An empirical study of quality management practices in the petroleum industry

The purpose of this paper is to empirically study quality management practices in the petroleum industry in Iran. A reliable and valid survey instrument has been used for data gathering from managers in the petroleum industry in Iran. The instrument has been developed based on the criteria of the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award (MBNQA), which consists of 13 dimensions of quality management. Correlation analysis has been used to test for a relationship between the quality management constructs and quality results (internal quality results and/or external quality results). Most of the linkages within the Baldrige criteria were supported, which indicates the universal applicability of the Baldrige Award criteria. The result of the correlation analysis indicates that top management support is the major driver for quality management implementation which is significantly correlated with most of the quality management constructs. Furthermore, the results indicated that employee training and employee involvement are significantly correlated with internal (operational) quality results. Customer orientation and supplier quality are not significantly correlated with external quality results (business performance).     

The Role of Automation and Labor in Determining Customer Satisfaction in a Telephone Repair Service Process

Telephone repair process and performance relationships are modeled using a structural equation approach. The basic structure of the causal model is a function of process flow. The data analysis and modeling approach advocated here can be applied to any manufacturing or service process that has a recurrent process flow and good internal and external performance data. Our primary objectives are to define quantitatively (1) how the performance of repair persons dispatched to the customers' premises is related to automatic testing and repair, and (2) how internal process performance is linked to external customer satisfaction. A secondary objective of this article is to explain briefly some of the practical problems of modeling process-level performance relationships. Results indicate that the structural equation models are statistically significant and have a meaningful interpretation. Examples of “what if” scenarios using these structural equation models are presented to help managers predict customer satisfaction levels given certain process performance improvements, set standards of performance, and better understand the interdependencies between labor and automation resources in this telephone repair process.     

Radical Authentic Leadership: Co-creating the conditions under which all members of the organization can be authentic

Recently, in response to ethical challenges and loss of meaning within business, leadership theory and research has seen a proliferation of literature on ‘Authentic Leadership’. In this paper we argue that Authentic Leadership (AL), in the way it is currently theorized, is in danger of not reaching its stated objectives. We systematically address the “paradoxes” and shortcomings in current theory and suggest an extended focus of study. To do so, we draw on four existential authenticity themes: 1) inauthenticity is inevitable; 2) authenticity requires creating one's own meaning; 3) authenticity does not imply goal and value congruence, 4) authenticity is not intrinsically ethical. We systematically pursue the implications of these themes for the future development of Authentic Leadership theory and propose a more radical form of AL in which the focus of study shifts from the individual leader to understanding the conditions under which all members of the organization behave authentically. We suggest this is more likely to achieve the objectives of Authentic Leadership theory.     

The Role of Clinical and Process Quality in Achieving Patient Satisfaction in Hospitals

Managers constantly struggle with where to allocate their resources and efforts in managing the complex service delivery system called a hospital. In the broadest sense, their decisions and actions focus on two important aspects of health care—clinical or technical medical care that emphasizes “what” the patient receives and process performance that emphasizes “how” health care services are delivered to patients. Here, we investigate the role of leadership, clinical quality, and process quality on patient satisfaction. A causal model is hypothesized and evaluated using structural equation modeling for a sample of 202 U.S. hospitals. Statistical results support the idea that leadership is a good exogenous construct and that clinical and process quality are good intermediate outcomes in determining patient satisfaction. Statistical results also suggest that hospital leadership has more influence on process quality than on clinical quality, which is predominantly the doctors' domain. Other results are discussed, such as that hospital managers must be mindful of the fact that process quality is at least as important as clinical quality in predicting patient satisfaction. The article concludes by proposing areas for future research.     

Conceptualizing leadership with respect to its historical–contextual antecedents to power

An attempt is made here to build on the ideas and arguments presented in a recent Leadership Quarterly journal article written by Hunt and Dodge [Leadership Q. Yearly Overview Leadership 11 (2000) 435]. In their article, these authors argue that contemporary leadership researchers tend to neglect the historical–contextual antecedents of the field and as a result are developing many theories that reflect little more than a form of “academic amnesia” and “leadership déjà vu”. The importance of Hunt and Dodge's argument is reinforced through the use here of a form of deconstruction to reveal a lacuna in the leadership literature—the insufficient coverage of power, particularly at what is termed a deep structure level. With the current context of organizational change in mind, this lacuna is shown to have problematic consequences for leadership theory in general. More specifically, the increasing use of dispersed leadership strategies is shown to be particularly problematic. The article proposes a new conceptual framework that begins to address these problems and in so doing provides ideas and challenges for future research in the field.     

Turf disputes within federal systems: Leadership amidst enforceable checks and balances

Organizational leadership is a complex set of interdependent processes that occur within specific contexts. This article explores the case of leadership within a federal system where the members have legally enforceable powers, they operate within a system of checks and balances, there is no single “boss,” and the goal is not solely efficiency. Federal systems provide alternative mechanisms for managing change and organizational leadership. Terms are defined to derive a model of turf disputes. This model is applied to the historical case of the “turf war” between a U.S. President, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and the U.S. Senate over his 1937 attempt to “pack” the U.S. Supreme Court. This leads to a more general discussion of turf disputes and their occurrence. They are manifestations of underlying, unresolved authority-task gaps which become virtual-like organizational arrangements. The LAMPE (Leadership, Authority, Management, Power, and Environments) theory of organizational leadership appears to be appropriate for analyzing organizational leadership in federal systems.     

