Browsing by Subject "Strategic planning"
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Item A strategic planning model for the performance workshop (Taiwan): an internship report(Texas Tech University, 2002-08) Lu, Hung-huiPlanning has always been considered as a basic management function. Since the late 1950s, strategic planning has come into use in the business realm. Soon, many nonprofit organizations in the United States followed the course of for-profit businesses and adopted the process for their needs. These practices, however, are mainly limited to the United States. This dissertation is the first in-depth study of current management situation in Taiwan theatres. The intention of this study is to build a strategic planning model for a performance company in Taiwan. By implementing a strategic plan, the company can gain certain benefits. Furthermore, the planning processes and the model can be applied to or adapted for other theatres in Taiwan. In order to fulfill the objective, this study combines theories and cases of strategic planning in nonprofit arts organizations from published resources with working experiences gained through an internship program at Performance Workshop, a nonprofit, nonprofessional, and mainstream theatre in Taiwan. This study analyzes the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats of the company. It points out possible objectives and draws up practicable action plans reflect these objectives for the theatre. This strategic planning model is presented to Performance Workshop for its consideration.Item An analysis between organizational structure and enterprise resource planning system implementation success(Texas Tech University, 2004-12) Colak, MuratIn the past decade, the business environment has changed dramatically. The world has become a small and very dynamic marketplace and the evolution of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems has been a highlight in the information systems arena. While the growth of ERP systems has been enormous, cost and failures have undermined its true capabilities. With respect to the high percentage of implementation failures, it is very important to study all of the critical success factors in order to increase the ratio of successful implementations. This research presents an experimental design for a survey that will be utilized to investigate what effect that organizational structure has on the success of ERP implementation. First the organizational structures are described and possible effects of these structures are identified. Then, the necessary tests to analyze the survey are described. Finally, the results of the statistical analysis take place. After getting the results, the expected and actual relationship between the variables are discussed. Finally, conclusions about these results and future research that may take place after this study is described.Item Concurrency modeling extensions to the Fusion development methodology(Texas Tech University, 1997-05) Wenzel, Peter W.The "Fusion" software development methodology is a self-claimed second-generation full-coverage development method for object-oriented software covering the traditional analysis, design, and implementation phases as well as providing management tools for software development. Fusion's deficiency is its lack of support for concurrency modeling which is essential in the problem domains of all real-time systems. With this one exception. Fusion is an excellent example of a fully integrated object-oriented development methodology, combining the best of several first-generation object-oriented analysis and design (OOAD) methods. The Fusion development methodology may be extended by integrating concurrency modeling into the method, making it more suitable for real-time problem domains. The goals of this thesis are threefold: (1) identify the requirements for modeling concurrency in object-oriented systems, (2) propose extensions to the Fusion object-oriented method for modeling concurrency, and (3) demonstrate the proposed concurrency modeling extensions via a case study. The thesis identifies basic object-oriented concurrency modeling requirements by examining existing concurrency modeling techniques. These requirements are then used to form highly integrated concurrency modeling extensions to the Fusion object-oriented development methodology. Finally, the Fusion concurrency modeling extensions are demonstrated using the telecommunications real-time problem domain of cellular digital packet data (CDPD).Item Enabling enterprise integration through architecture(Texas Tech University, 1997-12) Burg, William DaleFor firms to effectively compete in today's turbulent market environment, their supporting software systems must be able to provide new, effective system solutions in a timeframe necessary to enable the business change required to remain competitive. In order to provide flexible responsive information systems, may organizations are pursing the idea of building software using factory-like concepts. To develop a software factory, information systems professionals focus on building standardized production processes, components, and tools that could be reused across new system solutions. To date, these attempts have resulted in the ability to build domain specific applications, but these applications are limited in there capability to be extensible. Thus, the requirement for systems to rapidly adapt has not been met. One of the major reasons for these limited results has been the failure to design the software factory concept upon an appropriate paradigm. Using the mass customization paradigm, this research effort represents a conceptual step towards building new system solutions based upon these driving business needs by identifying the functional requirements for its use as a referent architecmral paradigm for an adaptive software factory. Using grounded theory, this exploratory research effort attempts to identify the functional requirements of the command, control, and communication mechanism of a mass customization based software factory by evaluating current research and development projects centered around the ideas of the software factory and component reuse. By grounding this research effort in the context in which the solution must apply, the formal propositions developed thorough this research effort will