The value chain is a major focus in today's business world, and many companies and managers allocate considerable resources to understanding and analysing their value chain. The main reason for doing this is either to eliminate activities that do not add value, or to improve on activities that do not add sufficient value. In order to ensure optimum customer satisfaction, businesses must integrate the activities of various departments and functions. This demands a sound understanding of the chain of activities and their interrelationship with other business activities.

The authors of Business management adopt the value chain as a framework in order to help business students to visualise how the value chain works. New ground is broken in that management is not dealt with merely from a functional perspective. While the goal is to introduce undergraduate learners to the concept of the value chain, it is not, however, to offer a comprehensive directory on the related literature. The book is divided into three parts.

Part A introduces the reader to business management, the value chain, the business environment, the entrepreneurial process, and the considerations that need to be taken into account when establishing a business. Part B examines the activities of the value chain, starting with general management and leadership, followed by the primary and support activities that constitute the value chain. In Part C, contemporary management issues are reviewed, including diversity management, business ethics, globalisation, creativity and innovation, environmental issues, corporate governance and black economic empowerment.

Business management - a value chain approach covers basic points of theory, but it also has a strong practical approach, and includes self-evaluation exercises, challenging experiential exercises, information about relevant websites, interesting discussion questions and case studies, as well as useful lists of key terms.

This revised second edition has been updated in respect of new legislation such as the Companies Act, the Co-operatives Act, the Consumer Protection Act and the National Credit Act. Statistics have also been aligned with Census 2011.

An understanding of logistics is of primary importance in the modern business world and this text allows students and businesspeople alike to become comfortable with the fundamentals of this discipline. In its explanation of logistics--the process of moving a commodity or service from customer order to consumption--this guide provides insight into every step of the process, from order processing and purchasing to packaging and warehousing. Tips are included for integrated logistics, customer service, materials flow, and strategic logistics plans.

These are difficult times. The Covid-19 pandemic has proved to us that we cannot rely on tomorrow to be like today; there is no such thing as ‘business as usual’. The social and economic upheaval has been devastating, and its effects long-lasting, making these times even more uncertain. The antidote to this uncertainty is clarity.

Maanda Tshifularo has had the privilege of interacting with successful innovators, culture shifters, business leaders and thought leaders, and their ‘common success denominator’ is the ability to see, say, and do things, with purposeful clarity. He has identified ‘Super Clarity’ as the differentiator that helps leaders navigate the ambiguity and half-heartedness which have become the default state in many organisations, leading to plummeting employee morale and productivity.

Not only does a super-clear leader achieve and make a meaningful contribution, but they also experience remarkable joy and personal growth in the journey.

It has never been more crucial for leaders to provide clarity and, in this book, Maanda defines and explains the importance of Super Clarity, and how to translate purpose into our day-to-day activities to unlock exceptional results, job satisfaction, team cohesion and employee engagement.

He outlines in Lead with Super Clarity the critical steps that we can take, as business leaders or in our own lives, to foster clarity – and, in so doing, create an environment characterised by purpose, insight and alignment.

Change is the distinguishing characteristic of the business environment across the world and it affects how contemporary organisations operate. While organisations need to do more with less, they also have to satisfy the needs of their customers who, with more exposure to local and global markets, have higher expectations relating to the cost, quality, speed and innovation of the services and products they purchase from these organisations. In response to the changes in their business environment, organisations are becoming flatter, networked, global, more flexible and diverse and managers have to acquire the skills to face the challenges associated with these features.

The contemporary management principles offered in this publication integrates discussions on vital managerial competencies and skills with information on traditional and essential managerial concepts that have been effective in the past and are still relevant. The first part of the book deals with the evolution of management theory, the management process, and the features of contemporary organisations.

The next six chapters deal with the internal environment of contemporary business organisations, including a discussion on the composition of the management environment; managing change, corporate culture, power, politics conflict resolution and negotiation; business ethics; CSR and corporate governance; and workforce diversity. The rest of the chapters focus on the management functions of planning, organising, leading and control. An additional chapter deals with the role of management in the implementation of project management and a second chapter provides an overview of organisational value chains and the impact of electronic media and e-business on organisational efficiency and effectiveness.

The authors of Contemporary Management Principles are experienced lecturers in the field of business management from various universities in South Africa and Africa.

