<p> Organization Development (OD) has been used in a variety of ways to improve organizations both large and small. Interestingly, the institutions that teach and conduct research on organizations have been slow to adopt or utilize OD approaches and practices in their own institutions. This dissertation will use a thematic meta-synthesis approach to examine the case studies that have been conducted in which OD initiatives have been used in Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) between 2000 and 2015. It will look to synthesize the main themes of these case studies in an effort to create a new grounded theory of OD practice for HEIs. The study looked at 34 case studies (12 articles and 22 dissertations) that took place at a mixture of public and private universities and colleges in the United States from 2000 to 2015. Using a qualitative thematic meta-synthesis approach allowed the research to uncover the prevailing themes and discuss in a macro sense how OD has been applied to HEIs.</p>

<p> Excessive college student drinking is a complex problem associated with a range of consequences including deaths, injuries, damage, health risks, legal difficulties, and academic problems. State governing boards, trustees and executives have enacted policies aimed at reducing the negative effects of excessive drinking. This study examined influences on university staff members responsible for implementation of alcohol-control policies. Deeper understanding of factors influencing alcohol-control policy implementation may help leaders improve policy making, implementation and attainment of policy objectives. </p><p> This mixed methods study utilized a sequential transformative mixed methods strategy with a quantitative survey, sequenced first, informing the prioritized qualitative multiple case study. Research was conducted at two public universities selected from a single state. In the quantitative phase students (n=1,252) completed a survey measuring student support for 33 alcohol-control measures. Staff (n=27) responsible for policy implementation completed a survey estimating student support for alcohol-control measures. Survey data informed development of the case study interview protocol. In the qualitative phase ten interviews were conducted at each case study site. </p><p> The study&rsquo;s theoretical and conceptual model was based upon Pressman and Wildavsky&rsquo;s (1973) implementation framework and Kotter&rsquo;s (1996) eight-stage process for leading change. Findings from the quantitative phase of the study revealed strong levels of support for alcohol-control policies at both campuses while staff members generally underestimated student support for alcohol-control policies. The key findings that emerged after coding case study data included the influences of: (a) executive leadership; (b) leadership transitions and policy saliency; (c) cognition and sensemaking; and, (d) anchoring changes in culture. Student support for alcohol-control policies was found to have no direct influence on staff members responsible for implementation of alcohol control policies.</p>

<p> The concept of shepherding others goes back thousands of years, yet the shepherding metaphor received limited review in academic circles. A study transpired in order to better understand what shepherding entails. It was not known how self-declared leaders from the ecclesiastic, business, and education fields, perceived, described, and practiced shepherd leadership in the greater New York metropolitan area. The purpose of this qualitative case study was to explore how 30 self-declared leaders from the ecclesiastic, business, and education fields, perceived, described, and practiced shepherd leadership. The researcher conducted a qualitative case study involving 30 experienced leaders from three Abrahamic faiths (Jewish, Christian, Islamic) and three fields (ecclesiastic, business, education). All 30 participants completed the Shepherd Leader Inventory and the Brodie Ranking of Shepherd Leadership Skills. Combining 13 open-ended interviews with the two surveys enabled the researcher to triangulate the data. When participants were asked to describe practices unique to shepherding, the leaders in the study mentioned that the shepherd leader cares about others, behaves in a professional manner, builds up others, thinks through actions, builds relationships, shares authority, develops others, shows flexibility, and provides guidance. The researcher discovered that shepherding consists of similar constructs as several positive leadership models. Shepherding proceeds from Theory Z where the leader maintains authority in times of crisis and shares authority in times of ease. </p><p> <i>Keywords</i>: Leadership, Shepherd leadership, Shepherding, Servant leadership, Spiritual leadership, Positive leadership, Transformational leadership, Leader-member exchange, Agapao love, Ecclesiastic, Business, Education, Leadership theory, Spirituality</p>

<p> This study was conducted independently, but in collaboration with a team of peer-researchers who came together to study the lived experience of exemplar leaders in diverse organizations as they transformed conflict to reach common ground. This study contributed to the collective work by looking at K-12 Human Resource Officers (HROs) as the population of interest. HROs are often at the center of resolving conflict, yet only a few emerge as exemplar leaders. These exemplar leaders were the target population situated in the phenomena under investigations. The team selected a qualitative phenomenological approach, in an attempt to uncover what strategies exemplar leaders used to transform conflict to find common ground using the six domains of conflict transformation behaviors: collaboration, communication, emotional intelligence, ethics, processes, and problem-solving. Evidence showed that exemplar leaders tended to integrate these domains, rather than using them separately, for a more powerful impact in transforming conflict and finding common ground. Interviews, observations, and artifact data identified shared practices and behaviors to represent a more powerful repertoire of conflict transformational skills.</p>

