Federally Qualified Health Center (FQHC) organizations, which provide health care services to low-income, underserved patients, are underfunded. From 2000 to 2007, the cost of treating an FQHC patient increased by $146, while federal compensation to FQHCs increased by only $44 per patient. One FQHC organization in rural Alabama experienced financial losses from the fiscal year 2011 through 2014, jeopardizing services to approximately 6,000 low-income patients. The purpose of this qualitative case study was to analyze the subject organization and discover opportunities to improve financial performance. The research question pertained to the opportunities for improving profitability at the subject organization. The conceptual framework was the systems thinking model. Along with data from the literature review, reviews of the organization's archived data containing employee feedback and feedback from unstructured interviews of four of the 14 FQHC chief executive officers in Alabama were used to develop the profitability model. No employees were interviewed or surveyed during this study, however, a review of archived documents revealed information provided by employees that was helpful in developing the profitability model. To help determine the subject organization's performance, data from independent auditors, technical assistants, FQHC performance reports, the organization's electronic health record system, accounting system, meeting minutes and performance reports were coded, classified, and analyzed. Data from these sources was compared to the profitability model and a gap analysis was used to identify the areas and causes of poor performance. The results indicated that the rural environment impacted the organization's financial performance. The subject FQHC organization may be able to use the results of this study to improve profitability. This study contributes to positive social change by providing a profitability model that other FQHC organizations may use to improve their financial viability and expand services to underserved patients throughout the United States.

The literature indicates that leaders influence the establishment of organizational learning culture (OLC) by the application of transformational (TFO), transactional (TAC), and passive-avoidant (PAV) styles. Further, the literature links OLC to the financial performance of organizations by leadership involvement in establishing learning organizations. However, the manner in which the practice of OLC occurs and the relationship of OLC with TFO, TAC, and PAV is unclear, as is the link between OLC and financial performance (ROA); especially for growing economies outside North America. The purpose of this study was to address this gap in the literature through a quantitative study of leadership styles and their relationship to OLC based on complexity and contingency leadership theories, and organizational learning theory. The research questions focused on establishing the association between TFO, TAC, and PAV and OLC, and the link between OLC and ROA. Data from 40 commercial banks in Kenya were collected and multiple regression models developed. TFO and PAV Leadership styles were associated significantly with OLC; TAC did not have a significant relationship with OLC. OLC was linked significantly to ROA. The results of this study show that leaders of commercial banks build relationships with followers and support learning within their institutions; however, the results of this study show that these leaders engage in a limited form of organizational learning practice. This study has potential to contribute to positive social change by providing information about leadership and organizational learning strategies that advance transformational engagement with followers and organizational performance.

Alignment of information technology (IT) projects remains a concern for business executives and negatively impacts IT investments through failed projects. Drawing from the theory of systems thinking and the concept of holism, the purpose of this correlational study was to provide executive leaders with information about influences associated with the independent variables of project alignment and performance outputs, and the dependent variable, project success rates. Accordingly, the research question addressed the relationship between the 2-predictor variables and the outcome variable. Data collection involved a nonprobability, purposive sample of 49 credentialed project managers from Arizona who completed an online survey. Results from multiple linear regression analysis indicated statistically significant relationships between the predictor variables (F (2, 46) = 111.08, p < .001). The regression model predicted 82% of the variation resulted from the independent variables. The study's findings provide corporate leaders with a better understanding of project alignment, performance outputs, and project success rates from the operations perspective of project management professionals who contribute to the organization's competitive advantage through the implementation of strategic IT projects. The positive social change implications of this study include increased organization benefits, such as substantiated IT investments and higher profits. Increased project success rates substantiate IT investments through improved customer satisfaction and financial performance. Improved financial performance leads to higher profits, which leads to higher wages. Higher wages contributes positively to society-at-large through an enhanced quality of life.

