Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Business for Professionals'

Sending employees on global assignments are becoming a means for companies to gain new knowledge and consequently increase their competitive advantage. This has created a new focus on the repatriation of employees. Repatriation is although still a disregarded aspect in research and many returning repatriates experience difficulties to readjust and feel dissatisfied with the repatriation process. More analytical information is thus needed for managers to inform about what actions to take to generate more advantageous results for both the company and the repatriate. The aim of the thesis is therefore to further examine how a business can manage repatriates to transfer knowledge more effective. The study expires in a conceptual framework concerning management of repatriates for effective knowledge transfer. A case study of a company within the consulting industry was conducted and the methodology used for answering the aim was the implementation of a survey. The purpose was to generate as qualitative answers as possible and as a result a questionnaire with a majority of open-ended questions was outlined. The questions were grounded in the framework and the analysis of the empirical findings showed dispersed answers and signs of dissatisfaction among the repatriates. Conclusions drawn from the analysis are that the management of repatriates needs to be further implemented within the company. For example an articulated process consisting of the three different steps: before, during and after the assignment should be elaborated for the company to become more competitive through knowledge transfer.

Based on the community of practice theory by Lave and Wenger this quantitative non-experimental study investigated the relationship between economic trust and sense of community of members who participate in virtual communities of practice to help them find answers to work related issues. The Classroom Community Scale and the Economic Trust Scale was the survey instrument utilized in this study. The participants in the study numbered 108 with their ages ranging from 18 to 65. Participants were working adults who currently used virtual community of practices for work related issues. The data collected in the study were analyzed using Pearson correlation and descriptive statistics. The results of the study found a significant correlation between economic trust and sense of community. The study also analyzed the two sub-constructs of sense of community, which are learning and connectedness to determine if a correlation existed with economic trust. The findings showed that learning was not significantly impacted by trust but connectedness was.

Do communication professionals fill the role of negotiators and conflict resolvers within their organizations? Some scholars (Dozier, Grunig, & Grunig, 1995; Plowman, 2007) have claimed this role theoretically, but little research evidence has verified the negotiator role in practice. To gather empirical evidence, I conducted a qualitative research study (Corbin & Strauss, 2008; Miles, Huberman, & Saldaña, 2014) using in-depth interviews and critical incident technique with thirty-one public relations professionals who had an average of 18 years of experience in a variety of organizations across the United States and overseas. Data analysis included open and axial coding and integration with prior research. Validity and reliability were enhanced through member checking, triangulation of data, and peer review of findings. Researcher bias was minimized through bracketing and audit trails. Findings showed that practitioners experienced most conflict within teams and other internal audiences, practiced conflict avoidance rather than conflict engagement, understood individual level factors as major contributors to conflict, and avoided digital channels in conflict resolution. A model of practitioners as transformers of organizational conflict is proposed. This exploratory study leaves an important question unanswered: Can communication practitioners play a recognized role in transforming organizational conflicts rather than negotiating solutions? A quantitative survey with random sampling could be a next step in verifying the extent of conflict resolution in communication practice and how practitioners can engage workplace conflict more effectively. However, communication practitioners in my sample strongly recommended conflict training and activism to promote conflict transformation as an official role for public relations professionals.

Keywords: negotiation, public relations, communication professionals, conflict management, conflict transformation, grounded theory, digital conflict resolution

The business problem is that some human resource (HR) professionals lack the skills necessary to effectively manage emotional labor (EL) in the workplace. HR professionals are responsible for managing potentially high-stress situations within organizations, yet little research exists that describes what skills help to prepare early-career HR professionals for these work situations. The research purpose of this qualitative single case study is to explore the necessary skills needed for HR professionals to effectively manage EL intensive situations within the workplace environment. This research adds to prior studies on emotional work, organization display rules, the socialization of EL, and the organizational impact on expression and feelings for early career HR professionals. The research question for this the research study was how early-career HR professionals developed the skills needed to manage EL in the workplace. The sources of data included nine early-career HR professionals with three or fewer years of experience, nine business leaders managing business organizations within the participating company, and a review of documentation related to HR skill development. Participants in the research studied agreed to participate through a purposeful sampling method and participated in semi-structured interviews. The key findings from the research study resulted in six dominant themes that were coded in Nvivo 11 qualitative analytics software: “experience is the best teacher”, surface acting vs. deep acting, reliance on HR, networking for different purposes, learning processes, and emotion regulation training. Both groups of participants indicated the desire for training on emotion regulation techniques and emotional intelligence early in the career of new employees to the company. One unexpected finding was that eight of the nine early-career HR professional participants indicated that surface acting was the selected style and nine of the nine business leader participants indicated deep acting was the selected style for managing emotional labor in the workplace. The contributions of the research to the practice of business may assist organizations in developing training content and additional support group structures for early-career HR professionals as they continue to develop within the corporate environment. The contributions of the research to the business literature will add to the body of practitioner knowledge by providing a better understanding of the significance of how early-career HR professionals experience and manage EL in the workplace.