<p> The Caribbean region consists of many small island developing states (SIDS) that are dependent on a sun, sea, and sand (3-S) tourism product. These SIDS are facing declining competitiveness vis-&agrave;-vis other tourism destinations and need to differentiate and rejuvenate their tourism product offerings. This study investigates the extent to which marijuana-tourism can lead to disruptive innovations (DI) in SIDS that are tourist dependent. A systematic review, using 53 research articles and a thematic synthesis analyzing seven different themes: (1) demographic profile of marijuana users and potential market size, (2) marijuana-tourism motivations, (3) common uses of marijuana, (4) types and structures of legal and regulatory frameworks, (5) cultivation, distribution, and marketing factors, (6) economic impacts of legalized recreational marijuana; and (7) adverse health and safety impacts were elaborated. The principal findings are that the regulatory framework for legalization acts as a mediating variable for defining the scope and structure of marijuana-related businesses and tourism niches that appear. When the recreational regulatory framework permits private competition, as evidenced in the early pioneering jurisdictions, significant economic benefits have resulted and at the same time social and health costs have been attenuated to date. In the context of SIDS, legal regimes are still largely prohibitionist, and in a few instances, partial liberalization has occurred. As liberalization progresses, structural and governance challenges exist that may moderate benefits. Further research is needed in many areas, given that the liberalization of marijuana laws is a recent phenomenon. More research is needed in areas, such as in-depth economic and social impacts analysis; the profile, composition, and expenditure patterns of marijuana tourists; the comparative advantages of different regulatory frameworks; and the public health and safety impacts for residents, marijuana tourists, and hospitality sector workers.</p><p>

<p> A gap exists in the literature on the actual experiences of older workers with information and communication technology adoption in technology-infused workplaces. To inform organizations on how to more effectively support this employee group's adoption of technology, the purpose of this qualitative exploratory multiple case study was designed to gain a deeper understanding of the daily experiences of older workers when adopting and adapting to information and communication technologies in a technology-infused workplace. This study is framed by, first, the <i>selection-optimization-compensation framework for successful aging</i> and, second, the <i>age-inclusive training design framework.</i> Semistructured interviews with 8 participants, observational field notes, and archival data provided data regarding specific technology experiences among older workers in the workplace. Identifiable themes emerged through thematic analysis of the textual data and cross-case synthesis analysis. A total of 8 categories that enclose a total of 18 themes were identified. The categories are (a) selection of resources, (b) optimization of resources, (c) compensation of resources, (d) performance limitations, (e) assessing training needs, (f) establishing/ sustaining performance, (g) age-inclusive training needs, and (h) older workers as organizational assets. Findings enhanced social change efforts by providing insight on the daily experiences that the older worker faced which may contribute to limited productivity in the workplace. Organizational leaders and human resource managers may use results of this study to implement provisions that improve help organizational profitability, team cohesiveness, and workplace satisfaction.</p><p>

<p> The purpose of this quantitative correlational study is to examine the relationship between three professional factors and the affective commitment of online adjunct faculty in a university located in the Southwestern United States. The three identified professional factors include: (1) the length of time they have been online adjunct faculty members for the university under study, (2) their current full-time employment status outside of their contract work with this university, and (3) the total number of online courses where they currently teach. Organizational commitment was the theoretical framework used as a basis for this study. Affective commitment was measured using the Three-Component Model Employee Commitment Survey. The results from Spearman&rsquo;s rank correlations did not identify any significant relationships between affective commitment and the length of time the online adjunct faculty member had worked for the university or the number of universities for which they currently teach (<i>p</i> = .359, <i>p</i> = .076). Additionally, the point biserial correlation coefficient did not identify a correlation between affective commitment and the outside work status of the online adjunct faculty member (<i>p</i> = .667). The results indicated that these experiential work factors do not have a relationship with affective commitment in online adjunct faculty members. </p><p>

