Purpose and research question: The purpose of this research is to explore how dynamic marketing capabilities in international e-tail companies are influenced by organizational culture. Furthermore, the aim is to contribute to the theoretical field of marketing capabilities, as well as providing practical implications to managers in international e-tail companies.How does organisational culture influence dynamic marketing capabilities in international e-tail companies? Method: The study is conducted with a qualitative method and an abductive approach, using a single case study design. The empirical data consist of eight semi-structured interviews with people at the company Scandinavian Design Center, in addition to secondary data and observations on site. Findings: The results of the study indicate that characteristics from four types of organisational cultures, including entrepreneurial, team, hierarchical and rational can influence DMCs positively and negatively on two levels: incremental and renewing. Team culture influences DMCs positively on both levels, while entrepreneurial culture has both positive and negative influence on different levels. Hierarchical and rational culture negatively influence DMCs on both levels, except when it comes to formal roles and articulated goals, which positively influence both incremental and renewing DMCs.

This research project studies the management of change by school managers. South African school managers are operating in one of the most difficult environments in the world, one where many variables have an enormous influence on their main task, namely to achieve their organisation's goals and objectives. The new political dispensation in South Africa is characterized by a host of variables that can be classified under what is known as "transformation".The organization exists in a dynamic environment in which changing ways of life, as well as political trends are continually changing the environment and ultimately affecting it. Insight into trends and events in the environment, especially the ability to forecast the implications of these for managerial decision-making, are now a top priority for management, since past experience in the rapidly changing environments often of little help when the management has to deal with new problems.All organizations, including school organizations, are created and kept together by a group of people striving towards a common purpose or goal. All organizations have plans on how they will achieve the goals. These people are called managers, and they influence the success of their organizations. The success with which an organization achieves its objectives and satisfies the ever-increasing needs of society, depends on the competence of its managers.All organizations, including school organizations, are created and kept together by a group of people striving towards a common purpose or goal. All organizations have plans on how they will achieve the goals. These people are called managers, and they influence the success of their organizations. The success with which an organization achieves its objectives and satisfies the ever-increasing needs of society, depends on the competence of its managers.In developing goals, or planning the future of the organization, managers are confronted with decisions. In a decentralized organization members of the organization participate in decision making. Empowerment, which means the sharing of power with subordinates, has become a very important management issue.Change triggers emotional reaction because of the uncertainty involved, and most organisational change efforts run into some form of employee resistance. Resistance to change can be overcome by education and communication, participation and involvement, facilitation and support, negotiation and rewards, and coercion and manipulation.From the empirical research undertaken through the use of questionnaires, interviews and observation, it is apparent that managers are working hard to implement change and that all stakeholders need to be trained on issues related to change. This implies that managers have to be exemplary and motivate teachers, learners and the parent body to do their respective duties. Parents are no longer spectators in the education arena, they are part of the governance structures in schools. Their co-operation, support and participation is highly crucial in the implementation of change in schools.Several recommendations are made in respect of the Department of Education, managers, educators learners and parents in education. These recommendations will hopefully benefit all stakeholders in education and contribute in stimulating further research. / Thesis (MEd)--University of Pretoria, 2003. / Education Management and Policy Studies / unrestricted

