Strategic plans provide the roadmap by which organizations achieve their vision. To effectively serve as that roadmap, strategic plans must have certain essential characteristics. These include the ability to inspire and motivate while remaining action-oriented and understandable to all personnel. More than a decade ago, in Crossing the Quality Chasm, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) suggested o...

The application of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOT) analysis to formulation of strategy concerned with the safe carriage of bulk liquid chemicals in maritime tankers was examined in this study. A qualitative investigation using SWOT analysis has been implemented successfully for ships that are designed to carry liquid chemicals in bulk. The originality of this study lies ...

The current project investigated affective and strategic determinants of participation in collective actions by taking a multidimensional approach to collective identity (see Cameron, 2004) and investigating rational decision-making processes. A field study was conducted during an important student strike within the Canadian province of Quebec. One hundred and eighty four students attending the...

The article discusses the results of operationalizing Situational Strategic Planning adapted to the local level in health, considering the communicative approach and equity in a parish in Venezuela. Two innovative criteria were used: estimated health needs and analysis of the actors' potential for participation. The problems identified were compared to the corresponding article on rights in the...

Increasing interest in sustainability has led to a growing number of initiatives directed at environmentally sustainable operations. However, a systems perspective with hierarchically structured principles is often not a prerequisite to these action-oriented efforts. While the linkage between overall guiding principles and the definition of successful outcomes has been addressed in other areas,...

Business process models (BPM) can be useful for requirements elicitation, among other uses. Since the active participation of all stakeholders is a key factor for successful requirements engineering, it is important that BPM be shared by all stakeholders. Unfortunately, organizations may end up with inconsistent BPM not covering all stakeholders’ needs and constraints. The use of multiple level...

Classical theories of semantic memory assume that concepts are represented in a unitary amodal memory system. In challenging this classical view, pure or hybrid modality-specific theories propose that conceptual representations are grounded in the sensory-motor brain areas, which typically process sensory and action-related information. Although neuroimaging studies provided evidence for a func...

Advances in emerging ICT have enabled organisations to develop innovative ways to intelligently collect data that may not be possible before. However, this leads to the explosion of data and unprecedented challenges in making strategic and effective use of available data. This research-in-progress paper presents an action research focusing on applying business intelligence (BI) in a UK higher e...

We present twelve propositions constituting a contribution to a contingency view of time in organizations and synthesize apparently opposite perspectives of time. To articulate them, we relate the ‘planning’, ‘action’ and ‘improvisation’ strategic orientations to the ‘dependent’, ‘independent’ and ‘interdependent’ perspectives of the environment. Then, we relate these strategic orientations rel...

This article uses a socio-phenomenological methodology to develop knowledge and understanding of the healthcare consultation based on the concept of the lifeworld. It concentrates its attention on social action rather than strategic action and a systems approach. This article argues that patient-centred care is more effective when it is informed through a lifeworld conception of human mutual sh...