<p> Education policymakers in Nigeria lack the knowledge on the views of Niger Delta youths, who rely on entrepreneurship education and its contents to fight poverty and unemployment in their area. This study&rsquo;s purpose was to gain deeper understanding of the views of Niger Delta youths on entrepreneurship education, its contents, and its role in fighting their area&rsquo;s high rate of poverty and unemployment. This study was framed and guided by three key concepts that focus on the challenges of poor communities: youth unemployment in sub-Saharan Africa, entrepreneurship education, and youth entrepreneurship. To address this issue properly, a qualitative multiple-case study was designed. Data were collected from multiple sources: semi structured interviews, archival data from government labor reports , and the researcher&rsquo;s field notes.Data analysis was completed through thematic and cross-case synthesis analysis. . The findings showed that the Niger Delta is less privileged in financial availability, deepened in economic recessions under unemployment, poverty, inflation, hunger and starvations, with less chance of obtaining education, without qualification for employable white-collar jobs, neglected by the government of Nigeria, irrespective that Niger Delta region is the city of petroleum production that gives approximately 95% of Nigerian national revenue annually. With the adoption of entrepreneurship education in their school system and through training and skill acquisition, the Niger Delta would contribute to poverty alleviation, increased business career ownership, and meet the daily economic demands of their families, and be able to have a voice in social change. Social change can potentially be achieved through economic restoration and the enhancement of youths&rsquo; education and employment status, which in turn would help decrease the rate of poverty.</p><p>

<p> The purpose of this qualitative exploratory case study was to examine the significance of participation in a six-session innovation training program on participants&rsquo; perceived creative behaviors in a military research and development organization in eastern Maryland. This study included an introduction and background of the problem, thorough literature review, declaration of design and methodology, data collection and analysis, and presentation of the findings. Data collection included an online qualitative survey of past program participants, theoretical literature, and innovation training course materials. The survey responses showed evidence through individuals&rsquo; perceptions, beliefs, and lived experiences that may encourage leadership to utilize innovation-training programs and similar creative behavior training to improve organizational culture, communication, and experience. Four common themes emerged through data analysis relative to influencing creative behaviors as follows: Essential to Innovation, Applicable to Daily Activities and Organization, New Skills and Methodologies Learned, and Significant Perceptions and Beliefs. These themes were analyzed to formulate responses to the guiding research questions of this study. The data presented in this study has shown the potential value of innovation training by presenting both positive and negative outcomes, allowing leaders to understand current issues with organizational creative behaviors, and the potential opportunity to bolster these behaviors through innovation training. Organizational leaders have an opportunity to potentially utilize innovation training as a means of reinforcing or improving the quality and productivity of organizational innovative projects through enhancing individual perception in areas including critical thinking and problem solving, communication, collaboration and team building, and creativity and innovation.</p><p>

This study was designed to analyze the sources of revenue, revenue variability, program and personnel changes, and the fiscal soundness of six Latino nonprofit organizations (LNPOs) in three major cities in Western Massachusetts, for the period 1989 to 1992. Income variability was assessed for the period 1985 to 1992. Contingency or adaptive theory formed the basis of the study, with emphasis on organizational uncertainty, and the concepts of complexity and chaos. Contingency theory holds that there is no best way to organize, and that any way of organizing is not equally effective. The review of the literature was exhaustive and presented an analysis of the history, economic impact, and relationship of both LNPOs and non-LNPOs with the modern welfare state. IRS Form 990 and Form PC, filed by the six LNPOs with the Public Charities Division of the Massachusetts Attorney General, was the source of the data for this study. The study concluded that the aggregate reliance of LNPOs on government sources of revenue was 79.5 percent. Diversity of the funding base of these LNPOs was very limited. The average rate of revenue increase for 67 percent of these LNPOs ranged from 14 percent to 72.3 percent. The influence of revenue variability on the program mix and primary personnel was not as conclusive. Revenue increases correlated more with salary increases of primary personnel than with increases in the number of programs. Revenue increases correlated with salary increases of the rank and file for four of the six LNPOs. Fifty percent of the LNPOs in the study were rated as fiscally sound. None of the six LNPOs had contingency reserves and endowment funds. The most compelling recommendations for improving the infrastructures of these LNPOs include: the expansion of their funding base; the establishment of contingency reserves and endowment funds; effect changes in management and in governance; improve technology; and develop partnership with area colleges and universities for developing degree programs for managers of NPOs, and programs and workshops aimed at providing technological assistance to LNPOs.

This study is concerned with the impact of two simultaneous trends in American business. The first is that work teams have become increasingly popular in the workplace (Miller, 1991). The second is that increasing cultural diversity is a demographic fact in the current and future workforce (Johnston and Packer, 1987). On the basis of these trends, this study presumes that work teams are becoming more culturally diverse and that research is needed on how work group dynamics may be affected by cultural differences. The specific goal of this study is twofold. First, to determine whether members of a culturally diverse work group felt that others in the group treated them differently because of their cultural background. The second object is to determine if those people in question felt that cultural differences (in a group or as a whole) interfered with the group's ability to work together. To achieve this goal, I interviewed five white men, three African American men, four Latino men and four white women from four different types of work groups. Past research has suggested that cooperative teamwork minimizes cultural tensions within a culturally diverse group. However, despite participants perceiving their teams as cooperative, the men of color in their twenties and thirties and all the white women experienced ongoing harassment and exclusion because of their culture. These participants perceived a relationship between their cultural group membership and their work group's dynamics. The two older men of color (over age forty-five) did not claim to have experienced harassment or exclusion.

