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  • About
  • The Global ETD Search service is a free service for researchers to find electronic theses and dissertations. This service is provided by the Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations.
    Our metadata is collected from universities around the world. If you manage a university/consortium/country archive and want to be added, details can be found on the NDLTD website.
11

Critical success factors for lean construction intervention

Ward, Steven Anthony January 2015 (has links)
Despite the successful application of lean thinking across a wide range of industries, and a number of UK Government funded programmes such as the Construction Lean Improvement Programme and Constructing Excellence, the construction sector lags behind other sectors as highlighted in the Egan Report (1998) and more recently in Sir John Egan’s speech to the House of Commons in 2008 which gave the construction industry “four out of ten – for trying.”This led to the research question: What are the critical success factors for lean construction interventions? The emergence of lean production as a concept and the contributions of its key historic influencers are explored. Differences between construction and manufacturing are compared and discussed, and it is concluded that there is no practical reason why lean production cannot be successfully applied to construction operations. However, the issue of buildings being “rooted-in-place” is a potential barrier to true global competition. Progress was made towards a satisfactory definition of lean construction, a term hitherto ill-defined. Nineteen potential critical success factors (CSF) were identified in a literature review. A pilot study conducted with senior construction staff experienced in lean construction identified a further seven potential critical success factors and discounted three derived from the literature. Face-to-face interviews with thirty-one construction staff that had attempted lean construction interventions were conducted to examine the significance of each factor. Of the interventions, twenty-six were successful and six were failures. Statistical analysis compared the failure and success groups and of a total of twenty-three factors examined, thirteen were critical, two important, seven not critical and one unknown. Some of the most cited lean critical success factors, for example “There must be a crisis”, were shown to be not significantly important for the construction sector. Interdependencies between the statistically significant factors were explored and it was concluded that a wide concern with “getting buy-in” exists. Three factors appeared to possess a greater ability to influence all the others: the capability of management; client influence; and the right facilitator.
12

Implementing strategic change through projects: Identifying CSFs within the setting of SMEs

Martínez Zamorano, Daniela, van Bohemen, Joep January 2009 (has links)
<p>Strategic change projects allow companies to align their strategy to the turbulent external environment in today’s marketplace and are therefore crucial for retaining the competitive advantage of the firm. The identification of the critical success factors for these projects has become increasingly important, because of the reported high failure rates in the implementation of such projects. The important role of SMEs for the social and economic development of a country is well-known. However, SMEs as an area of study are not often discussed by researchers and an appropriate set of critical success factors for them is lacking. Therefore, it is vital to identify the critical success factors for the implementation of strategic change projects in SMEs to ensure the success of their efforts.</p><p>This study, which seeks to determine the critical success factors for the implementation of strategic change projects within the context of SMEs makes use of a multiple-case study strategy. The cases are based in two companies where semi-structured interviews were conducted in order to obtain the primary data required. The information retrieved from the selected cases was analysed using a qualitative approach. For the elaboration of the conclusion, an iterative process was followed, moving from the data collected, to the theoretical background and to the development of theory.</p><p>At the end of the study it was possible to identify a set of eleven critical success factors that answers the research question of this thesis. In addition, a conceptual model was derived from the theoretical and empirical studies of this work, outlining three dimensions that are considered to influence strategic change project success in the SME-setting. The present study would be beneficial to the practitioners of SMEs as the identified set of critical success factors can be used as a checklist of points to concentrate on when implementing strategic change projects. This will assist them in ensuring that the crucial factors and issues are addressed during implementation. For academics, the study contributes new knowledge to the field and offers a common language for discussing the critical success factors of strategic change projects in SMEs.</p>
13