have a high degree of external consistency.Item Integrated marketing: the process and challenge of implementing this evolving concept at three private universities(Texas Tech University, 2003-12) Morris, L. MichelleThis multi-site case study conducted at three private, doctoral intensive universities in three different states used a semi-structured interview guide to explore the processes and challenges of defining, developing, organizing, implementing, and assessing integrated marketing. In the mid-1990s, the phrases "integrated marketing communication" and "integrated marketing" became popular in higher education, and results of this study indicate that the two phrases are often used interchangeably, despite their distinctive meanings. None of the universities in this study had integrated organizationally to include marketing, student recruiting, and fundraising under one vice president, as recommended by Sevier (1999b). However, all three universities were actively engaged with alumni; had strong, directive presidents; had governing board committees tied to the marketing efforts; had a clear institutional vision; linked marketing efforts to the institutional vision; and found it challenging to integrate professional schools and athletics into the central marketing effort. None of the participants had a written definition of integrated marketing, and none of the institutions had fully implemented the concept. Two of the three universities had formed a cross-functional team to enhance integration. However, in both cases, the effort was directed at coordinating promotion. Although one university had some influence on certain aspects of academics, most effort being expended for "integrated marketing" at all three schools related to communication and promotion. This study found little or no connection between integrated marketing and the academic "product" at these three institutions.Item Strategic configurations of system resources: configurations for the organizational orientation to change context creation competency(Texas Tech University, 1995-08) Black, Janice Anne DonahooDuring the preponderance of their lifetime, most companies do not attain average profitability rates much less above average ones. Although external elements such as market and industry position were the prominent form of determining firm survival and success in the past, a recent stream of research, the resource based view has refocused attention internally. This dissertation examines the "bundling" of the resources that is referred to in the resource based (and core competency) literature and which results in the creation of a competency. In particular, this dissertation examines a strategically important competency in an organization, the creation of an organizational context needed for organizational learning to occur. A framework provided by Ghoshal and Bartlett (1994) for the context creation calls for a set of four key attributes: discipline, stretch, trust, and support. The competency configurations among these key attributes and their interaction terms are examined to determine if some particular configuration of relationships among them is necessary for both higher levels of the competency and higher performance by comparing the configurations of competencies from high and low competency levels and high and low performance levels within and across sites and then across industry and firm boundaries. Such comparisons enable this dissertation to begin to open the "black box" on the bundling of resources. The dissertation finds that those maps created from high levels of orientation to change or performance are more similar with each other within sites, across sites, and across firms and industries. The range of variability across the high level maps was small when compared to the range found in the low level maps. In other words, there are many diverse ways to fail and only a few similar ways to succeed. This dissertation also found that being ready to change need not adversely affect performance since similar configurations are found in both high maps. Thus the bundling of this competencies resources appears to matter. Although these configurations were compared across sites within a firm and between firms, only a few actual sites were analyzed and, hence, there is room for further corroboration in future research.Item Strategic planning in hospice organizations and the higher education needs of hospice administrators(Texas Tech University, 1994-12) Roark, Charles E.Hospice administration is a new field of practice. It has not yet developed its own research and education foundations; consequently, the practitioners of the field often do not have the professional knowledge needed for current and continued hospice operation. The goals for this research were to establish baseline data on hospice organizations, to determine for the first time the professional education status of hospice administrators, to develop and validate a strategic planning model for hospices, and to guide the development of higher education courses related to strategic planning for allied health professionals. The research methodology for this project relied upon descriptive and general systems research designs. An Executive Director Planning Questionnaire containing questions related to hospice demographic information, administrator characteristics, education, needs and status, and hospice planning modes was sent in 1993 to all 1,500 hospice chief executive officers. The Questionnaire also asked these officers to validate two strategic planning models for use in hospices.Item Strategy and structure configurations: an examination of fit and performance(Texas Tech University, 2001-08) Payne, Gregory TygeOrganizational configurations are groupings of firms that are connected by a common theme or profile (Miller & Mintzberg, 1984; Miller, 1996a). These themes are found within or across different categories of organizations and have led to debates as to their specific relationship to organizational performance. While Ketchen, Combs, Russell, Shook, Dean, Runge, Lohrke, Naumann, Haptonstahl, Baker, Beckstein, Handler, Honig and Lamoureux (1997) demonstrate that the configuration-performance relationship does exist, previous studies on configurations have been criticized (Barney & Hoskisson, 1990). In addition to other criticisms, configuration