No business exists in a vacuum – it is impacted on by a constantly evolving world, which presents new challenges and opportunities every day. To cope with these, a business should be proactive and adaptive, not just at an operational level, but at a functional and strategic level as well. There are 12 chapters in Business Management: A Contemporary Approach focuses specifically on the functions of the business organisation and how to respond to changes in the micro-, and macro-environment, and in the market.

An introduction to the field of business management orients the reader, followed by general management principles applicable to any business manager. The book goes on to cover the various functions of the business organisation: financial management; credit management; information management; public relations; operations management; marketing management; human resource management; and purchasing management in supply chain management. It also covers contemporary issues like corporate citizenship and trends and changes in internationalisation.

The fourth edition of Business Management: A Contemporary Approach includes new features and updated content, such as:

• New case studies applying theory to practical situations
• Experiential exercises and multiple-choice questions
• Up-to-date theory on the functions of the business organization
• In-depth analysis of the relevant issues of corporate citizenship, globalisation and international trade

This book will equip readers with a general understanding of the divergent internal functions of the business organisation and the interrelationships between and among these functions. The readers will also be equipped with the necessary competencies (knowledge, skills and values) to perform the tasks and roles of a manager in any functional area of a business. At the end of each chapter, there are questions for self-assessment. By answering these questions, you will get an idea of whether you have mastered the chapters.

This textbook is written specifically for those studying and working in an engineering discipline. It will be an invaluable tool for the existing or aspirant engineer and engineering manager.

The text introduces the reader to management and related issues (for example law and economics), which are essential when dealing with customers, suppliers, contractors, accountants, lawyers, economists and managers, either inside or outside an organisation.

The authors of the pioneering Cutting-Edge Marketing Analytics return to the vital conversation of leveraging big data with Marketing Analytics: Essential Tools for Data-Driven Decisions, which updates and expands on the earlier book as we enter the 2020s. As they illustrate, big data analytics is the engine that drives marketing, providing a forward-looking, predictive perspective for marketing decision-making.

The book presents actual cases and data, giving readers invaluable real-world instruction. The cases show how to identify relevant data, choose the best analytics technique, and investigate the link between marketing plans and customer behavior. These actual scenarios shed light on the most pressing marketing questions, such as setting the optimal price for one’s product or designing effective digital marketing campaigns.

Big data is currently the most powerful resource to the marketing professional, and this book illustrates how to fully harness that power to effectively maximize marketing efforts.

Intangible value leads to new insights and ideas, and higher levels of creativity and innovative thinking. Personal knowledge capital focuses on the knowledge worker, knowledge creation, and third generation knowledge management. A focus on the inner and outer aspects of personal knowledge capital creates a balanced approach in order to produce creative solutions. As such this forms part of a synthesis of mind versus body thinking in relation to knowledge creation theory within knowledge management. This title is divided into two sections: the inner and outer path. The inner path focuses on tacit knowledge in knowledge creation, and highlights the importance of inner value, resulting in a model for personal knowledge awareness. The outer path explores how to effectively communicate and exploit knowledge in a modern business world, both online and offline. This section focuses on valuing intangibles including social capital, relationships and trust, exploring community, conversation, infrastructure and ecologies for a web world. You can manage your own assets through your communities and networks, exploiting the latest technologies around you.
Examines know-how, tacit knowledge, and emotional and cognitive knowledgeLinks social capital to web technologies to create innovative frameworks, tools and modelsPuts forward tools and mechanisms supported by research, which can be used for the design of a knowledge infrastructure"

In the knowledge economy, professionals have to make decisions about non-tangible, non-monetary, and largely invisible resources. Information professionals need to understand the potential uses, contributions, value, structure, and creation of broadly intangible intellectual capital in libraries. In order to fully realize intellectual capital in libraries, new practices and skills are required for library management practitioners and researchers.
Managing Intellectual Capital in Libraries provides research advances, guidelines, methods and techniques for managing intellectual capital in a library environment, and includes analyses and case studies. This book includes a foreword by Anne Woodsworth and is structured into seven chapters, covering: libraries in the knowledge economy; worlds of production and intellectual capital utilization in libraries; identifying and categorizing intellectual capital; measuring libraries intellectual capital; financial valuation and reporting of intellectual capital in libraries; and survival analysis for libraries intellectual capital resources. The book concludes with a summary, and turns the reader towards future research.
Practical methods and techniques are outlined that can be applied to real-life library situations, as they have been extensively applied in other economic sectorsProvides illustrative examples and case studies for exploring and explaining the meaning of specific intangible assets and resources in libraries, such as user oriented intangible assets, library system automation and technology, library location, human capital, external relations and moreConsiders libraries as intellectual capital within organizations and broader socioeconomic systems"