IT governance in Tanzanian public sector organisations

Nfuka, Edephonce Ngemera January 2012 (has links)
In many public sector organisations, the use of Information Technology (IT) has become important for sustaining and extending public service delivery. This has caused there to be a critical dependency on IT, which calls for a specific focus on effective IT governance. Accordingly, the success factors for effective IT governance must be determined and adhered to if an organisation wishes to increase the contribution of IT towards achieving its objectives. Much research has been carried out on IT governance effectiveness and the necessary success factors, but not with a focus on organisations from a developing country such as Tanzania. The context in these organisations is characterised by IT resources, knowledge and culture constraints as well as by an increasing level of IT investment and applications. In this research, we analyse how IT governance practices are implemented in Tanzanian public sector organisations (TaPSOs) and benchmark their levels of maturity. Furthermore, we analyse and identify the critical success factors (CSFs) that contribute to effective IT governance in TaPSOs. Subsequently, we analyse the effects of these CSFs on IT governance performance and develop and evaluate a CSFs framework for implementing effective IT governance in TaPSOs. We find weak IT governance practices, especially in terms of processes. This was also pointed out by the lower level of IT governance maturity in TaPSOs in contrast to public sector organisations in developed countries. Furthermore, we find that the identified CSFs have a significant effect on IT governance performance in TaPSOs. In addition, the designed CSFs framework is found to be important for providing guidelines to be used by IT and business management personnel for implementing effective IT governance. This CSFs framework for implementing effective IT governance in TaPSOs consists of the IT governance focus areas, CSFs, activities, roles, IT resources and environment in which it should be implemented. In contrast to existing frameworks from the research literature, the designed CSFs framework offers a holistic view by focusing on the five IT governance focus areas.
14

Implementing strategic change through projects: Identifying CSFs within the setting of SMEs

Martínez Zamorano, Daniela, van Bohemen, Joep January 2009 (has links)
Strategic change projects allow companies to align their strategy to the turbulent external environment in today’s marketplace and are therefore crucial for retaining the competitive advantage of the firm. The identification of the critical success factors for these projects has become increasingly important, because of the reported high failure rates in the implementation of such projects. The important role of SMEs for the social and economic development of a country is well-known. However, SMEs as an area of study are not often discussed by researchers and an appropriate set of critical success factors for them is lacking. Therefore, it is vital to identify the critical success factors for the implementation of strategic change projects in SMEs to ensure the success of their efforts. This study, which seeks to determine the critical success factors for the implementation of strategic change projects within the context of SMEs makes use of a multiple-case study strategy. The cases are based in two companies where semi-structured interviews were conducted in order to obtain the primary data required. The information retrieved from the selected cases was analysed using a qualitative approach. For the elaboration of the conclusion, an iterative process was followed, moving from the data collected, to the theoretical background and to the development of theory. At the end of the study it was possible to identify a set of eleven critical success factors that answers the research question of this thesis. In addition, a conceptual model was derived from the theoretical and empirical studies of this work, outlining three dimensions that are considered to influence strategic change project success in the SME-setting. The present study would be beneficial to the practitioners of SMEs as the identified set of critical success factors can be used as a checklist of points to concentrate on when implementing strategic change projects. This will assist them in ensuring that the crucial factors and issues are addressed during implementation. For academics, the study contributes new knowledge to the field and offers a common language for discussing the critical success factors of strategic change projects in SMEs.
15

Critical Success Factors for Implementing the Information System -- A case study of the electronic communication system of State-owned Enterprise

Fang, Sheng-I 12 June 2006 (has links)
While the low profit times is coming, most of the enterprises hope to strengthen the interior information construction to promote the ability of obtaining profit or enhancing the management skill. With the progress of information technology, descent of hardware price, more friendly user interface, fast computer processing speed and the simplification of information technology, all these factors will aid business management for the enterprises. Recently electronic-business has turned into the mainstream, to implement the information system and build the e-business enterprise nowadays are becoming the hot topic in business management. When the macroeconomic environment is changing quickly, now the state-owned enterprise is facing the unprecedented pressure of reformation. The reformation includes the simplification of manpower, the objective effect management and running the state-owned enterprise by the private stockholder. In order to face the changes and promote the efficiency, all enterprises step into implementing all kind of information systems to enhance the management efficiency. With the electronic trend, a state-owned enterprise has also implemented many information systems, however, the process turned out to have some success and some failure. What are the critical success factors and how do they work? It is worth to do research in depth. This thesis will take ¡§technology acceptance model¡¨ for basis and add something like ¡§computer self-efficacy¡¨ and ¡§task-technology fit theory¡¨ for external variance to discuss what the critical success factors are to implement the information systems for the state-owned enterprise. Besides, we hope the conclusion of the critical success factors will be the reference for other state-owned enterprises or government departments.
16

