Audrey Grace

Beyond Knowledge Management: Introducing Learning Management Systems

In the knowledge economy, a firm’s intellectual capital represents the only sustainable source of competitive advantage; accordingly, the ability to learn, and to manage the learning process are key success factors for firms. The knowledge management approach to learning in organizations has achieved limited success, primarily because it has focused on knowledge as a resource rather than on learning as a people process. Many world-class organizations, such as Procter & Gamble, Cisco Systems and Deloitte Consulting, are now employing a new breed of systems known as Learning Management Systems (LMS) to foster and manage learning within their organizations1. This article reports on the deployment of an LMS by a major US multinational, CEM Corporation, and proposes a framework for understanding learning in organizations, which highlights the roles that LMS can play in today’s knowledge-intensive organizations.

Evaluating the effectiveness of clinical decision support systems: the case of multimorbidity care

General Practitioners (GPs) and healthcare systems, worldwide, are overwhelmed by the growing number of patients with multimorbidity, particularly in light of the additional complexity and costs involved in treating these patients. While it has been proven that clinical decision support systems (CDSS) play a key role in supporting healthcare decisions, there is little research into their role in the case of multimorbidity. This study examines practice systems currently used in Ireland and evaluates their effectiveness in such circumstances. The findings uncover a number of deficiencies, including: (1) the lack of provision of integrated medical guidelines for multiple chronic diseases within the CDSS, (2) the inability to centralise the patient rather than the disease, (3) the difficulty in seamlessly integrating CDSS into the patient consultation, and (4) the lack of adequate training of GPs on how best to use CDSS in multimorbidity decision making. The study underlines the need for further research into CDSS and multimorbidity, and highlights some of the key issues that must be addressed in order to improve how CDSS support the care of multimorbid patients.

Designing an artefact to help users make intervention decisions about their wellness

Abstract Healthcare systems have been evolving towards more decentralised, patient- empowered, and holistic approaches. This places a greater expectation on patients to monitor and report changes in their general wellness so they can make decisions as to when to seek clinical interventions. However, findings from this study suggest individuals find it challenging to detect deteriorations in wellness, due to the vast and multifaceted nature of the concept, the gradual onset of symptoms, and the difficulty in articulating change. Thus a mobile application is developed to help users with these issues. The design of this mobile application draws upon existing cognitive neuroscience research on change detection, both for external stimuli and internal ‘interoceptive’ sensations. This highlights several key factors to be considered, if wellness-related decision-making is to be supported. In particular, this identifies the role of patients’ top-down (attentional) and bottom-up (less-voluntary) processes for detecting wellness deteriorations.

Understanding core IS capabilities throughout the IS/IT service co-production lifecycle

Abstract During service co-production, the firm and the customer jointly participate in design and delivery of the service by leveraging the customer’s knowledge and preferences to individually tailor the service for the customer. Here, the main challenge is how a firm’s project team may accomplish modifications to meet the customers’ needs within the required timeframe. Thus, this research paper explores the role of project team’s core capabilities during the IS/IT service co-production lifecycle stages across three case studies. The paper contributes to theory by presenting a matrix model which maps the core capabilities against IS/IT service co-production lifecycle stages. The study also contributes to practice, specifically where firms are looking to enhance their in-house core capabilities in order to improve their IS/IT service co-production involvement with their customers.