While this book is primarily aimed at those who are involved in Knowledge Management (KM) or have recently been appointed to deliver KM in sales and marketing environments, it is also highly relevant to those engaged in the management or delivery of sales and marketing activities. This book presents models to assist the reader to understand how knowledge can be applied and reused within the sales and marketing processes, leading to an enhanced win rate.
Topics covered provide managers and practitioners with the necessary principles, approaches and tools to be able to design their approach from scratch or to be able to compare their existing practices against world class examples. Several models and methodologies are explained which can be applied or replicated in a wide variety of industries. The book also features numerous case studies which illustrate the journey that various companies are taking as they implement KM within sales and marketing.
Develops a generic model for managing knowledge in sales and marketing environmentsProvides a handbook for line managers wishing to introduce knowledge management into their sales and marketing activitiesWritten by a highly knowledgeable and well-respected practitioner in the field who is mentored by an recognised sales and marketing industry expert

Whilst enterprise technology departments have been steadily building their information and knowledge management portfolios, the Internet has generated new sets of tools and capabilities which provide opportunities and challenges for improving and enriching knowledge work. This book fills the gap between strategy and technology by focussing upon the functional capabilities of Web 2.0 in corporate environments and matching these to specific types of information requirement and behaviour. It takes a resource based view of the firm: why and how can the knowledge capabilities and information assets of organisations be better leveraged using Web 2.0 tools?
Identifying the underlying benefits requires the use of frameworks beyond profitability and cost control. Some of these perspectives are not in the usual business vocabulary, but when applied, demonstrate the role that can be played by Web 2.0, how to manage towards these and how to assess success. Transactive memory systems, social uncertainty, identity theory, network dynamics, complexity theory, organisational memory and the demographics of inter- generational change are not part of normal business parlance but can be used to clarify Web 2.0 application and potentiality.
Written by a well-respected practitioner and academicDraws on the author s practical experience as a technology developer, designer, senior manager and researcherProvides approaches to understanding and tackling real-world problems"

Entrepreneurship and small businesses are vital determinants of sustainable economic growth, particularly in emerging economies, and are acknowledged as engines driving competitiveness and job creation. Countries that have encouraged and nurtured both of these have stronger economies and are more resilient. Entrepreneurship and small business management focuses on developing the important skills necessary for entrepreneurs to succeed at doing business in emerging economies either in small or larger business.

Entrepreneurship and small business management provides a balanced theory and practical approach to help budding entrepreneurs develop thriving businesses. Fundamental aspects such as innovation and creativity are discussed as well as entrepreneurial strategies. The concluding section covers the essence of the business plan as well as relevant case studies, which are presented as a way of ensuring understanding.

Contents include the following:

• Starting a business
• Entrepreneurial skills
• Finance
• Corporate entrepreneurship
• Entrepreneurship
• Social entrepreneurship
• Governance
• Sustainability

Entrepreneurship and small business management aims to provide students of today with competencies to foster entrepreneurship.

This timely book evaluates international human capital policies, offering a comparative perspective on global efforts to generate new ideas and novel ways of thinking about human capital. Examining educational reforms, quality of education and links between education and socio-economic environments, chapters contrast Western experiences and perspectives with those of industrializing economies in Asia, focusing particularly on Korea and the USA. Contributors analyse trends in Korean education, including state, charter and private education, higher education and student loans and debt, and provide policy prescriptions for the improvement of higher education financing in the USA. Offering theoretical insights into the relationship between socio-economic and educational benefits for children and young people, and human capital formation, further chapters consider recent empirical evidence on disadvantaged people in the USA, before broadening the scope of analysis to consider the effects of human capital on industrial structure and productivity among OECD countries. Providing a unique and incisive understanding of human capital formation in the context of education, this book lays out guidance to scholars and researchers of human capital, particularly those concentrating on policies in Korea and the USA. It will also be useful to policymakers involved in economic and education policy.