<p> Health care organizations are facing increasing challenges as they strive to keep pace with evolving service delivery and reimbursement models. In this context, the effective use of Information Technology (IT) is widely acknowledged as a critical factor for achieving the quadruple aim of health care: better outcomes, lower cost, improved patient experience, and improved clinician experience. Even so, health care organizations have struggled to develop effective working relationships between IT and business units and there remains a dearth of research on the impact that the quality of the relationship between IT and business employees has on organizational performance outcomes. </p><p> Applying social capital theory, the purpose of this study was to investigate the extent to which the quality of the relationship between IT and non-IT employees is correlated with organizational performance outcomes in a hospital setting. Hypothesized relationships between the structural, cognitive, and relational dimensions of social capital and intellectual capital were examined. Multi-level SEM path analysis was employed to analyze survey data from 143 IT Field Service workers who provide services in one of 34 hospitals within a single health system in the western United States. Multivariate and ordinary least squares linear regression was used to investigate the relationship between intellectual capital (aggregated by hospital, <i>N</i> = 34) and extant data from four hospital performance metrics: hospital quality, employee productivity, patient length of stay, and patient satisfaction. </p><p> A positive correlation was observed between structural and cognitive dimensions of social capital (<i>Std.</i> &beta; = 0.550, <i> p</i> = 0.003), cognitive and relational dimensions of social capital (<i>Std.</i> &beta; = 0.581, <i>p</i> = 0.001), and between the cognitive dimension of social capital and intellectual capital (<i> Std.</i> &beta; = 0.643, <i>p</i> = 0.001). Intellectual capital was positively correlated with employee productivity (<i>Std.</i> &beta; = 0.468, <i>p</i> = 0.005) and negatively correlated with patient length of stay (<i>Std.</i> &beta; = &ndash;0.422, <i>p</i> = 0.032). These correlational results provide direction for future experimental research and offer guidance for health care and IT leaders as they examine whether the development of structural and cognitive social capital between IT and non-IT employees has a causal impact on hospital performance. </p><p>

This paper analyzes the founding rate of bioengineering departments in the United States. It takes the density dependence model from organizational ecology literature as the starting point of the analysis. This model predicts that founding rates of organizational populations are driven by population density, which represents processes of legitimation and competition, and by external environmental factors. The analysis finds support for density dependence predictions about the effect of population density on the founding rate of bioengineering departments. Further, this analysis finds that funding from the Whitaker Foundation has a significant positive impact on the founding rate of departments. The density dependence model is based on assumptions that individual actors are limited in their ability to act strategically and that competition is diffuse. In light of these assumptions and the threat to validity that would be posed if they were incorrect, the paper presents a discussion of strategic interaction and direct competition. I use an acceleration analysis comparison to conduct an initial study of the existence of endogenous interaction within the population of bioengineering departments. I find evidence of endogenous interaction through a process of cumulative social learning.

<p> This qualitative research study explored the characteristics, emergence, and engagement of people who occupy the role of the family champion in family-enterprise systems. The family champion is a next-generation leader who emerges from within the ownership group of a family-enterprise system and who works to develop the ownership, governance, and relational capabilities of the family-owners to support their goals of success. This study investigated the interdependent exchanges between individual family champions, the family-ownership group, and their family-enterprise systems. Much of the existing research on leadership within family-enterprises has focused on leadership for the business entity. This study focused specifically on leadership within the family-ownership group. Ownership of an enterprise by a family has long been cited as a strategic asset. A need exists for further understanding of the role and function of leadership within the family-owners. </p><p> This study explored the characteristics, emergence, and engagement of 14 primary family champions through semi-structured qualitative interviews. An additional eight supporting interviews were conducted with another family member who was familiar with the primary interviewee to provide a complimentary perspective. The research was discovery based and designed to explore the experiences of family champions. The extensive interviews were transcribed and analyzed utilizing grounded theory principles with the assistance of NVivo 10 qualitative analysis software. </p><p> This research revealed a rich interaction between the context of family-enterprise systems, the characteristics of family champions, and systemic shift points that created the awareness of the need for leadership. The family champions worked to develop the family-ownership group through a cycle of engagement, to produce an advanced family-enterprise system. Four main themes linked to issues in family-enterprises emerged: The systemic context of family-enterprises, the process of leadership emergence, how family champions operate as catalysts for change, and governance of both family and enterprise. The family champion is a visionary catalyst who brings new energy into the family system to support and develop the family-ownership advantage. This research makes a contribution to our understanding of the vital role of leadership within family-enterprises, and has significance for individual leaders, families who own a business, and professionals who work with these systems.</p>