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Allt mer naturvetenskapsdidaktisk forskning intresserar sig för systemtänkande och elevers utvecklande av förmågor som att förstå, förklara och tolka komplexa och dynamiska system. I detta ingår identifikation av fenomen på olika biologiska organisationsnivåer och relationerna dem emellan. Kolets kretslopp är exempel på ett komplext system som innefattar komponenter och processer på flera olika mikro- och makronivåer. Denna studie undersöker elevers uppfattning och användning av olika biologiska organisationsnivåer vid förklaring av kolets kretslopp med hjälp av en interaktiv visualisering. För datainsamlingen användes think aloud-intervjuer med gymnasieelever som, indelade i par, genomförde en övning i visualiseringen och med hjälp av den förklarade kolets kretslopp. I analysen kategoriserades elevernas uttalanden till olika organisationsnivåer (molekyl, cell, organism, ekosystem och global) och beskrivningar av nivåerna upprättades utifrån kodning. Resultatet visar att eleverna framförallt förklarar kolets kretslopp på organism- och ekosystemnivå, men också att samtliga fem utvalda organisationsnivåer behandlas. Dessutom består resultatet av beskrivningar av, och exempel på, organisationsnivåerna utifrån elevers användande av dem, vilka kan fungera som stöd för biologilärare i utveckling av elevers systemtänkande. / An increasing amount of science education research concerns systems thinking and the development of students’ ability to understand, explain and interpret complex and dynamic systems. This includes the identification of phenomena on different biological levels of organisation, as well as their interrelationships. The carbon cycle constitutes a complex system including components and processes on several micro- and macrolevels. This study investigates students’ perception and use of different biological levels of organisation in explaining the carbon cycle through an interactive visualisation. Data collection was carried out through think aloud-interviews with Swedish upper secondary school students divided into pairs. The students performed an exercise in the visualisation and used it for explaining the carbon cycle. In the analysis students’ expressions were categorised according to five selected levels of organisation (molecule, cell, organism, ecosystem and global). Coding of the expressions was performed to characterise each level of organisation. The result shows that the students primarily explained the carbon cycle through the organismal and ecosystem levels, but that all five of the selected levels of organisation were used. Additionally, the results contain descriptions and examples of the levels of organisation based on students’ use. This can serve to support biology teachers in developing students’ systems thinking.

The growth of technology and the proliferation of information made modern complex systems more fragile and vulnerable. As a result, competitive advantage is no longer achieved exclusively through strategic planning but by developing an influential cadre of technical people who can efficiently manage and navigate modern complex systems. The dissertation aims to provide educators, practitioners, and organizations with a model that helps to measure individuals’ systems thinking skills, complex problem solving, personality traits, and the impacting demographic factors such as managerial and work experience, current occupation type, organizational ownership structure, and education level. The intent is to study how these skills, traits, and demographic factors can impact an individual’s abilities in working effectively with modern complex systems. These skills and traits also enable individuals to display distinctive patterns of thoughts in developing solutions that address complex technical problems. The dissertation further provides strategies for the management and enhancement of technical individuals based on assessing their performance. The model consists of three established instruments: Systems Thinking Skills, Perceived Complex Problem-Solving (PCPS), and Myers-Briggs Personality Type Indicator. These instruments are applied at the individual level to identify strengths and weak areas of improving an organization. In particular, PCPS is a researcher-developed instrument that captures the complex problem-solving perception of individuals. The different samples of the population for the dissertation come from students and practitioners.

The 21st century is marked by a technological revolution that features digital implementation and high interconnectivity between systems across different domains, such as transportation, agriculture, education, and health. Although these technological changes resulted in modern systems capable of easing individuals’ lives, these systems are increasingly complex, and that increased complexity is only expected to continue. The increased system complexity is due to the rapid exchange of information between subsystems, which creates high interconnectivity and interdependence between the subsystems and their elements. Workforce skill sets, as a result, must be modified appropriately to ensure the systems’ success. Systems Thinking is an approach that helps individuals better understand and effectively solve modern complex systems problems by encouraging holistic thinking. Systems thinking consists of two approaches holistic and reductionist views. This dissertation aims to study college engineering and non-engineering students’ preference for holistic thinking versus reductionist thinking, their ranking to the systems thinking dimensions, and whether this preference varies depending on demographics and general factors. Additionally, this study investigates the possibility of predicting the students’ preference for holistic thinking. The study uses the multi-criteria decision-making method, the Analytic Hierarchy Process and Fuzzy Analytic Hierarchy Process to determine the student’s preferences, and uses statistical analysis such as independent sample t-test and ANOVA to evaluate the factors. Also, the study uses machine learning classification models such as Logistic Regression, Support Vector Machine, Naïve Bayes, Decision Trees, voting classifiers, Bagging, and Random Forest to predict and evaluate the most predicting model. The results of the dissertation conclude that overall students prefer the reductionist approach and report the students’ preference towards dimensions of complexity, independence, uncertainty, systems worldview, and flexibility and the ranking difference based on some factors. Lastly, the results show that the students’ preference for holistic thinking can be predicted with a 77% accuracy using the Random Forest classifier.

