Richard V. McCarthy

Knowledge management and the competitive strategy of the firm

Purpose – Knowledge management (KM) has emerged as a strategy to improve organizational competitiveness. Our purpose is to identify the relationship between KM and the firms competitive advantage.Design/methodology/approach – We review the existing literature on KM and strategy formulation. We utilize the resource‐based view approach as a lens for fitting KM with strategic planning. The concept of strategy and KM integration is introduced.Findings – We relate KM strategies to business strategy through a thorough review of the literature.Research limitations/implications – Future research should investigate the circumstances under which KM can create a sustainable competitive advantage within the framework of the RBV. Another area involves the investigation of the degree of integration between the competitive strategy and KM strategy.Practical implications – A very useful source of information for practitioners to refine their thinking about KM and the firm strategic resources. It offers the practitioner ...

Does UML make the grade? Insights from the software development community

The Unified Modeling Language (UML) has become the de facto standard for systems development and has been promoted as a technology that will help solve some of the longstanding problems in the software industry. However, there is still little empirical evidence supporting the claim that UML is an effective approach to modeling software systems. Indeed, there is much anecdotal evidence suggesting the contrary, i.e. that UML is overly complex, inconsistent, incomplete and difficult to learn. This paper describes an investigation into the adoption and use of UML in the software development community. A web-based survey was conducted eliciting responses from users of UML worldwide. Results indicate a wide diversity of opinion regarding UML, reflecting the relative immaturity of the technology as well as the controversy over its effectiveness. This paper discusses the results of the survey and charts of the course for future research in UML usage.

An Evaluation of E-Learning on the Basis of Bloom's Taxonomy: An Exploratory Study

Universities have rushed to expand their delivery of courses through e-learning environments. But is e-learning effective? The authors conducted an exploratory study to evaluate e-learning through WebCT on the basis of Blooms taxonomy. The authors distributed 75 questionnaires to investigate whether individual or instructional factors play an important role in learning when using WebCT. On the basis of analysis of surveys from undergraduate students at a medium-sized university in the southeastern region of the United States, the authors determined that individual and instructional factors do not play a major role in the learning process.

Knowledge management formal and informal mentoring: An empirical investigation in Lebanese banks

Purpose – As businesses continue to forge ahead in the twenty‐first century, knowledge management (KM) has materialized as a significant differentiator. The process of creating new knowledge, sharing, and preserving such knowledge, is crucial for achieving competitive advantage. To gain maximum benefit from new knowledge, it must be efficiently integrated into the organization within a continuous knowledge life cycle. In this respect, mentoring is becoming ever more effective as a means to facilitate knowledge creation and sharing and build intellectual capital. This study aims to examine how both formal and informal mentoring enhances KM in the Lebanese banking sector.Design/methodology/approach – Professionals in the Lebanese banking sector were surveyed to measure their perception of the impact of mentoring on their willingness to share information within the organization on both a formal and informal basis. A Pearson correlation was conducted to test the hypotheses.Findings – Results suggest that info...

The intriguing art of knowledge management and its relation to learning organizations

Purpose – The goal of this research is to empirically assess whether knowledge management (KM) and learning organizations (LO) are distinct concepts and if so, to test whether KM enhances LO more or vice versa. Design/methodology/approach – The authors propose an approach by which they first empirically assess the independence of those two concepts, then KM’s fundamental processes, being knowledge acquisition, sharing, and utilization, are hypothesized to have a positive relationship with the different LO dimensions. Retail business employees working in organizations in Lebanon were surveyed. KM processes were first designated as dependent variables and then as independent variables. Bartlett’s test, Pearson correlation, factor analysis, and regression analysis were used to test the hypothesis. Findings – The results indicated that the two dimensions LO and KM are distinct and that KM enhances LO more than LO enhances KM. Practical implications – This research extends the impact of knowledge management to include informal processes. It provides empirical evidence that managers should seek to implement formal and informal knowledge management processes into their organizational culture to enable a dynamic learning environment. Originality/value – This research is significant in that up to this point the relationship between KM and LO has been posited and supported through anecdotal evidence and observation. This research provides empirical evidence of the relationship and forms the basis for further study in this area.

To restrict or not to restrict personal internet usage on the job

Purpose – The subject of cyber‐slacking has prompted many organizations to respond by enforcing or implementing policies that restrict internet access. The purpose of this paper is to empirically examine the impact of four internet monitoring policies on cyber‐slacking and work satisfaction.Design/methodology/approach – Employees working in medium‐size organizations in Lebanon were surveyed. Chi‐square tests, correlation, ANOVA, and regression analysis were used to test the hypothesis.Findings – Results indicated that having a free internet access had a positive relation with cyber‐slacking, leading to an increase in work satisfaction. The survey also indicated relationship with demographic factors.Research limitations/implications – Although the research provides useful insight on cyber‐slacking and monitoring policies, it is nevertheless restricted to Lebanese companies.Originality/value – This paper adds to the literature on cyber‐slacking by empirically testing the effect of different monitoring policies.

Job insecurity: a whirlpool of chronic powerlessness

Purpose – Organizational downsizing, right sizing, layoffs, and restructuring that attempt to reduce labour cost and increase competitiveness, have generated considerable feelings of job insecurity among todays employees. Conversely, the rapidity of change in the Middle Eastern region, coupled with the unpredictability of economic conditions, the inevitable need to survive and the ever‐lasting craving for organizational success merge to aggravate the adverse effects of job insecurity. The purpose of this paper is to study the relationship between job insecurity and powerlessness, management trust, peer trust and job satisfaction within Lebanon.Design/methodology/approach – Employees working within medium‐sized organizations in Lebanon were surveyed to measure their perceptions of job insecurity, job satisfaction, powerlessness, and interpersonal trust. Statistical analyses were performed using Pearson correlation matrix and linear regression tests.Findings – The study identified significant positive rela...