Leaders of small businesses need dynamic capabilities created through careful implementation of information technologies (ITs) to enhance efficiency, performance, and output. The purpose of this multicase study was to explore strategies leaders of small businesses used in developing countries to implement ITs for improved business performance. The framework for this study was the technology, organization, and environment model. The sample population consisted of 10 leaders of small businesses located in the Accra region of Ghana. The study participants had at least 5 years of experience working with small businesses that implemented IT. Data were collected from semistructured interviews and review of companies' strategic and project plans. The data analysis process included methodological triangulation, coding, the identification and congregation of themes, and the interpretation of inferences. Five themes emerged: top management support for IT implementation, investment in appropriate IT infrastructures, engaging in appropriate IT knowledge and skills training, creating an organizational culture of IT acceptance, and embracing legal and regulatory frameworks for IT. Findings from this study might assist leaders of small businesses in gaining insights into key IT strategies required for improving small business survivability. The implications of this study for positive social change include the potential to facilitate employment generation and reduce poverty in developing countries by improving small business performance.

Healthcare administrators have regarded employee motivation and performance as significant factors because of the challenges with employee disengagement, which may decrease patient satisfaction and profitability for healthcare organizations. The number of available jobs within healthcare continues to increase at a high rate, while the total hires within the healthcare industry decreased from 2.9% in December 2014 to 2.7% in January 2015. Motivation in the workplace is a continuous concern for organizational leaders, more specifically for the health care industry. Based on Vroom's expectancy theory, the purpose of this single-case study was to explore the motivational strategies healthcare organizations' leaders could implement to improve the performance of entry-level medical service employees. Data collection consisted of direct observation and semistructured interviews of 4 leaders and 22 entry-level medical service employees at a health care organization in the Piedmont Region of North Carolina. Data analysis included the use of multiple sources of data collection, along with the use of member checking with interview transcripts, which allowed triangulation and verification of the themes derived from the interview data. The 2 main themes revealed were workplace motivation and organizational leadership, which affects employees' performance and organizational effectiveness. Business leaders in organizations may use the findings of this study to increase employee organizational commitment, which could improve the U.S. health care industry turnover rates. Social change implications include the importance of the need for leaders to develop effective motivational strategies for motivating employees.

[pt] A presente dissertação tem como propósito analisar o gerenciamento cultural e o impacto no desempenho organizacional de uma organização de 145 anos, com 68 mil funcionários, que representa o maior agente financeiro do Brasil de fomento ao desenvolvimento urbano, nos segmentos de habitação, saneamento e infra-estrutura, na administração de fundos, e em programas e serviços de caráter social. A posição da empresa no mercado nacional e principalmente sua trajetória, passando por uma crise de confiança e resultados, com motivos internos e externos, até a recuperação recente de seus resultados associada ao ambiente do mercado financeiro, vem apresentando constantes alterações, principalmente devido às mudanças no cenário econômico que foi responsável pela significativa mudança organizacional. Neste estudo foi feita uma análise qualitativa de questionários semi-estruturados,discursos presidenciais,e entrevistas individuais, segundo tipologias culturais e modelos propostos por Chow et al. e Gordon. Conclui-se que a organização passou a ter um planejamento estratégico mais voltado para o mercado e seus clientes, reforçando a premissa de que existe uma forte correlação entre cultura, estratégia e desempenho, e evidenciando a importância de algumas variáveis como: processo de comunicação, estrutura de poder e processo decisório no gerenciamento da mudança organizacional. / [en] This dissertation has as objective to analyze the cultural management and the impact on the organizational performance of a 145 year old organization, which with 68.000 employees represents the largest Brazilian financial agent. This organization fosters the urban development in real state, sanitation, infrastructure, funds administration and in social programs and services. The position the company holds in the national market and mainly its history through liability crisis and its results with internal and external reasons until its recent result recovery is associated with the financial market environment. This position has been showing constant alterations mainly due to the financial setting changes that have been responsible for the significant organizational changes. In this study, a qualitative analysis has been done on semi-structured questionnaires, presidential speeches and individual interviews according to cultural and proposed models by Chow and Al Gordon. It has been concluded that the organization has adopted a strategic planning more focused on the market and on the clients emphasizing the idea that there is a strong correlation among culture, strategy and performance and making more evident the importance of some variables such as combination process, power structure and decision process and the management of the organizational changes.