Although the Dimensions of the Learning Organization Questionnaire (DLOQ) has been widely accepted by the HRD community, it has not been tested in a startup context for reliability. The purpose of the current study is to explore if the DLOQ is a reliable instrument for startups to help them be more successful. The current study seeks to address some of the questions, which have been posed by previous researchers. The study utilizes a mixed-method design applying Cronbach alpha values to check the reliability of the instrument in a startup learning environment, with more than 600 participants and 42 startup businesses at a university in the Mountain West. The study uses objective financial measures for startup firms to explore the correlation between the seven dimensions of the DLOQ and startup companies at the university. Cronbach alphas for the instrument measured at the .80 level or higher. Four of the dimensions were found to be statistically significant resulting in a model that accounted for 30% of the variance in predicted Operating Income (p<.004) and 29% of the variances in predicted Net Income (p<.003). The study also uses qualitative analysis to explore what activities relate to the seven dimensions of the DLOQ, and if those activities would be considered complex and disruptive. Thirteen activity clusters were identified and found to be relevant to startups and the seven dimensions of the DLOQ.

Around one million tonne of food is annually wasted in Sweden, of which 100,000 tonne of surplus foodis wasted in the retail sector. Even if redistribution of surplus food is the second most preferable optionto reduce food waste according to the food waste hierarchy, only 5% of surplus food in retail is donated.At the same time, food insecurity is a global as well as a Swedish concern. In 2017, 6% of the Swedishpopulation had a low-income standard, and food banks are currently reporting an increasing demand forfood support. The goal of the study was to investigate surplus food donations from grocery stores tofood banks as an approach to address the paradox of food waste and food insecurity. It was done byidentifying challenges and potential lock-in factors, and by analysing practices and success factors toidentify potential best-practices. The study was a qualitative case study and used the sustainabilitytransition framework ‘multi-level perspective’ (MLP) for analysis. The study took part in a collaborationproject to produce a handbook for surplus food donations in retail, which aims to guide actors in retailhow to reduce avoidable food waste by increasing donations. The results showed that there are some basic conditions that are needed for surplus food donations totake place in a safe way. These can be fulfilled in diverse ways, which have been analysed together withsuccess factors and learnings from the literature to give examples of ‘good enough’ practices and bestpractises. This division of ‘good enough and ‘best’ was made to address that small, volunteer-led foodbanks and larger, more experienced ones have quite different opportunities and challenges. Grocerystores also seem to face various practical, economic, and managerial challenges to donating their surplus.The analysis of the challenges showed some potential lock-in factors that contribute to obstructingsurplus food donations to be an integrated part of the food regime. These lock-in factors are mainlyrelated to the devaluation of ecological and social costs of food waste and the low political priority,thereby sustaining a lack of funding, and a ‘waste as a resource’-thinking. Even if there are severalpotential lock-ins that might need to be ‘unlocked’ for surplus food donations to be a part of a radicaltransition to a more sustainable food system, there are still several of the ‘good enough’- and bestpractices that can be implemented to incrementally improve the resource efficiency of the current foodsystem. Surplus food donations may, however, be a key component in the transition towards asustainable food system. / Omkring en miljon ton mat slängs årligen i Sverige, varav 100 000 ton överskottsmat slängs idetaljhandeln. Trots att omfördelning av överskottsmat rankas som det näst bästa alternativet för attminska matsvinnet enligt resurshierarkin för livsmedel, doneras endast 5 % av överskottsmaten idetaljhandeln. Samtidigt är matfattigdom såväl ett globalt som svenskt problem, 2017 hade 6 % av densvenska befolkningen en låg inkomststandard, och livsmedelsbanker rapporterar om en ökandeefterfrågan på mathjälp. Målet med studien var att undersöka donationer av överskottsmat frånlivsmedelsbutiker till matbanker som ett tillvägagångssätt för att minska matsvinn samt matfattigdom.Det utfördes genom att identifiera utmaningar och potentiella inlåsningsfaktorer relaterade till dessa,och genom att analysera praxis och framgångsfaktorer för att identifiera bästa praxis. Studien var enkvalitativ fallstudie och för en bredare analys av strävan mot ett mer hållbart livsmedelssystem såanvändes ramverket "multi-level perspective" (MLP). Studien är en del av ett Vinnovafinansieratsamarbetsprojekt för att ta fram en handbok för livsmedelsdonationer i detaljhandeln, som syftar till attvägleda aktörer inom detaljhandeln hur de kan minska matsvinnet genom ökade donationer av överskott. Resultaten visade att det finns vissa grundläggande förutsättningar som generellt sett behöver uppfyllasför att donationer av överskottsmat ska fungera. Dessa kan uppfyllas på olika sätt, dessatillvägagångssätt har analyserats tillsammans med framgångsfaktorer och lärdomar från litteraturen föratt ge exempel på "bra" praxis och bästa praxis. Denna uppdelning gjordes för att det framkom attmindre, volontärledda matbanker och större, mer erfarna matbanker har olika möjligheter ochutmaningar. Livsmedelsbutiker möter också olika praktiska, ekonomiska och administrativa utmaningarnär det gäller att donera sitt överskott. Analysen av utmaningarna visade några potentiellainlåsningsfaktorer som bidrar till att hindra donationer av överskottsmat från att vara en integrerad del iden nuvarande livsmedels-”regimen”. Dessa inlåsningsfaktorer är främst relaterade till att ekologiskaoch sociala kostnader för matsvinn ofta bortses ifrån, och den låga prioriteringen på den politiskadagordningen. Därmed kvarstår brist på finansiering och ett "avfall som en resurs"-tänk. Även om detfinns flera potentiella inlåsningar som kan behöva "låsas upp" för att donationer av överskottsmat skavara en del av en radikal omställning till ett mer hållbart livsmedelssystem, så finns det även flera bra-och bästa praxis som kan genomföras ändå, för att stegvis förbättra resurseffektiviteten i det nuvarandelivsmedelssystemet. Donation av överskottsmat kan dock vara en nyckelkomponent i omställningen tillett hållbart livsmedelssystem.