A 25-year perspective on levels of analysis in leadership research

The purpose of this article is to present a comprehensive 25-year review of the incorporation of levels of analysis into conceptual and empirical leadership research published within Leadership Quarterly throughout its history. We assessed the population of Leadership Quarterly's research (790 research articles) on four key levels of analysis-based issues: (1) explicit statement of the focal level(s) of analysis; (2) appropriate measurement given level of constructs; (3) use of a multi-level data analysis technique; and, (4) alignment of theory and data. Prior reviews regarding levels of analysis incorporation into leadership research have been limited to major research domains. Results revealed that while both conceptual and empirical articles only explicitly state the focal level of analysis in approximately one-third of the articles, appropriate levels-based measurement and alignment between theory and data are relatively strong areas of achievement for the articles within Leadership Quarterly. Multi-level data analysis techniques are used in less than one-fifth of all articles. Although there is room for improvement, there is evidence that Leadership Quarterly is a premier outlet for levels-based leadership research. Given the increasing complexity of organizational science with regard to groups, teams and collectives, Leadership Quarterly has an opportunity to model for organizational research on how to build and test complicated multi-level theories and models.     

POTENTIAL RESEARCH TOPICS IN DECISION ANALYSIS*

Robert L. Winkler's paper [1] provides a comprehensive overview of challenging research areas for decision making under uncertainty. Hence, rather than try to extend the list of research areas identified, this note will attempt to embellish some that I feel are particularly important. In these areas, I feel the value of systematic research is particularly high. For convenience, the discussion will be organized under the four research categories identified by Winkler with a couple of sugestions following in an “implementation research” category. The reader will note, however, that many of the suggested topics actually relate to more than one research category.     

Evaluating the Deming Management Model of Total Quality in Services*

This article uses the Deming management model developed by Anderson et al. (1994b) as an initial template to analyze total quality in services. While the literatures addressing quality management have developed separately for products and services, the founders of total quality portrayed this management philosophy as universally oriented. Our study first replicates two earlier studies that tested the Deming management model in manufacturing industries. Using hospitals as our unit of analysis, we realized findings similar to the earlier manufacturing studies. Next, we used contributions from the MBNQA literature to test an enhanced model. Our subsequent findings support the MBNQA concept that “leadership drives the system that creates results” and provides evidence of the ubiquitous importance of leadership for ensuring the success of a quality improvement program. Finally, an anomaly of this study and those published earlier is the inability to find support for the relationship between continuous improvement and customer satisfaction. Integrating the substantial work in the service quality literature focused on customer satisfaction measurement is recommended to future researchers to help resolve this issue and further enhance the model.     

Facial appearance and leadership: An overview and challenges for new research

There is plenty of evidence showing that facial features predict success in politics, business and the military. Some of the papers providing this evidence are related to selection into leadership positions, others into how facial features predict performance in such a position. The purpose of this introduction is to provide an overview of The Leadership Quarterly special issue on Facial Appearance and Leadership, as well as to discuss the use of good looks as a heuristic, and difficulties related to establishing causal relationships in this area of research.     

THE IMPACT OF ENTERPRISE INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY ADOPTION ON OPERATIONAL PERFORMANCE: AN EMPIRICAL INVESTIGATION

This paper presents the results of a natural experiment conducted at a U.S. high‐tech manufacturer. The experiment had as its treatment the adoption, at a single point in time, of a comprehensive enterprise information system throughout the functional groups charged with customer order fulfillment. This information technology (it) adoption was not accompanied by substantial contemporaneous business process changes. Immediately after adoption, lead time and on‐time delivery performance suffered, causing a “performance dip” similar to those observed after the introduction of capital equipment onto shop floors. Lead times and on‐time delivery percentages then improved along a learning curve. After several months, performance in these areas improved significantly relative to preadoption levels. These observed performance patterns could not be well explained by rival causal factors such as order, production, and inventory volumes; head count; and new product introductions. Thus, this longitudinal research presents initial evidence of a causal link between IT adoption and subsequent improvement in operational performance measures, as well as evidence of the timescale over which these benefits appear.     

Using case studies as an approach for conducting agribusiness research

Case study research is increasingly important in agricultural economics as a means of collecting data, and building and testing theory. Case study research has a prescribed set of objectives, espitemology, methodology, and methods that have been developed and tested in a wide range of scholarly and problem-solving situations. This article reviews these fundamentals and then demonstrates the case study approach within the context of an agribusiness research project. This application exemplifies how case study research is capable of generating a robust, comprehensive array of “knowledge” about complex, highly interdependent and dynamic economic and social phenomena.     