To compete globally, the financial service industry in Taiwan continuously expands markets and integrates sources and is one of the industries popular in mergers and acquisitions lately. Counting on people to deliver service is one of the traits in the field, therefore, it¡¦s worthy of attentions and discovery about the relations of the acculturation/the employees¡¦ working attitude/the perceived organizational performance between the acquiring and the acquired firms when combined. The study targets on the two cases of M&As in the financial service industry happened in the past two years in Taiwan and it is conducted by the questionnaire survey. Throughout interviewing total 364 of the staffs and agents in Kaohsiung of two pairs of the acquiring and the acquired companies which were combined, the datum of the research is made by reliability analysis, descriptive analysis, Pearson correlation analysis, independent sample t-test, ANOVA, and multiple regression analysis to analyze the dimensions of the organizational culture and the employees¡¦ working attitudes and the perceived organizational performance of the acquiring and the acquired firms. The major findings are as follows: 1. The Organizational culture and the employees¡¦ working attitude both are statistically significant correlated to the perceived organizational performance, especially the latter affects the perceived organizational performance more than the former does. 2. Among the sub-dimensions, the organizational commitment in the employees¡¦ working attitude explains most the variation of the perceived organizational performance and then the recognition. Also, the service quality in the organizational culture explains most the one. It means that the organizational commitment and the recognition of employees¡¦ as well as the service quality are with significant influences on the perceived organizational performance. 3. The Organizational culture is statistically significant correlated to the employees¡¦ working attitude, and among its sub-dimensions the service quality explains most the variation of the employees¡¦ working attitude and then the teamwork. In other words, the service quality affects the working attitude of employees¡¦ significantly. 4. The working attitude of the employees¡¦ of the acquiring firm A is significantly different from the one of the acquired firm B, however, the odds in the identity degrees of the organizational culture and the perceived organizational performance between A and B are no significant. 5. The variations in the identity degrees either of the organizational culture, the working attitude of employees¡¦, or the perceived organizational performance between the acquiring firm C and the acquired one D are significant. The research gives the evidence that the working attitude of employees¡¦ affects the perceived organizational performance most. It represents that the acquiring firms should pay more attentions to the soft integration such as human resources and culture when combined to know better the expectation and to reduce the uncertainty of employees¡¦ of both the acquiring and the acquired, to enhance the strength and value identified by both sides in order to reinforce the confidence as well as the identity of the employees¡¦ if it wants the merger to reach the expected accomplishment.

In this highly competitive environment, innovation seems to be the inevitable challenge to every company. The employees within the companies have become the key point for the companies to be innovative. So how do these companies use human resource management practices to promote innovation capabilities? In this thesis, the study will explore the relationship between human resource management practices and innovation capabilities and as well as the relationship between innovation capabilities and organizational performance. In addition, the business strategy as the moderator is also discussed. This thesis is conducted through opinion survey. This study gathered 86 valid questionnaires replied by the directors of research and development department in each company and the findings of this thesis can be summarized as follows: 1.Training and teamwork impact the exploratory innovation positively. 2.Recruitment, career system and employee participation impact the exploratory innovation positively. 3.Performance reward impacts the exploitative innovation positively. Performance appraisal does not have evident impact on exploitative innovation. 4.Recruitment, career system and employee participation impact the exploitative innovation positively. 5.Exploratory and exploitative innovations impact the organizational performance positively. 6.Business strategy does not have evident moderating effect.

The Research on Flexible Staffing Arrangements in High-tech Industry Given the excess supply in the global market and the pressure of little gross margin in the foreign high-tech business, the major high-tech businesses can no longer enjoy a market with high growth rates and high profit earnings. The business, as the industry matures or even slows down, starts to seek for solutions to shorten its supply chain, to lower the cost of products, and to increase competitiveness. The technology industry has been facing cyclical fluctuations and fluctuations in demand in recent years. To sustain competitiveness in this market and to secure its core worker, it has to adjust with changes of time in the management of human resources, enhance the R&D and technology levels, and pay much more attention to long-term human resource development. Thus, in terms of human capital management, the major challenges the technology industry is currently facing are the issues of flexibility in the human resource department, the most efficient use of these resources, and how to adapt the planning and development of these departments. The goal of the thesis is to provide an in-depth study and analysis of 1) the status quo of the internal/external human resources management in the technology industry, 2) the relations between the characteristic of the organization and flexible staffing arrangements, and 3) the effect of flexible staffing arrangements on the organizational performance. This study uses the questionnaire adopted by Professor Jhy-Jer Ko in the study of The Flexibility of the Labor Market and the Atypical Work Arrangement(2003). 387 copies of the questionnaire were sent out to high tech companies and 115 were returned (112 valid, 3 invalid). The return rate was 28.9%. The results of the analysis are as the following: 1.Remarkable differences of functional flexibility are found among different characteristics of the organization. The larger the organization is, the greater functional flexibility it has. Organizations with over 500 workers have better functional flexibility than those with under 100 workers. 2.Remarkable differences of numerical flexibility are found among different characteristics of the organization. The lower the ratio of the labor cost to the total expenditure, the better for the organization to use outsourcing. 3.Remarkable differences of wage flexibility are found among different characteristics of the organization. The larger the organization is, the greater the wage flexibility is. Companies with lower ratios of labor cost compared to total expenditure have a higher tendency to adopt variable salary. 4.Functional flexibility has great effects on turnover rate of full-time employee. The greater functional flexibility is, the lower the full-time employee turnover rate is. In addition, the implementing of the practice of numerical flexibility can lower full-time employee turnover rate. 5.Functional flexibility and diversified skills-training opportunities have great effects on organizational performance. The greater functional flexibility is, the better the performance is. 6.Numerical flexibility has enormous effects on organizational performance. The use of outsourcing has a positive effect on the increase of the company¡¦s profit gains. Moreover, the use of dispatch has a positive effect on lowering employee turnover rate. 7.Wage flexibility has great effects on organizational performance. A higher rate of variable salary for full-time employees has a reverse effect on the lowering of labor cost. That is, adopting wage flexibility may increase labor cost. Keywords¡GFlexible Staffing Arrangements , Functional Flexibility, Numerical Flexibility, Wage Flexibility, Organizational Performance