The Quality Management initiative Lean is a popular method used by organisations to engage in organisational development. The Lean philosophy is grounded in numerous values. The organisations must implement and apply these values to achieve the desired results. Lean poses a dilemma in that many organisations fail to implement it because they fail to change, and they fail to maintain their new organisational culture. Lean's values are linked to sustainable development principles, and organisations that have implemented Lean have achieved results consistent with a more sustainable society. Previous studies have shown that more research is needed in areas in which business leaders require more support and knowledge so that they can combine these areas to strive for sustainable development.   The purpose of this thesis is to contribute a deeper understanding of the application of Lean values when implementing Lean, and the potential to interlink to sustainability theory. To achieve this purpose, studies have been conducted in three organisations. Data were collected through a survey, interviews, and a systematic literature review was conducted that was also used to analyse findings from the empirical data. The results have been presented in four different papers.   The findings provide deeper knowledge of Lean values during Lean implementation. They also provide a picture of the complexity in the inter-linkages between the values embodied in Lean and sustainable development principles. This thesis shows that the length of time that Lean has been implemented affects the kind and extent to which values are visible in an organisation: more values are visible in organisations that have worked the longest following Lean implementation. It has also been found that the values articulated in an organisation’s vision and strategy for implementing Lean have a greater perceived presence among employees than other Lean values. As well, differences were found in the presence of Lean values between the operational level and the strategic level of an organisation. However, findings indicated that the Lean values that were visible were more often fragmented rather than a pure value as presented in the theory. The findings also showed that interlinkages between some of sustainability principles and Lean values are more visible in one of the two organisational levels. For example, ´Waste reduction´ was only visible at the operational level.   Implementing and applying Lean takes time and requires a change in the organisational culture. This thesis concluded that the Lean values of the ‘System view’ and ‘Long-term thinking’ have low presence and are not a part of the values considered most important to employees when implementing Lean. For organisations at the beginning of their implementation, this knowledge may be good to consider as failures with implementation are often due to the fact that change in organisational culture does not happen as intended. This finding indicates that there are gaps in the knowledge among employees about the important links between Lean and sustainable development. It is difficult to draw boundaries between the values when they should be recognized as a system. / Kvalitetsinitiativet Lean är för organisationer ett populärt sätt att arbeta med organisationsutveckling. Lean, som ses som en filosofi, grundas i ett antal värderingar som utgör dess bas. Dessa värderingar behöver implementeras och tillämpas i organisationen för att önskade resultat skall kunna uppnås. Ett dilemma med Lean är att många organisationer misslyckas med implementeringen på grund av att de inte lyckas ändra och bibehålla den nya förändrade organisationskulturen. Värderingarna inom Lean har kopplingar till principer för hållbar utveckling och organisationer som implementerat Lean har nått resultat i linje med ett mer hållbart samhälle. Tidigare studier har visat att mer forskning behövs inom området då verksamhetsledare är i behov av mer stöd och kunskap för att kunna föra samman dessa områden i organisationer och därmed driva utvecklingen i en hållbar riktning.   Syftet med denna avhandling är att bidra med djupare kunskap i tillämpningen av Lean värderingar vid implementering av Lean, samt kopplingar till hållbar utveckling. För att uppnå syftet har studier genomförts hos tre organisationer. Empiri samlades in genom en enkätstudie och intervjuer. Dessutom gjordes en systematisk litteratur studie, som använts för att analysera insamlad empiri. Resultaten har presenterats i fyra olika artiklar.                                                                                                                         Resultaten bidrar med fördjupade kunskaper om värderingar inom Lean under implementeringen av Lean. De ger också en bild över komplexiteten som finns kring kopplingarna mellan värderingar inom Lean och principer för hållbar utveckling. I denna avhandling visar resultatet att tiden för hur länge implementering av Lean har pågått påverkar antalet synliga värderingar i en organisation. I detta fall är fler värderingar synlig hos den enhet som arbetat längst med implementeringen. Det har också framkommit att de värderingar som organisationen valt att lägga till i sin vision och strategi för implementeringen av Lean har högre närvaro hos de anställda än andra Lean värderingar. Det finns skillnader i vilken organisationsnivå, den operativa eller den strategiska nivån, för vilka Lean värderingar som är närvarande på respektive nivå. De Lean värderingar som identifierats som synliga har i de flesta fall endast visat sig vara delar av hur Lean värderingarna presenteras i teorin. Kopplingarna mellan Lean värderingar och principer för hållbar utveckling är många och finns representerade inom all tre hållbarhetsaspekterna: ekonomi, miljö och sociala området. Resultatet visar att vissa hållbarhets principer som har kopplingar till Lean värderingarna är mer synlig i en av de två organisationsnivåerna. Till exempel eliminering av löserier är mer synlig i den operativa nivån. Systemsyn, som har betydelse ur ett hållbarhetsperspektiv, har av medarbetare rankats som minst viktig av de utvalda Lean värderingarna och har låg synlighet i organisationerna.   Att implementera och tillämpa Lean tar tid och kräver att organisationskulturen förändras. Slutsatser som dragits i denna avhandling är att Lean värderingarna systemsyn och långsiktighet har låg närvaro och tillhör inte de värderingar som ses som viktigast hos de anställda vid en implementering av Lean. Då organisationerna är i början av sin implementering kan denna kunskap vara bra att förhålla sig till då misslyckanden med implementering ofta beror på att förändring av organisationskulturen inte sker som avsett. Hos de anställda finns det luckor i kunskapen kring kopplingar mellan Lean och hållbar utveckling. Att dra tydliga gränser mellan värderingarna är svårt då de snarare ska ses som en helhet. / <p>Vid tidpunkten för framläggningen av avhandlingen var följande delarbeten opublicerade: delarbete 4 inskickat.</p><p>At the time of the defence, the following papers were unpublished: paper 4 submitted.</p>