Exploring Critical Success Factors of the K12 Digital School

Chen, Ying-hsiu 10 September 2006 (has links)
In the new era of information technology, teachers will have to keep learning in order to offer students with proper directions. However; the traditional teacher professional training modes still have a lot of problems, so the teachers¡¦ aspiration in pursuing further professional development is not high. Teacher¡¦s training through the Internet using digital school therefore becomes one of the possible solutions to solve this problem. The management model of digital school is different than the traditional physical school; it will be difficult to run the school continuously if key factors are not operated and managed well. The Kaohsiung city K12 digital school is founded in 2001 by Prof. Nian-Shing Chen. It has already opening teachers¡¦ training courses for 10 semesters, and its excellent achievement has obtained an honor of wining the third place for the competition held by the Executive Yuan in Taiwan in 2002. It certainly exhibited its excellent model in implementation and operation. Therefore; exploring the critical success factors of K12 digital school will be able to advance its strengths to the digital school operators, for helping them to operate the digital school continuously and extend to the other cities and counties around Taiwan. All the teachers from the elementary and secondary schools will be able to have a more innovated and convenient digital learning environment. This study adopted Analytic Hierarchy Process for the research of critical success factors for K12 digital school, and the result showed that course content is the critical success factor. The most important elements are encouraging interactive course design, and the requirements of the course content that fits the students. We hereby recommend the operators of K12 digital schools to acquire the requirements of the teachers in advance before planning the courses, and offering the courses that will be useful for them. While designing the courses, the schools also need to consider enhancing the interactive and corporative learning activities. We also suggest the K12 digital schools to gain the supports of principles and government administrative chiefs. The positive reward system will be one of the attractions to encourage teachers to attend the training courses in K12 digital schools. The selection of the courses and the training of the teaching team are also the key factors to the success of running K12 digital schools.
17

Critical Success Factors across the ERP life cycle : A study of SMEs in Jönköping County

Krantz, Niclas, Sköld, Marcus January 2005 (has links)
<p>Enterprise Resource Planning systems are business systems that are expected to integrate all the business’ processes within organization, and since ERP systems are complex and re-quire extensive changes in the organization, it is crucial that the implementation is success-ful. However, the implementation of ERP systems is described as both risky and complex projects.</p><p>The purpose of this master thesis is to investigate the importance of different critical success factors across the ERP project life cycle within SMEs. Furthermore, we will compare our findings to see if there are differences between larger corporations in the USA and SMEs in the county of Jönköping, Sweden and try to explain the potential differences.</p><p>In order to fulfill our purpose, we used a quantitative approach to collect primary data from the SMEs in the county of Jönköping. Our data was thereafter qualitatively analyzed in order to describe our findings.</p><p>The conclusions drawn in this thesis is that the following critical success factors are per-ceived to be most important within the SMEs investigated:</p><p>• Infusion stage: Careful selection of package</p><p>• Adoption stage: Top management support</p><p>• Adaptation stage: Project champion</p><p>• Acceptance stage: Project champion</p><p>• Routinization stage: Education on new business processes</p><p>• Infusion stage: Vendor support.</p><p>It was apparent that the critical success factors identified in our research differed from the critical success factors identified for the Fortune 500 companies in the USA. However, we have failed to find any valid and reliable reasons for the differences even though we have discussed possible reasons for them.</p>
18

Industry and project enablers for broader use of modularization

Kluever, Karl Mathew 17 February 2012 (has links)
Substantial step-wise advances and efficient work processes geared towards leveraging the modularization strategy to an optimal extent are needed in industry in order to maximize its potential benefit for capital projects because the industry suffers from low levels of application of the strategy. Due to this, this research focused on what changes to the traditional work processes within the industry as a whole and on individual projects are required. The ideas presented in this thesis seek to guide individual professionals and engineering organizations to create an optimal environment in which broader and more effective use of modularization can occur. / text
19

Mission accomplished? : Measures of Success and Critical Success Factors in Startup Project Management