This research focuses on the relationship between workforce flexibility and organizational performance of the cooperative subcontractors in the Steel Industry, and compares the differences between ¡§S¡¨ and China Steel Corporations. The questionnaires were mailed to 161 of the ¡§S¡¨ Steel Co.¡¦s subcontractors and 77 were returned; so the response rate is 48 %. Other 108 data were from survey data of the China Steel Co.¡¦s cooperative subcontractor, which are from my advisor. I deleted the overlapping cooperative subcontractors between the two steel corporations. Total survey size is 181. The results are shown as follows: 1. Deployment of workforce flexibility Characteristics of the functional flexibility of the Cooperative Subcontractors include development of multi-skill, horizontal and vertical mobility. The numerical flexibility is represented by the fact that average 80 percents of temporary workers among all the full time jobs, but there exists substantial difference. 16 percent of the subcontractors contracted out at least part of their jobs. The design of wage structure had flexibility. The ratio of variable wage is about 20 %. The subjective organizational performance was above average. As to the objective organizational performance, the contracting ratio of steel sales was nearly 50 %. The main reason for obtaining the deal were quality, customer satisfaction, delivery speed, and price. The turnover rate on average was not low (nearly 10 %). The reasons for the high turnover rate were the high proportion of temporary workers, and rapid change in demand, but the turnover rate was negatively related to the amount of capital and the number of regular workers. 2. The relationship between the organizational characteristic, the use of workforce flexibility and the performance of organization The different characteristics of organization including the number of divisions, the types of subcontractors, the number of regular workers, and the amount of capital have caused significant differences on the proportion of temporary workers and subcontractors. The smaller the size of regular worker of cooperative subcontractors is, the more likely the use of temporary workers will be. The labor subcontractors were more likely to use temporary workers, but the engineering subcontractors were more likely to outsource. The amount of capital and the dependence of subcontractors upon the steel company caused significant differences on the design of wage flexibility and the proportion of variable wage. The amount of capital of subcontractors has significant impact on the organizational performance, and the turnover rate. The number of regular worker caused significant differences on the operational performance and the turnover rate. The proportion of subcontracting from the steel company caused minor difference on operational performance. These show that the larger the amount of capital, the size of employees, the better the subjective organizational performance; whereas the smaller the organization, the higher the turnover rate. 3. The relationship between the use of workforce flexibility, other influential factors and the performance of organization The functional flexibility and the wage flexibility had positive association with the subjective organizational performance. The horizontal and vertical mobility had positive association with the turnover rate. The numerical flexibility was not associated with the organizational performance, but the proportion of temporary workers has significant positive impact on the turnover rate. The influential factors such as horizontal and vertical mobility, the dependence of subcontractors on the steel corporation, and the flexible wage design would influence the organizational operational performance. The influential factors such as wage flexibility, the amount of capital, and the length of time of cooperation with the steel company will influence the organizational production performance. But the proportion of temporary workers would directly influence the turnover rate.