Gamification and sustainability are two topics that have gained a lot of attention in the past few years, both from the corporate sector and the academic community. Yet, the connection between the two concepts has seldom been made. This study addresses this research gap, by presenting the novel concept of gamification and connecting it to established theories in the field of organisational change. It then creates a discussion around the question of the potential of gamification as a tool to foster sustainability practices within organisations.To answer this question, this thesis followed a qualitative research design. By performing semi-structured interviews with experts in the field of gamification, the study explored different aspects of gamification, namely its definition, the opportunities and challenges it faces in regards to sustainability, the organisation’s responses towards the concept and the hypotheses for the further development of gamification.The results of this study suggest that gamification has great potential to foster sustainable practices within organisations. With its element of fun, gamification has the power to engage employees in sustainability issues, create a deeper understanding of the topic and relate it directly to the employees’ personal values and decision-making process. By offering different perspectives and helping employees see the bigger picture, gamification can inspire a sense of meaningfulness and contribution to something bigger than oneself. However, this can only happen when the tools are designed and used in the right way. Building an understanding of the user and implementing the fitting game design elements to create an impactful experience for the player is, however, a complex and time-consuming process, and therefore put forth as one of the biggest challenges. Furthermore, gamification should strive to expand beyond the commonly used game design elements of points, badges and leaderboards to tap into the user’s intrinsic rather than extrinsic motivation.

The effective management of organisational climate has become an increasingly important ingredient for business success. This has resulted in a need for up-to-date research and information on the subject, leading to the development of various measurement instruments. The main purpose of this study was to validate the Organisational Climate Measure (OCM) for the South African context. The OCM is designed to serve as a global multi-dimensional measure of organisational climate and is based on the competing values model developed by Quinn and Rohrbaugh. In this study a comprehensive literature review was conducted prior to the OCM’s administration to a sample of 200 individuals currently employed in a South African organisation. The reliability and validity of the OCM was evaluated by means of Cronbach’s alpha coefficient and confirmatory factor analysis. The results indicated strong correlations between factors and a good model fit. It was concluded that the OCM is a valid and reliable instrument for measuring organisational climate within the South African context. Copyright / Dissertation (MCom)--University of Pretoria, 2011. / Human Resource Management / unrestricted

This study investigates what culturally related responsibilities leaders in innovative SMEs have when preparing employees prior to M&amp;As in order to mitigate drawbacks due to culturally related discrepancies. The findings of this study especially confirm previous studies on culturally related difficulties in change management by emphasising the significant meaning of evaluating soft factors prior to change. The study was conducted by examining an innovative SME in the telecom industry that during 2009 embarked upon a major amendment of business by restructuring the company set up and relocate its headquarters to Singapore. The analysis is based on both existent studies in the field of organisational culture and change management, as well as on material obtained from qualitative research. This research consisted primarily of unstructured interviews and active participation is various company events and initiatives.  The subject is of great importance as M&amp;As are an increasingly common feature of innovative companies' strategies in order to gain access to important knowledge and technologies. However, a great number of these initiatives fail, usually due to leaders inability to evaluate future prospects in relation to soft factors. The findings provide an in depth understanding of leaders significance prior to, and during change, in order to create cultural stability and predictability as a means of mitigating employee anxiety and ultimately reluctance to change.

Introduction: The focus area of this thesis is on Innovation services and organizations intentions for utilizing innovation services. Innovation services is defined as consultancy services aimed at improving the innovation process, such as innovation training, ideation sessions and innovative workshops. In regard to existing research, the field of innovation services remains rather unexplored. While some studies have conducted research on the impacts of utilizing innovation services, no study has explored the underlying perspectives influencing intention of utilizing innovation services.  Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to explore the underlying perspectives that influences organisations intention to utilise innovation services. Research Questions: How does the structure of the organisational culture influence the intention for utilising innovation services? Which factors motivate organisations to utilise innovation services? What value do organisations perceive in innovation services? Methodology: In order to answer the purpose and the research question of the thesis, a qualitative research approach was deemed appropriate as the focus of the thesis is to understand the “why” aspect of the utilization of innovation services. Semi-structured interviews were deemed as a suitable data-collection method to gather data from the appropriate sample. Since the purpose of the study is to explore the underlying perspectives that influences organisations intention to utilise innovation services, managers working with innovation were considered a suitable sample group due to their decision-making power on choosing to utilise innovation services or not. Conclusion: The study offers insight as to the underlying perspectives influencing organisations intention of utilising innovation services. The primary influencers were the improvement to the innovation process which could be achieved through the utilisation of innovation services, which could result in a more efficient innovation process, and increase the rate of innovation. Furthermore, the thesis offers insight as to how organisational culture influences intention of utilising innovation services and identifies that the culture within departments working with innovation differs from the overall culture of the organisation.

