports and productivity, this study provides a valuable input in the UK context by analysing a panel of 956 firms during 2003/4 – 2013/14, employing an empirical approach. We find no significant relationship between a firm’s R&D stock of knowledge and its size (measured in terms of both absolute size and size relative to its industry) across ‘All-Firms’ dataset as well as a subset of only highly innovative firms. Employing the Generalised Structural Equation Modelling, we evidence two-way causality between a firm’s R&D stock of knowledge and its exports, both positively affecting each other, depending on firm productivity. In line with Bravo-Ortega et al. (2013), we find that at a firm-level, R&D stock of knowledge affects productivity by two channels; directly and indirectly through export levels. However, we find no evidence of ‘selection’ bias in both export and R&D activities. Contrary to the ‘learning by exporting’ hypothesis, we evidence a negative relationship between a firm’s labour productivity and its export intensity (running in both directions).

Research and technological development processes increasingly entail inter-organisational collaboration for the access and integration of external complementary knowledge, especially within emergent technological innovation systems and small developing countries. Collaborative efforts aggregate capabilities of individual actors into system-level innovation capacity, fostering technological and innovation outcomes from both individual organisations and the technological system as a whole. Significant understanding of these interactive processes has been achieved by previous research on innovation systems, inter-organisational collaboration and networks, and studies of interdisciplinary scientific research. Nevertheless, further knowledge is required on how and why organisations may differ in their ability to collaboratively exploit potential complementarities. Consequently, this thesis examines institutional and organisational factors that influence the actual extent of knowledge integration achieved by public research organisations through collaborative research endeavours, within the agri-biotechnology innovation system in Uruguay. The research followed a mixed empirical method. Exploratory interviews with members of public R&D groups and firms were conducted in order to reach a preliminary understanding of the main forces affecting collaboration and knowledge integration. Quantitative indicators of the degree of knowledge-integration achieved by R&D groups' collaborative links were designed and computed using data gathered through a survey of R&D group members. Indicators were also developed to statistically assess how the extent of collaborative knowledge-integration achieved by an R&D group is influenced by system-level incentive institutions, by the absorptive and relational capacities of the group, and by the compliance of the group with local scientific assessment and reward mechanisms. This thesis makes various theoretical contributions and draws relevant policy implications. The results show that members of R&D groups may exert differing levels of influence on knowledge-integration. Specifically, postgraduate students were found to play a relevant bridging role, enhancing the ability of the group to access knowledge from complementary disciplines. The study also found consistent evidence of a negative relation between an R&D group's compliance with local scientific incentives, and the group's ability to collaboratively integrate complementary knowledge-assets. Therefore, formal incentive institutions are presumably affecting the exploitation of potential synergies among local knowledge resources and hence the learning and innovation capabilities and the cohesion of the entire agri-biotechnology innovation system. As a methodological contribution, this thesis develops novel indicators to assess the degree of inter-organisational complementarity that go beyond those used in previous research.

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