This study examined the work experience of a selected group of business executives by extending to the executive role the debate over paradigm commensurability that is taking place in the organization literature. The study set out to answer two meta-questions. These were: (MQ1) Can executives be multi-paradigmatic? (MQ2) What are the epistemological issues that need to be resolved so we can find out? This study used Burrell & Morgan's (1979) sociological paradigms framework and a research method that appeared to be compatible, Bougon's (1983) Self-Q Method. Four top level business executives were interviewed individually in Puerto Rico and New Jersey. The data generated was then analyzed through the lenses of each paradigm in Burrell and Morgan's (1979) framework. The researcher positioned herself in each one of the paradigms and analyzed the data through the lenses of the paradigms. The first analysis covers the two paradigms status quo paradigms: interpretive and functionalist. For the interpretive analysis, life history techniques were used. For the functionalist analysis techniques associated with grounded theory were used first (Strauss, 1987). The data was then submitted to a cluster analysis. The second analysis covers the two critical paradigms. From the radical humanist paradigm, the researcher reexamined the analysis of the interpretive paradigm from a critical perspective. Particular attention was given to the notion of self created entrapments. The radical structuralist analysis focused on the systemic contradictions embedded in corporate life. The analysis was based on a reanalysis of the findings of the functionalist paradigms. In relation to the appropriateness of the Self-Q Method for multiple paradigms research, it was found that the method is a point of departure for multiparadigmatic analysis. The method as used, however, is not sufficient. It is recommended that complementary techniques be used in future studies.

<p> Small business owners face challenges associated with leading change, and many times lack the necessary resources to manage it properly. The purpose of this descriptive qualitative study was to determine what challenges leaders of small businesses face in managing change, what strategies and practices those leaders employ, and how the leaders of small businesses measure success in managing change. This study also determined what advice leaders of small businesses would suggest for managing change. Four research questions were created to assist with this process, and 13 semi-structured interviews were conducted in various cities throughout the state of Michigan. The participants were small business owners of privately held American companies that had been in business for a minimum of 5 years. Twelve interview questions were asked to answer the 4 research questions. Many themes emerged. Some of the challenges that participants face while managing change are resistance to change, communication issues, lack of confidence, lack of resources, lack of knowledge/experience, absence of strategy, conflicts of interest, and lack of emotional intelligence. The participants shared many different strategies for successful management of change and also offered their lessons learned over the years. The main overall theme presented by all of the participants in this study was the importance of knowledge and experience for management of change in small businesses.</p>

Thesis (doctoral)--Universität, Bern, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 2001. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 88-99).

The impact of the Intranet on knowledge management within an Omani organisational context is investigated. The main purpose is twofold, to investigate the use, benefit and impact of the Intranet on Omani organisations and to identify factors that make organisations successful in using an Intranet. A quantitative survey is used as the main data collecting method, however, some qualitative means are used in each of two mini case studies to test the validity of the proposed model and inform a detailed case study. Using the strategy of multiple paradigms, the robustness of the results is shown to be increased and cross-validation is achieved. A number of statistical techniques such as descriptive statistic, Speraman correlation and regression are used to derive to the results. While most of the participants report the benefits from the use of the Intranet for their organisations in managing organisational knowledge, it is shown that currently Omani companies' experience is mostly limited to explicit knowledge. Furthermore, the empirical findings clearly link success with positive interaction between IT staff training, management support, availability of funds, user participation and organisational culture factors. The results of logistic regression analysis suggest that 89% of the variation in the level of Intranet usagew ithin Omanic ompaniesis attributedt o thesef actors. The model presented not only gives a description of the use and benefits of the Intranet within Omani organisations but offers a prescription of the factors that need to be considered in the implementation of the Intranet and the consequent utilisation of the technology to its full potential. The factors are of great importance, particularly to practitioners hoping to change the attitudes and the behaviour of employees who are reluctant to actively participate in the acquisition and exchange of knowledge. In the adopting and implementing Intranet based strategies for knowledge management in Oman, it is vital that these factors are considered.Practitioners and researchers alike will benefit from the results obtained. Researchers may benefit from the theoretical framework, which may form the basis for further empirical research. In addition, practitioners have gained models to guide them in implementing and using the Intranet to manage knowledge, the most valuable resource available to ensure organisational success.

<p> The purpose of the quantitative descriptive correlation study was to understand whether leaders of financial institutions considered operational risks when making decisions. A 6-point Likert scale questionnaire surveyed 30 leaders from 30 publicly held Small, Midsize, and Large Size financial institutions headquartered in the United States. The collection of data included demographic constructs, leader position, and size of organization. Dependent variables in the study were strategic, tactical, and operational decision types, and the independent variables were people risk, process risk, technology risk, and external event risk. Using Microsoft XLSTAT, descriptive and inferential statistics were employed to analyze the data. Statistical analysis using Pearson product-moment correlation matrix indicated a positive correlation between operational risk elements when making strategic and operational decisions and a positive correlation between people-process, process-technology, process-external, and technology-external risks when making tactical decisions, resulting in acceptance of the alternate hypotheses and rejecting the null. The findings did not result in significant evidence to support the alternate hypothesis and reject the null hypothesis for relationships between people-technology and people-external when making tactical decisions, resulting in a do not reject the null for these operational risk elements. Findings from the study may assist financial industry leaders in understanding if financial institution leaders consider operational risk when making strategic, tactical, and operational decisions affording the opportunity to improve leader decision-making in the industry.</p>