Over the past years, research on the basis of intangible resources and capability has been suggested for the development of corporate competitive advantage. Through the process of learning, the organization can create knowledge and shortage intangible intellectual capital. This study is empirical research carried out on the industrial circles using questionnaires to clean out scholars¡¦ definition on intellectual capital and organizational learning capability. From this study, I try to find out the relationship among organizational learning capability, shortage intellectual capital, and organizational performance, also the interactive effect between organizational learning capability and strategy management of intellectual capital towards company¡¦ performance. The results of the research indicate: I. The factors of organizational learning capability 1. The executives¡¦ direction ability of learning and amelioration 2. Team-leadership competitiveness II. The factors of intellectual capital 1. The factors of human capital are: the knowledge innovation directed by executives, employees¡¦ professional capability. 2. The factors of structural capital are: cross department¡¦ management and storage knowledge, inner process responds to market demand, and cross department¡¦ knowledge group. 3. The factors of relational capital are: flexible business strategy of customer ecosystem¡¦ orientation, the management of service and brand value, and the management of customer orientation. III. Organizational learning capability and intellectual capital¡¦ storage have effects on organizational performance. 1. Through the intellectual capital intermediary effect, the executive¡¦ direction ability of learning and amelioration and the competitiveness from the team¡¦ directed have significant influence on business operational performance. IV. The interaction between organizational learning capability and strategy management of intellectual capital. 1. The interaction between strategy management of knowledge-centered and the executives¡¦ direction ability of learning and amelioration have significant influence on both organizational business operational performance and behavioral performance. 2. The interaction between knowledge-centered strategic management and team-leadership competitiveness has significant influence on organizational behavioral performance. 3. The interaction between strategy management of information-centered and the executives¡¦ direction ability of learning and amelioration have significant influence on both organizational business operational performance and behavioral performance.

In a freedom, international and global market, companies are under an intense competitive environment and with hi-pressure than before, besides increase the product and service quality, cost is a very important factor for operation. Since the margin of product is uncontrollable, personnel¡¦s cost controlling becomes a surviving criterion for businesses; therefore the typical employment relationship is no longer applicable to current challenging environment. In order to keep flexible to rapidly response the environment and sustain competitiveness, company¡¦s organization and staff placement are demanded adjustment. The goal of the thesis is to provide a retail business study and analysis of: 1) The status of the l human resources management in supermarket and hypermarket. 2) The relations between the characteristic of the organization and flexible staffing arrangements, and 3) The effect of flexible staffing arrangements on the organizational performance. 4) The influence of different management attitude between standard and non-standard workers. During this study, there are 38 copies of the questionnaire were sent out to HR supervisors of supermarket and chain-hypermarket stores, 30 were returned (no invalid). The return rate was 78.9%, nine of the HR supervisors had accepted an interview for opening questions about outsourcing training and flexible manpower policy. The results of the analysis are as the following: 1. Remarkable differences of numerical flexibility are found among different characteristics of the organization. The lower ratio of the labor cost of the organization is, the greater functional flexibility it has. 2. Remarkable differences of management attitude are found among different characteristics of the organization. The fewer layers of the organization is, the little difference of management attitude between various type workers. 3. Remarkable differences of organizational performance are found among different characteristics of the organization. The fewer layers of the organization has a positive effect on the higher customer satisfaction. 4. Functional flexibility has enormous effects on organizational performance. The diversified job arrangement of full-time worker has a positive effect on management effectiveness. 5. Functional flexibility has enormous effects on organizational performance. The independence of job arrangement of full-time worker has a positive effect on the increase of staff productivity. 6. Functional flexibility has enormous effects on organizational performance. Training supply of full time worker has a positive effect on the increase of staff productivity, company¡¦s profit gains, management effectiveness, customer satisfaction and decrease the ratio of labor cost. Base on the result of this research, here are our suggestion to business: 1) Considering company¡¦s long-term objective when planning the functional flexibility to cultivate and retain core workers. 2) Continue conducting training to increase organizational performance.3) Design a complete human resource management policy to increase effort and decrease the negative effect of non-standard worker. 4) Apply Wage flexible in company.

Due to rapidly changing conditions and the increasing pressure of global competition, corporations are facing a management crisis that has never happened before. To overcome this situation, corporations have developed a Corporate Transformation Strategy (CTS) to strengthen the core abilities, increase management performance and become a long lasting competitor. This is both necessary and urgent. However, the uncertainty and change that this aggressive self-motivated CTS brings directly effects employees at all levels. Therefore, the corporations have to arrange suitable Employee Incentive System (EIS) and Organizational Career Development (OCD) while concurrently the corporations are developing their CTS. Additionally, these incentives not only appease the work force, they lower employees desire to change employment, keep the best and brightest at the corporation, and raise all employees work satisfaction and performance. Combined, these results raise Organizational Performance, competitive advantages, and potential for continued growth. This study is based on 1,000 corporations in Taiwan and will show the direct and indirect relationships between CTS, EIS, OCD and Organizational Performance and how they affect each other. After analyzing data from138corportations with canonical correlation, regression analysis, ANOVA and LISREL, the research found: 1.CTS, EIS, OCD and Organizational Performance are all correlated. 2. The CTS has a positive preeminent affect on the EIS and the EIS also positively affects the Organizational Performance. This indicates that the CTS will indirectly affect the Organizational Performance by affecting the EIS. 3. The CTS has a positive preeminent affect on the OCD and the OCD also positively affects the Organizational Performance. This indicates that the CTS will indirectly affect the Organizational Performance by affecting the OCD.