Organizational Behavior and Theory Commons^™

Smart Manufacturing And Its Implications For Singapore's Smes, Thomas Menkhoff, Surianarayanan Gopalakrishnan

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

While Covid-19 and the climate catastrophe continue to make headlines, local small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are quietly setting the gears of Smart Manufacturing in motion with a strategic focus on digitising and automating production processes powered by "Industry 4.0" (I4.0) ready business models. A shared view among several interviewees we talked to recently in the context of an ongoing study on the impact of I4.0 on the business models of local manufacturers is that Industrial Internet-of-Things (IIoT), machine learning, visual computing, automation and digital twining are deemed of great importance for the long-term competitiveness of Singapore's manufacturing ecosystem on …

When Your Authority Fluctuates Throughout The Day, Eric M. Anicich, Michael Schaerer, Jake Gale, Trevor A. Foulk

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

For many of us, the power we feel at work — how much, when it occurs, and around whom — can fluctuate. This can result in a surprising increase in stress and a decrease in well-being. To address this, consider these strategies for making power imbalances more manageable. First, be deliberate in scheduling your tasks to cluster activities with similar levels of power together. Second, give your work a routine and consider “theming” together days with similar activities. Third, create a role-transcendent identity in order to embrace your different levels of power. And finally, work to actively manage your well-being.

Carlos Ghosn: The Rise And Fall Of An Automobile Legend, Jochen Reb, Abhijeet K. Vadera, Sin Mei Cheah

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Was it politics, greed, or hubris that led to Carlos Ghosn's downfall? On December 29, 2019, disgraced auto titan Carlos Ghosn (rhymes with ‘tone’) made an audacious escape from house arrest in Tokyo, where he had been detained on financial impropriety charges. Of all the places imaginable, Ghosn hid in a huge case for musical instruments, which was then loaded onto an aeroplane as cargo. Dubbed as “one of the most brazen and well-orchestrated escape acts in recent history, involving a dizzying array of hotel meet-ups, bullet train travel, fake personas, and the chartering of a private jet”, it was …

Burnout Isn’T Just Exhaustion: Workers Can Also Feel Cynical Or Inadequate, Tina Li Yi Ng, Andree Hartanto

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Employers, take note: There’s more to burnout which corporate wellness initiatives alone cannot solve, say SMU researchers. The huge wave of resignations spurred by the pandemic has forced companies to confront burnout, implementing “burnout breaks” to curb the loss of productivity that comes with working too much. Though initiatives like “mental health weeks” are widely appreciated, they merely scratch the surface and do not solve the issue. To truly put out the flames of burnout, a precise diagnosis of the problem is critical. This is especially true in Singapore, the world’s most fatigued country where one in two workers feels …

Driving Health Care Results With Authenticity, Kindness, And Vulnerability: A New Model Of Authentic Leadership, John D. Couris

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Current management scholars have defined authentic leadership as consisting of four dimensions: relational transparency, self-awareness, balanced processing, and internalized moral perspective. This research extends the concept of authentic leadership to include kindness and vulnerability. I created two scales to measure kindness and vulnerability within the context of leadership and used them to examine perceptions of authentic leadership and its impact on three organizational outcomes: trust in one’s leader, work engagement, and psychological safety. Using a two-group, pretest-posttest experimental design, 44 Tampa General Hospital managers were either selected to participate in a four-hour authentic leadership training that included instruction on kindness …

The Longitudinal Effects Of A Family And Sleep Supportive Intervention On Service Member Anger And Resilience, Shalene Joyce Allen

Dissertations and Theses

The vast majority of workplace intervention research on employee anger and resilience primarily focuses on individual-level strategies for mitigating employee anger and resilience outcomes in the workplace, with no studies having examined these outcomes with tangible occupational health interventions utilizing organizational-level techniques. Thus, the current study extends the literature on how to provide improvements in employee anger and resilience using higher system and organizational change mechanisms by providing evidence-based support for the effectiveness of a Total Worker Health® intervention, referred to as the Family and Sleep Supportive Intervention Training (FaSST). This approach employs both health protection and health promotion strategies …

The Motive To Work: Assessing Organizational Motivation Within The Federal Probation System, Aleda M. Thomas