Determining causal relationships in leadership research using Machine Learning: The powerful synergy of experiments and data science

Machine Learning (ML) techniques offer exciting new avenues for leadership research. In this paper we discuss how ML techniques can be used to inform predictive and causal models of leadership effects and clarify why both types of model are important for leadership research. We propose combining ML and experimental designs to draw causal inferences by introducing a recently developed technique to isolate “heterogeneous treatment effects.” We provide a step-by-step guide on how to design studies that combine field experiments with the application of ML to establish causal relationships with maximal predictive power. Drawing on examples in the leadership literature, we illustrate how the suggested approach can be applied to examine the impact of, for example, leadership behavior on follower outcomes. We also discuss how ML can be used to advance leadership research from theoretical, methodological and practical perspectives and consider limitations.     

Bricks without clay: On urban myths in occupational health psychology

Abstract

There is a lack of intricate research into the relationships between work performance and other variables. This study examined the causal relationship between work, non-work stressors, and work performance. Using longitudinal multi-group data from three groups—university staff, trainee nurses, and part-time employees (overall N=244)—structural equation modelling was employed to explore one-way and reverse competing models. The results produced a good fitting model with one-way causal paths from work-related and non-work stressors (time 1) to job performance (time 2). Nested model comparison analysis provided further evidence to support this best fitting model, emphasizing the strong influence that non-work factors have within the workplace. This study has important implications for theory, methodology and statistical analysis, and practice in the field of work-related stressors and performance.     

INTERVENTIONS INTO GROUP PROCESS: AN APPROACH TO IMPROVING THE EFFECTIVENESS OF GROUPS*

Some new directions for research on group effectiveness are proposed. These include: (a) explicit recognition of group interaction process as the moderator of input-output relationships in groups; (b) research which focuses on the functions of group interaction in influencing group performance; and (c) use of experimental interventions which create new, non-typical patterns of interpersonal behavior in groups as an approach to studying group effectiveness. The results of two studies based on these proposals are summarized. One study examines the effectiveness of implicit vs. explicit discussion of group task “strategies”; the other addresses the effects of implicit (“traditional”) vs. explicit (“adaptive”) approaches to the maintenance of internal social relationships in work groups. Implications of the research are drawn both for future research on group effectiveness, and for the design of interventions aimed at improving the performance of on-going groups in organizations.     

A longitudinal study exploring the relationships between occupational stressors, non-work stressors, and work performance

There is a lack of intricate research into the relationships between work performance and other variables. This study examined the causal relationship between work, non-work stressors, and work performance. Using longitudinal multi-group data from three groups—university staff, trainee nurses, and part-time employees (overall N=244)—structural equation modelling was employed to explore one-way and reverse competing models. The results produced a good fitting model with one-way causal paths from work-related and non-work stressors (time 1) to job performance (time 2). Nested model comparison analysis provided further evidence to support this best fitting model, emphasizing the strong influence that non-work factors have within the workplace. This study has important implications for theory, methodology and statistical analysis, and practice in the field of work-related stressors and performance.     

Leadership, levels of analysis, and déjà vu: Modest proposals for taxonomy and cladistics coupled with replication and visualization

In the inaugural issue of LQ's Yearly Review of Leadership, Hunt and Dodge (2000, p. 442) note that, “Within the last two decades, one of the crucial developments in organizational research in general, and in leadership research specifically, is the articulation of specific levels of analysis and their implications for theory building, measurement, and observation.” Their original observations are updated by extending the inferential logic of Yammarino, Dionne, Chun and Dansereau (2005) to determine if any increase in the utilization of a level of analysis perspective has occurred in the last five years. The possible evolution of leadership theory and analysis is discussed, especially with reference to Relational Leadership Theory, Leader–Member Exchange, and Individualized Dyadic Theory. Proposals incorporating taxonomic and visualization tools as a means to help bridge the stakeholder gap are also offered.     

„Coaching“ durch die Führungskraft — eine kritische Betrachtung

?Leadership Coaching“ — A critical discussion?Leadership Coaching“ comes into vogue again. It is possible that cutting down the expenses for HRM (and specially for counsultants) reinforces this trend. Therefore it is again time to discuss the question about the main differences between “leadership coaching” and coaching by professionals. Consultations by the superior can be helpful, however there are distinct differences to the professional coaching.     

Public Perceptions of the Risks and Benefits of Technology1

This study attempted to verify and extend previous research on people's perceptions of the risks and benefits of technology and their judgments concerning the acceptability of technology safety regulations. The study addressed several limitations of prior work, in that: (1) it was the first “expressed-preference” study to collect data from large, representative samples of Americans; (2) the research design made “person,” rather than “technology,” the unit of statistical analysis; and (3) the study employed an expanded set of independent variables, including three qualitative benefit characteristics. The results confirmed several major conclusions of prior expressed-preference research, the most important being that members of the public tend to define “risks,”“benefits,” and “acceptability” in a complex, multidimensional manner; and that their definitions differ significantly from those used by professional risk-managers and other technical experts in quantitative assessments of risk and acceptability. The results also indicated that people's stances toward technology regulation tend to cut across traditional sociodemographic lines.