research typically fails to account for both strategic and structural elements of organizations (Miller, 1996a) and often lacks acceptable statistical power (Ferguson & Ketchen, 1999). Therefore, the actual relationship between organizational configurations and performance may still not be adequately shown. This study tests this relationship by following Miller's (1996a) and Miller and Chen's (1996) argument for researching configuration properties by placing specific focus on competitive activities and the complementary structural elements involved. In addition, equifinality and strategy-structure fit arguments are theoretically expanded upon and empirically tested as components of organizational configurations. Specifically, this study examines explicit configurations that place emphasis on two types of strategy dimensions—differentiation-cost and broad-narrow scope—based on Porter's (1985) generic strategies and on two structure dimensions covering expansiveness and interorganizational relationships (lORs). Specific hypotheses are developed and multiple empirical tests follow the conceptual arguments made for the existence of configurations that reside in the orchestrating themes and interactive mechanisms surrounding both strategy and structure. Results support the existence and importance of strategy and structure configurations in relation to financial performance. Additionally, all of the independent dimensions of strategy and structure demonstrate statistical significance in relation to financial performance. As anticipated, the strategy dimension of differentiation was positively related to financial performance, the strategy dimension of scope was inversely related. The structural dimensions of expansiveness and level of interorganizational relationships also showed a significant inverse relationship. Hypotheses regarding the fit between each of these dimensions are not entirely supported however. Only the fit between target scope and expansiveness demonstrated statistical significance. Conclusions drawn from these results suggest that within a specified segment of a dynamic and uncertain industry, fit between strategy and structure is not important to overall financial performance. Implications are that true equifinality is non-existent in such controlled industry contexts. In other words, perhaps only one or a very few organizational configurations are successful in any given environment—failure to take that configurational form will result in diminished financial returns. This "successful" form is characterized by highly differentiated services, narrow target scope, and small physical and organization size with little geographical dispersion.Item Supporting environmental scanning and organizational communication with the processing of text: the use of computer-generated abstracts(Texas Tech University, 1988-05) Morris, Andrew H.This research proposes a model text-based decision support system designed to support the activities of environmental scanning and organizational communication by actively filtering and condensing text. To filter textbased information requires the use of automatic routing schemes; to condense text requires the use of computergenerated abstracts or extracts. A key element in the model system is the ability of the computer to condense text by generating short abstracts of documents. Two approaches to condensing text have been proposed: (1) using natural language processing techniques to construct a knowledge base of the document contents, from which to write an abstract, and (2) employing algorithm based extracting systems to generate extracts of important sentences and phrases. Systems using natural language techniques are still being researched; most are successful only in limited domains. Systems using extracting algorithms have been researched, but have not been applied to the problem of information overload in an organizational decision-making context. These two approaches were tested in a laboratory setting with student subjects.Item The impact of relative organizational capabilities as firm resources on patterns of strategic and tactical choices of strategic engineering groups(Texas Tech University, 1998-08) Nix, Timothy WilliamThis dissertation investigates how integrative firm resources lead to strategy development in medical groups. The strategy model merges the current firm resources with the process of strategy development into actual strategy content. The study of strategy content is based on the concept of strategic engineers. Strategic engineers concentrate on maximizing efficiency in the organization. The process of strategy development centers on organizational priorities as intended strategic choices and organizational actions as tactical choices. By combining the process and content of strategy, a new model is developed that suggests that not all strategic engineers are equal. However, rather than performance as the dependent variable, this model uses strategy as the dependent variable. The firm resource literature suggests that firm resources are key to gaining competitive advantage in an industry. Finding that different types of firm resources lead to different types of engineers may be a precursor to explaining differences in performance, although this study does not address performance of the organization.Item The managerial roles of community college chief academic officers(Texas Tech University, 2002-05) Anderson, Philip WayneIn higher education administration, there is little information concerning the managerial roles of community college chief academic officers (CAOs). Because of this, many CAOs enter the position not knowing what to expect. Therefore, this study was designed to ascertain what managerial roles CAOs perform based on Mintzberg's (1973) taxonomy of managerial roles. Included in the study are environmental, personal, and situational variables associated to CAOs at community colleges across the country. The random sample is representative of the nation and is stratified by six accreditation regions. Understanding the managerial roles that are actually performed by CAOs will help community colleges in many ways. First, those who aspire to become CAOs will understand what managerial roles will be required of them and to better aid them in preparation for the position. Second, those who are in the position can use the