Dissertations

Competition within the United States workforce is growing at an unprecedented rate. Turnover rates of all organizations and businesses have reached an all-time high. According to the U.S. Labor Department, 4.3 million Americans quit their job in the month of August alone. Times have shifted to where the ball no longer resides on the side of employers, but now it resides with employees. As such, it is vital to ensure workplaces are enjoyable and encompass cultures that produce high levels of motivation, satisfaction, and engagement. As such, the retention of skilled and qualified employees must be at the forefront of …

Exploring And Exploiting The Dynamics Of Networks In Complex Applied Research Projects: A Reflection On Learning In Action, Paul Coughlan, David Coghlan, Clare Rigg, Denise O'Leary

Books/Book Chapters

Since 1984, the European Union (EU) has supported research and development activities covering almost all scientific disciplines through a series of multi-annual Framework Programmes. The current programme is Horizon 2020. Common across the key indicators of research project performance have been actions by companies, including introduce and test innovations new to the company or the market. Initiatives to achieve these objectives require researchers to generate transdisciplinary knowledge in partnership with practitioners as co-researchers. This paper reflects on the authors’ experience of engaging in five EU-funded complex applied research projects over 20 years. The paper locates the process of the five …

Cancel Culture In College: A Phenomenological Study To Define Cancel Culture In The College Generation, William D. Morgan

Senior Theses

The history of civic activism dates back centuries and in 2021, with the increased role of technology and social media, civic engagement rates are at all-time highs in the United States. The rise in popularity of smartphones and social media applications have given consumers new ways to connect with like-minded peers and develop a unified voice to fight for movements towards equality and justice in the US economy. College students represent a large point of emphasis for public relations and marketing teams as their generation is entering the US consumer market with high rates of social media use to make …

Gender Differences In Self-Attribution And Overconfidence In Financial Decisions, Aine M. Ford

Student Publications

Behavioral finance and the study into biases is a rapidly increasing area of interest for finance professionals and academics alike. Understanding the sources of overconfidence and the self-attribution bias from a gendered framework can provide insight for managers and industry leaders to insulate their firms from underperformance losses due to these biases. Education and relevant financial experience are key controllable variables that impact overconfidence and self- attribution. Using a survey sent to around 130 students and finance professionals, gender, education, and relevant experience were tested against overconfidence and self-attributional scores to determine if there were any meaningful relationships. The results …

Organizational Leadership In Funeral Homes During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Lafonda L. Ehlers

Doctor of Education (Ed.D)

The purpose of this non-experimental, quantitative study was to describe the impact that the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic had on essential elements of organizational leadership in the funeral home industry. A quantitative, cross-sectional survey approach was utilized as this study was intended to be a stand-alone study to provide a snapshot of current organizational elements of funeral homes impacted after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. All the employees of a six-location, family-owned funeral home in the Midwest, with the exception of two employees the researcher had direct supervision over, were emailed a survey titled A Non-Experimental, Quantitative Study …

Exploring The Impact Of Industry 4.0 On The Business Models Of Small And Medium-Sized Manufacturing Enterprises In Singapore, Surianarayanan Gopalakrishnan

Dissertations and Theses Collection (Open Access)

Triggered by the ongoing transformation of Singapore's manufacturing industries towards 'smart(er)' manufacturing with a focus on digitising and automating production processes and more competitive business models, this study contributes to the limited Asian management literature about the readiness and impact of 'Industry 4.0' (I4.0) on the business models of Singapore's Small and Medium-sized manufacturing Enterprises (SMEs). I4.0 encompasses adopting opportunities from end-to-end digitalisation with connected computers and increasingly autonomous automation systems equipped with intelligent machine learning algorithms that control robotics with minimal human input. As the traditional manufacturing model is increasingly replaced by advanced, high-value manufacturing technologies such as the …

An Initial Examination Of State And Longitudinal Effects Of Loving-Kindness Practice On Affective And Motivational States At Work, Theodore Charles Masters-Waage, Jochen Reb, William Tov

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Objectives: Drawing on practices and concepts from Buddhist ethics, we developed a loving-kindness training. We investigated the state and longitudinal effects of this training on employees’ affective and motivational states at work in two studies. Methods: Study 1 tested this training program in a randomized controlled trial, comparing the effects of loving-kindness practice on employee affect and motivation with an active (mindfulness) and a passive (waitlist) control condition. Analyses focused on both longitudinal effects (increases in affect and motivation over the training period) and state effects (effects of practice on daily affect and motivation). Study 2 conducted a 1-week study …