Businesses are faced with many challenges in the global economy which require frequent changes to their organizational structure and business processes. One of the roles of the human resources (HR) department in any business is to act as the strategic partner for management in disseminating changes to the broader employee base. The HR professional who is faced with communicating and implementing these changes may encounter stressful situations as they are executing these new change processes. When stress is not treated it can lead to burnout. The purpose of this quantitative study was to investigate if there was a relationship between frequency of change in organizations and burnout among HR professionals. The study also sought to explore the relationship between burnout and gender as well as the relationship between and burnout and position within the organization. The sample included 147 HR professionals who completed the Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI), which measured burnout and the Frequency of Change Scale (FoCS) which measured change. The results indicated that the frequency of change in an organization does not have a significant effect on burnout among HR professionals. No relationships were found between burnout and gender or burnout and position. Additional research is needed in this area and recommendations are suggested.

This sequential, mixed methods research addressed emerging social media use practices among IT professionals and explored lived experiences of senior IT leaders relative to successful organizational social media adoption and use. The study was informed by structuration theory and elements from the universal technology adoption and use (UTAUT) model, generation theory, and open leadership theory. In the first, quantitative descriptive research phase, an online survey was administered to describe IT professionals' uses of and attitudes toward social media in the workplace. Survey results based on 406 responses from IT professionals in the greater Seattle area indicated widespread use of different social media applications, and also showed that Millennial IT professionals use social media more extensively and are have more positive opinions about social media as compared to their older colleagues. Survey findings also indicated that an increasing number of employers are developing formal social media strategies and adopting policies and guidelines governing the use of social media in the workplace. The second, qualitative hermeneutic phenomenological research phase built on survey results and involved interviews with 13 senior IT leaders in the greater Seattle area. Findings indicated that despite the inherent user-driven nature of social media, senior leadership plays a key role in driving strategic social media adoption and in ensuring broad participation across generational cohorts and employee groups. Findings from the qualitative research phase further suggested that social media can help employees and stakeholders communicate and collaborate more effectively and efficiently, and that leaders can derive significant benefits from social media without compromising the integrity of their organizations.

A wave of sustainability initiatives is affecting many traditional corporate functions. While many companies focus on their own internal sustainability initiatives, there is a small but growing number of initiatives focused on promoting sustainability across the supply chain. The resulting sustainable supply chain management (SSCM) is faced with the challenge of justifying its contribution to the performance of the focal company. This study attempts to gain insights into the perception professionals have of the impact of SSCM on corporate environmental, social, and economic performance. The study looks into the moderating effects of company size, industry collaboration, and regulatory framework on the relationship between SSCM and corporate performance. Using a mixed methods approach, this research collected and analyzed quantitative and qualitative data from 242 respondents. Simple and multiple linear regressions in Minitab 17 were used to analyze the quantitative data; qualitative data were analyzed using thematic analysis. In the end, triangulation was used to integrate the quantitative and qualitative analyses to gain a deeper understanding of the perceptions reported by survey respondents.

The results of this study show that SSCM is statistically significant to corporate environmental, social, and economic performance based on the independent variables analyzed. The results also show that the moderating effect of company size, industry collaboration, and regulatory framework on the relationship between SSCM and corporate performance made a difference for all three moderators based on factorial plot analysis. However, only the regulatory framework was found to be a statistically significant moderator based on regression analysis. Thematic analysis of the qualitative data showed that SSCM helps the focal company mitigate risks and improve, or preserve, its reputation. Another benefit of SSCM is its ability to help the focal company create a competitive edge with sustainability-conscious stakeholders. At the macro level, the benefits of SSCM are in the areas of long term availability of natural resources, respect for human rights, and better opportunities for persons from socially disadvantaged groups. The challenges of SSCM were reported to be in the areas of cost, difficult enforcement and implementation, and the lack of a common commitment to SSCM throughout the supply chain. These challenges could be overcome through leadership, collaboration, and consistent regulations at the corporate, industry, and country levels respectively. The triangulation (meta inference) showed alignment between the correlation between SSCM and economic performance, and the fact that solutions to most of the reported challenges to the implementation of SSCM in the thematic analysis had economic implications for the focal company. This study provides corporate leaders and governments with meaningful insights into how SSCM can be leveraged as an effective tool to enhance corporate performance and sustainability initiatives.