Business-IT alignment (BITA) has clearly become more important over the last decade. However, considerable difficulties remain when attempting to achieve a mature level of BITA. Therefore, research efforts which have resulted in a number of theoretical models have been able to help in devising and applying supportive tools for assessing different components of BITA. However, most of these efforts have either been produced in Anglo-Saxon countries or have been based on specific experiences in those countries. Consequently, they have tended to ignore a number of factors which differ in nature due to variations in cultural contexts. However, organisational culture has been given little consideration. Societal and organisational cultural aspects of BITA are particularly important because the majority of BITA models tend to focus more on the efficiency and effectiveness of BITA components rather than on trying to create ways in which how BITA can be achieved or maintained in different contexts. Therefore, the purpose of this thesis is to investigate the impact of societal and organisational culture on achieving BITA and influencing its maturity. The main result is an extended BITA model developed originally by Luftman, known as; Luftman’s Strategic Alignment Maturity Model (SAM), which is influenced by the organisational culture perspective. The research method and process advocated by Peffers et al. (2007) is used in the thesis to design the extended-SAM, consisting of six activities. The first of these activities involves identifying specific problems. This is achieved by an extensive literature survey of theories related to BITA, an explorative study of the impact of organisational culture on BITA and a classification of the general limitations of BITA. The second activity concerns the requirement for definitions of the designed artifact. The third activity is then specified in terms of designing the artifact; i.e. an extended-SAM. The design is based on constructed hypotheses of the potential impact of organisational culture elements (based on Smit et al.’s model (2008) on BITA attributes (based on SAM), and followed by an empirical study of 6 multinational organisations, for testing the hypotheses. Following that, in the fourth activity, various processes for extending SAM are demonstrated in different seminars within the IT management group at DSV, in conference papers and in different seminars of the Swedish research School of Management and Information Technology (MIT) (Forskarskolan Management och IT. In the fifth activity, the extended-SAM model is evaluated in 5 multinational organisations to test its practicality and utility. In the last activity, a journal paper (Paper III in the thesis) is presented to summarise all the processes. The communication is also carried out through pre-licentiate and the licentiate seminars. The extended-SAM shows in the result of the thesis that organisational culture is a clear factor that should be considered while assessing and studying BITA maturity. In addition, by considering organisational culture, assessing BITA is clearly shown as being more accurate and as reflecting a more detailed picture of the organisation’s BITA.

Public construction projects set the standards for new procedures and perspectives within the industry. A way of improving procedures is through communication and the inclusion of all involved parties. It is therefore the purpose of this report to investigate how communication through organisational culture, power and trust can affect the incorporation of the tenant in the construction process. Two case studies, both having public future tenants and public clients, were chosen to enable the investigation of the three parameters of communication, organisational culture, power and trust. The empirics showed that the tenant was often excluded from the construction process due to their differing cultural background. The results also showed that the tenant was considered to have lower status which was exploited at times. In addition, it was found that although opportunistic behaviour was present in the construction project, it was a greater internal issue within the tenant organisation. In the conclusion the authors recommend construction management to evaluate the consequences of incorporating the tenant in the construction meetings as it could lead to less construction errors. They further recommend the public organisations to oversee their distribution of resources in order to avoid opportunistic behaviour. / Offentliga byggprojekt bidrar med normer för nya tillvägagångssätt och perspektiv inom branschen. Ett sätt att förbättra dessa metoder är genom kommunikation och att inkludera alla inblandade parter. Syftet med denna rapport är därför att studera hur kommunikation genom organisationskultur, status samt förtroende kan påverka inkluderingen av hyresgästen i byggprocessen. Två fallstudier, båda med offentliga framtida hyresgäster och offentliga beställare, valdes för att undersöka de tre parametrarna av kommunikation; organisationskultur, status och förtroende. Empirin visade att hyresgästen ofta uteslöts från byggprocessen på grund av sin skiljda kulturella bakgrund. Resultaten visade vidare att hyresgästen ansågs ha en lägre status vilket de andra parterna utnyttjade. Dessutom visade resultaten att opportunistiskt beteende i byggprojektet var mer tydligt i de interna relationerna inom hyresgästorganisationen än i de externa. I slutsatsen rekommenderar författarna byggprojektledningen att utvärdera konsekvenserna av att inkludera hyresgästen i byggmötena då det kan leda till mindre byggfel. Vidare rekommenderar författarna offentliga organisationer att se över distributionen av resurser för att undvika opportunistiskt beteende.