Jussila, Pertti, Wenderholm, Kirsten January 2015 (has links)
This research studies project success in the context of decision-makers in young, entrepreneurial companies, namely startups. More precisely the companies are European companies that are independent, active and under 10 years of age, and furthermore identified as startups through a framework created from literature derived from Organizational Life Cycle theory and other pluralistic literature about startups. The main concentration is in the concepts related to project success: Project Success Criteria and Critical Success Factors, based on two research questions: 1. “What success criteria are perceived to be most relevant in the project management of startup firms?” 2. “What critical success factors are perceived to be most relevant in project management of startup firms and why?” Previous studies on project management have been mostly conducted in the context of large organizations and typically in a quantitative form. Studies in project management of startups have been scarce, and in project success, nonexistent. Researchers have called upon project literature that concentrates on particular organizational context. In this study, existing theories are studied to find the most suitable framework for success criteria. This study is conducted as a case study, wherein interviews were conducted with startup founders, partners and CEOs, located in Finland, Sweden and Germany. The data collection in the interviews consisted of both semi-structured questions and rating of importance regarding the elements of aforementioned theoretical frameworks of Project Success Criteria and Critical Success Factors, creating a rich set of data, forming holistic cases of the view of project success. The resulting indicate that the most relevant success criteria for startup decision-makers are connected to customer relations, which dictates also the importance of short-term and long-term goals. The economic goals as well the preparation for future were more polarizing. The concentration on customer criteria is not divergent from previous research, but the importance of team criteria is a noticeable difference and a common theme across cases. It is also noticeable in the statements of interviewees that in the startup context the uncertainty regarding products, customers, and economical factors create certain tensions in project success assessment. In Critical Success Factors, there were also clear themes that mirror the aforementioned results. It furthermore became apparent that startups do not have clearly established tools or methods for their project management, which may distinguish them from larger, more established organizations.
20

The implementation and evaluation of a behaviour based safety intervention at Sishen iron ore mine / G.P. Moller

Möller, George Philippus January 2003 (has links)
World-wide it is estimated that workers suffer 250 million accidents every year, with 330 000 fatalities. In South a c a , the fatality rate is 426 per annum. Sishen mine also experienced safety problems, namely a high injury rate, an average of one fatality per annum, and 85% of injuries being caused by risk behaviour. Furthermore, the safety culture at the mine was moderate. A proper safety management system requires continual attention to three domains, namely the environment (equipment, tools and housekeeping), the person (knowledge, skills, abilities, intelligence and personality), and behaviour. Sishen mine previously concentrated on the domains of environment and person, and virtually ignored safety behaviour. To correct this, Sishen mine adapted a behaviour based safety intervention programme. The aims of this research were to determine drivers that motivate safety and risk behaviour, to identify critical factors for the successful implementation of such a programme, and to determine if the safety culture and performance were affected by the implementation of a behaviour based safety intervention programme. A single-group non-experimental design was used. Questionnaires were used to conduct non-experimental surveys. The questionnaires addressed certain safety culture dimensions. A longitudinal survey was carried out before and after implementation of the behaviour based safety intervention programme. The results showed that the safety culture at the mine improved since implementation of the intervention programme. Management support for safety improved by 6%, peer support for safety by 13%, personal responsibility for safety by 7%, management systems by 6%, and employees actively caring for safety, by 3%. The improvement in safety culture also positively impacted on the injury rate at Sishen mine. Results indicated the following factors as being critical for a successful behaviour based safety implementation (in order of importance): participation, structured implementation, training, readiness for such a programme, communication, observation and feedback, target critical behaviours, flexibility, effective intervention actions, and data management. The study identified issues and challenges which must be dealt with, especially those applicable in developing countries like South Africa, with unique circumstances such as social and political diversity. The conclusion was that safety behaviour is mainly d i e d by activators, and motivated by consequences. The ABC model was identified as an important tool to analyse the drivers for safety behaviour in an effort to develop effective intervention actions. It is recommended that companies shift their focus from traditional safety approaches to the human dimension of safety. Thus, it is recommended that the behaviour based safety model must be applied by companies in order to focus on behaviour. Secondly, it is recommended that factors that are critical for a successful implementation must be identified and ranked in order of importance. The attention which is paid to each critical factor should then be related to its relative importance. It is also recommended that activators and consequences must be regarded as important drivers for safety behaviour when intervention actions are to be developed, and that the ABC technique should be applied in practice to analyse the appropriateness of the intervention actions. By way of conclusion, recommendations for future research are made. / Thesis (Ph.D. (Industrial Psychology))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2004.

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