What Makes Employees Feel Empowered To Speak Up?, Shilpa Madan, Kevin Nanakdewa, Krishna Savani, Hazel Rose Markus

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Most managers understand that empowering employees to voice their opinions can help companies innovate and uncover their own shortcomings. However, this understanding does not seem to translate into action. Research shows that over 85% of employees remain silent on crucial matters because they worry about being viewed negatively. How can managers encourage employees to speak their minds at work? The authors’ new research identified a novel method to encourage employees to exercise their voice: creating a company culture that emphasizes the idea of choice. They found that employees were more likely to share their ideas and opinions at a company …

Too Many Peas In A Pod? How Overlaps In Directors’ Local And Global Status Characteristics Influence Board Turnover In Newly Public Firms, Abhijith G. Acharya, Timothy G. Pollock

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Drawing on status characteristics theory, we explore how boards’ social structures influence board turnover. We theorize that (1) understanding directors’ relative standing and spheres of influence in the local status hierarchy creates deference structures that reduce conflict and enhance stability, thereby reducing board turnover; and (2) shared performance expectations and attraction based on homophily in the global status hierarchy can also reduce conflict and enhance stability, and thus serve as another means of reducing board turnover. Using data on the five years following the initial public offerings (IPOs) of 218 firms that went public between 2001 and 2005, we find …

What’S The Best Way To Give Ground In A Negotiation?, Kian Siong Tey, Michael Schaerer, Nikhil Madan, Roderick Swaab

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

How much should you change your offer at each round of a negotiation? The stakes can be high: Give away too much and you devalue your offer; give away too little and you risk getting stuck in an impasse. The authors’ recent research shows that a rare approach to concessions — reducing the amount by which you reduce your offer each round — can yield the most value because it sends a clear signal about your final offer.

Close Friendships At Work Are Lifelines That Have Frayed During The Pandemic, Kenneth Tai

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

We have gone from having lunch with colleagues and meeting after work to eating hurriedly at our desks at home. The change in relationships at work also affects our productivity, argues SMU’s Kenneth Tai.

Towards A Pedagogy Of Connection: A Critical View Of Being Relational In Listening, Jessi Hinz, John Paul Stephens, Ellen Van Oosten

Faculty Scholarship

Positive Organizational Scholarship (POS) perspectives define interpersonal work experiences such as positive work relationships and high-quality connections by the mutual growth and empowerment experienced by relationship or connection partners. Listening has been implicated as a key mechanism for building such positive interpersonal work experiences, but it is unclear how listening spurs on mutual, rather than one-sided growth, in relationship and connection partners. In this paper, we argue that management education currently focuses on the intrapersonal capability of listeners to execute key verbal and non-verbal behaviors. Less emphasis is placed on the mutual experience co-created between speaker and listener and, thus, …

The Efficiency Of U.S. Public Space Utilization During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Seth G. Benzell, Avinash Collis, Christos Nicolaides

Economics Faculty Articles and Research

The COVID-19 pandemic has called for and generated massive novel government regulations to increase social distancing for the purpose of reducing disease transmission. A number of studies have attempted to guide and measure the effectiveness of these policies, but there has been less focus on the overall efficiency of these policies. Efficient social distancing requires implementing stricter restrictions during periods of high viral prevalence and rationing social contact to disproportionately preserve gatherings that produce a good ratio of benefits to transmission risk. To evaluate whether U.S. social distancing policy actually produced an efficient social distancing regime, we tracked consumer preferences …

Strengthening The Entrepreneurial Support Community, Andrew J. Hafer

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This study seeks to discover ways of improving the impact and effectiveness of entrepreneurial support organizations (ESOs) in the regional entrepreneurial ecosystem of Tampa Bay, Florida. First, the study establishes a comprehensive catalog (called the “Superset”) of potential support programs that might be offered by ESOs and consumed by entrepreneurs. Through empirical data collection, the programs in the Superset are ranked by entrepreneurs and ESO leaders according to their opinion of perceived value and importance for gaining the competency in said program. The rankings allow a mapping of the regional ecosystem to identify gaps, inefficiencies, and improvement opportunities.

The study …