The impacts of climate change on livestock production are complex problems, existing in the rela-tionship among this sector and others sectors such as environmental, social, economic and political systems. The complexity and dynamic of these impacts cannot be solved simply in isolation with the linear approach. A system thinking methodology is introduced in this paper to understand the impacts of climate change on livestock production, and identify effective interventions strategies to address this systemic problem. System thinking is a way of thinking about the world and relationships which has been developed far along way in the past. Today, systems thinking has become increasingly popular because it provides a \'new way of thinking\' to understand and manage complex problems, whether they rest within a local or global context. While four levels of thinking is a fundamental tool to identify systemic problems, Causal Loop Diagram (CLD) is a visual tool created by a computer program to illustrate the whole picture of climate change impacts. CLD consist of feedbacks for system, which help strategists identify appropriate intervention strategies in solving the systemic problem. / Ảnh hưởng của biến đổi khí hậu đến ngành chăn nuôi là một trong những vấn đề phức tạp, bởi mối quan hệ chặt chẽ có hệ thống của chúng với các lĩnh vực khác như môi trường, xã hội, kinh tế và chính trị. Những tác động phức tạp đa chiều này không thể giải quyết đơn thuần bằng các giải pháp mang tính đơn lẻ. Phương pháp tư duy hệ thống được giới thiệu trong bài này cho phép hiểu đầy đủ, có hệ thống các tác động của biến đổi khí hậu đến ngành chăn nuôi, đồng thời xác định được những giải pháp chiến lược phù hợp để giải quyết vấn đề mang tính hệ thống này. Tư duy hệ thống là cách tư duy và tiếp cận với sự vật, hiện tượng khách quan, và các mối quan hệ của chúng, phương pháp này đã được nghiên cứu và phát triển từ xa xưa. Ngày nay, tư duy hệ thống đang được ứng dụng phổ biến và rộng rãi hơn trong các nghiên cứu phát triển bền vững vì phương pháp này cung cấp một “tư duy mới” để hiểu và quản lý được các vấn đề phức tạp, dù chúng ở qui mô địa phương hay trên phạm vi toàn cầu. Trong đó, bốn cấp bậc của tư duy là công cụ cơ bản để nhận biết các vấn đề phức tạp, và sơ đồ các vòng tròn tác động (CLD) là công cụ trực quan được xây dựng bằng phần mềm máy tính để chỉ ra bức tranh toàn cảnh các tác động của biến đổi khí hậu. Các vòng tròn tác động này phản ánh các diễn biến thực tế và các thông tin giúp cho việc xác định các giải pháp chiến lược.