Organisational culture is a construct for conceptualising the way people experience and describe their work setting, and can be linked to organisational benefits and employee well-being. Researchers suggest that culture is created through group dynamics and interactions over time, the influence of surrounding environment and the founders of the organisation. This study aims to understand the main aspects of culture creation in semi-enclosed environments, i.e. environments where employees are physically enclosed to their workplace and colleagues without being deprived of their liberty. To fulfil the aim, an explorative, qualitative study of the onboard superyacht environment was conducted. The data was gathered through semi-structured interviews with 31 crew members of various rank and position, employed on superyachts of sizes between 40- 90 meters. The thematical analysis of the interviews found unique characteristics of the environment in terms of customer requirements, work conditions, interactions between crew members and challenges experienced. These findings are discussed in terms of how culture is created through industry impact, crew behaviour and the leader’s role in the organisation. The study concludes that the main important aspects for culture creation in semi-enclosed environments are how relationships, behaviour and identity are shaped by intense interactions due to the enclosed and limited physical space, time spent together and distance from external relations. Furthermore, it is concluded that the industry characteristics create a strong community culture, making the onboard environment on various superyachts fundamentally similar despite not being connected to each other on an organisational level. It is also concluded that the challenges experienced by members in this environment are in line with the these aspects, and therefore closely related to the culture creation. Ultimately, the study found that the environment and superyacht case has great potential for further research. This thesis can therefore be considered a base that outlines the semi-enclosed environment onboard superyachts for future studies. / Organisationskultur kan beskrivas som en konstruktion för hur människor upplever och beskriver sin arbetsmiljö, och kan kopplas till organisatoriska fördelar och de anställdas välmående. Forskare anser att kultur skapas genom gruppdynamik och interaktioner över tid, den omgivande miljöns påverkan samt organisationens grundare. Den här studien ämnar att förstå de huvudsakliga förutsättningarna för kulturskapande i halvslutna miljöer, d.v.s. miljöer där de anställda är fysiskt begränsade till sin arbetsplats och sina kollegor, men utan att vara berövade av sin frihet. För att uppnå detta syfte så har en explorativ, kvalitativ undersökning av miljön ombord superyachts utförts. Datainsamlingen bestod av semi-strukturerade intervjuer med 31 besättningsmedlemmar av varierande rang och position, anställda ombord superyachts i storleksordning 40 meter till 90+ meter. Den tematiska analysen av intervjuerna visade på unika särdrag i miljön ombord i avseende på krav från kunder, arbetsförhållanden, interaktion mellan de anställda och upplevda utmaningar. Dessa resultat diskuteras i samband med kulturskapande genom industripåverkan, de anställdas beteende och ledarens roll i organisationen. Slutsatsen av studien är att de huvudsakliga aspekterna för kulturskapande i halvslutna miljöer är hur relationer, beteende och identitet skapas genom intensiva interaktioner, som uppstår på grund av den fysiskt begränsade miljön, tiden de anställda spenderar tillsammans och avståndet till externa relationer. Vidare så kan det anses att industrins särdrag skapar en stark kultur inom yacht-samfundet, vilket gör att den upplevda miljön ombord olika superyachts i grunden är samma, även om de olika fartygen inte är kopplade till varandra rent organisatoriskt. En annan slutsats från studien är att de utmaningar som anställda upplever ombord relaterar till kulturskapandet. Slutligen så visar studien att miljön, och i synnerhet fallstudien om superyachter, har stor potential för vidare studier. Denna uppsats kan därför anses som en grund till framtida studier om halvslutna miljöer och studier om superyachtorganisationer.