information to help them be more effective. Third, hiring committees can use the information during the search and interview process for finding a new CAO by asking questions related to managerial roles actually performed.Item The Perceptions of Conflict on Strategic Planning in Higher Education Administration(2010-08) Wallace, Garland B.; Paton, Valerie O.; Claudet, Joseph; Price, Margaret A.As is true in most organizations, conflict is not absent in the higher education milieu. On the contrary, “as in the case with all complex organizations, educational systems manufacture the ingredients of conflict and stress” (Hanson, 2003, p.251). The purpose of this study is to determine how the presence of conflict affects the strategic planning processes performed by respective administrators in higher education and specifically how functional and dysfunctional conflict affect their key decision making processes. By placing this context alongside the strategic planning process, stressors become even more apparent and the inevitability of conflict becomes plain. Dominant to higher education and its functionality is the strategic planning process. This practice, loaded with controversy and individual agenda, can and will generate conflict. However, foundational to higher education is the creation of an atmosphere in which diversity of opinion is prevalent and appropriate. Through this diversity is the overwhelming temptation for argumentation. Conflict of ideologies, theories, and perspectives are certainly a vital portion of higher education; however, when the line between academic incongruity is crossed and the participants enter into personal assault, conflict becomes increasingly dysfunctional and counterproductive (Bolman & Deal, 2003; Socci, 2002). Complexity exists when the administrator is faced with a tactical decision to be made, and yet faces conflict without a clear, concise, and complete understanding of the functionality and/or dysfunctionality of that contradictory process. There are several conclusions that were made based on this research in regards to the perceptions of administrators regarding conflict and strategic planning. First, conflict is inevitable in strategic planning. Secondly, functional conflict aides in the strategic planning process. Finally, dysfunctional conflict has the potential of destroying effective strategic planning processes.Item The temporal dynamics of entrepreneurial growth: an event structure analysis in an entrepreneurial firm(Texas Tech University, 1998-05) Morse, Eric A.In the interest of advancing our understanding of entrepreneurial growth, this research has analyzed the five-stage growth model of Churchill and Lewis (1983). The goal of this analysis has been to add to our stock of knowledge about the Churchill and Lewis Model. To achieve this goal, event structure analysis (Heise, 1988, 1989) is applied to a large ethnographic data base on the life of National Software Corporation (NSC). Event structure analysis is a methodology for finding logical structure in qualitative data. Such logical structure can be used to theorize about temporal ordering of events leading to some conclusion, such as the events leading to the end of a particular crisis, or to the beginning of a new stage of growth. The ability to theorize, about events leading to outcomes, will help us to understand how these outcomes come about. This study found that the Churchill and Lewis (1983) Model does a good job of specifying the sequence of events that occur as the firm moves between stages of growth. However, the Model is not satisfactory in explaining how an owner can assess current patterns of events or why one event flows logically from the last or on to the next. This study also found the Churchill and Lewis (1983) Model lacking in contextual development in two areas. First, the Churchill and Lewis Model does not take outside influences such as alliances, boards, and other stakeholders into account. Second, the Churchill and Lewis Model does not account well for those firms whose intent is an entrepreneurial harvest. This study is also significant for the introduction of event structure analysis (Heise, 1988, 1989). An extensive literature review shows this study to be the first application of event structure analysis in the management literature.Item Towards a reconciliation of the diversification-performance paradox: an examination of strategies across the spectrum of diversified corporation(Texas Tech University, 2001-05) Stetz, Philip EdwardMost empirical research examining the value of diversification explores the linkage between economic performance and the level of diversification at the corporate level of analysis. However, without comparing the returns to diversification to business units operating within a corporation's governance system to the returns of stand-alone businesses or to other business units embedded in other diversified corporations, the analysis can not directly address a fundamental question underpinning the research on diversification, "Do corporations make businesses better off?" Furthermore, few studies, investigating the relationship between diversification and performance, have controlled for variables that have demonstrated effects on business unit performance. To address these criticisms, this study focuses on the business unit level of analysis and employs a general linear mixed model to investigate the linkage between the level of diversification on business unit performance (fixed effects) while controlling for industry, corporate, and business unit factors (random effects). Results show that the relationship between business unit performance and the level of corporate diversification, m which the business unit is embedded, is an inverted U-shaped relationship. Additionally, business unit performance, for most levels of diversification, was significantly different from that of stand-alone firms, suggesting that diversification strategies may add value to businesses over that which a business may achieve without corporate parentage. Business units, within low to moderately diversified corporations, earned a 60% greater return, on average, than that of single stand-alone firms. However, differences in performance of business units embedded in diversified corporations, from dominate through highly diversified corporations, were non-significant.