Written by a plethora of expert contributors from a range of institutions, the Handbook of Technology Transfer provides an engaging deep-dive review of technology transfer as a complex and dynamic process, applying different mechanisms characterising activities in a variety of countries. The Handbook takes a fresh look at how technology transfer comprises at least four dimensions: the underlying mechanism of transferring knowledge; the role of individuals that trigger the transfer; the role of institutions where the transfer takes place, and lastly the role of governments and politics. Split into four distinct parts, this insightful Handbook fully examines each of these dimensions and the roles that each of them play in technology transfer, highlighting university institutions in Europe and North America in particular. Forward-thinking, it also delves into future innovation implementation in emerging economies where resources are limited, and the challenges faced as a result. This enlightening Handbook will be an excellent resource for scholars of business management, economics and information technology. It will also be of great interest to policy-makers of innovation and entrepreneurship given its in-depth look at technology transfer and innovation.

HarperCollins and John C. Maxwell are celebrating the milestone anniversary of Maxwell’s New York Times bestselling book The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership with the publication of a new revised and updated 25th Anniversary Edition.

Maxwell has gone through every word of this book and updated it for the next generation of leaders. He has added new insights to these timeless laws and included lessons learned since he originally wrote the book. He removed dated stories and replaced them with fresh ones that apply to today’s world of business.

What Maxwell didn’t change are the powerful leadership truths that have been helping people become better leaders for the last quarter century. This is still the best book on leadership people can buy, whether they want to learn leadership on their own, develop as leaders in a group, or teach leadership to others as a mentor.

Readers new to Maxwell, as well as lifelong fans will want to get this new edition of the leadership book that has sold millions of copies in the United States and around the world.

South African organisations operate in an environment that is fast changing due to digital advancement, economic challenges, social complexities, and changing employee and customer values/expectations. In this environment, successful organisations empower talented employees to work in teams and make pivotal decisions that lead to innovation and exceptionally high performance. Success for these organisations is not by chance but is the result of adopting carefully planned and sophisticated interventions into the organisational structure, leadership and management orientations, culture, and processes and behaviours. In this respect, Organisational behaviour: a contemporary South African perspective provides a solid and scientific foundation for developing an integrated and holistic understanding of the individual and group processes in the modern organisation.

Organisational behaviour explores expectations that organisations and employees have of each other. It addresses contemporary issues related to organisational culture, change, engagement, performance excellence, changing communication technology, transformational and authentic leadership, diversity, business ethics, team excellence and globalisation. It contains many encounters, discussion questions, practical exercises and case studies with a southern African orientation to stimulate self-study, debate and reflective thinking.

Organisational behaviour is aimed not only at aspiring HR practitioners and managers, but also at established professionals who need to stay updated, irrespective of their field and nature of their organisation.

The Handbook of Research on Artificial Intelligence, Innovation and Entrepreneurship focuses on theories, policies, practices, and politics of technology innovation and entrepreneurship based on Artificial Intelligence (AI). It examines when, where, how, and why AI triggers, catalyzes, and accelerates the development, exploration, exploitation, and invention feeding into entrepreneurial actions that result in innovation success. Individual chapters explore the factors that shape and drive innovation and entrepreneurship, including modalities (such as the Internet of Things (IoT)), challenges (such as privacy and safety concerns), and opportunities (such as augmenting the efficacy frontier of technological solutions enabled by AI). This Handbook provides comprehensive coverage of AI, technology, and innovation and entrepreneurship for academics, policy makers, practitioners, and students.

Elgar Research Agendas outline the future of research in a given area. Leading scholars are given the space to explore their subject in provocative ways, and map out the potential directions of travel. They are relevant but also visionary. Leveraging the knowledge gained from knowledge management and from the growing fields of Analytics and Artificial Intelligence (AI), this Research Agenda highlights the research gaps, issues, applications, challenges and opportunities related to Knowledge Management (KM). Exploring synergies between KM and emerging technologies, leading international scholars and practitioners examine KM from a multidisciplinary perspective, demonstrating the ways in which knowledge sharing worldwide can be enhanced in order to better society and improve organisational performance. Chapters investigate KM as it applies to business, library and information science, enterprise-wide strategies, innovation, privacy and data, measurement, Analytics, and AI, before summarising the lessons learned and best practices for future research. A Research Agenda for Knowledge Management and Analytics will be a key resource for students, academics and practitioners working in the fields of KM and Analytics, helping the academics of the future to build on existing successes and identify ways to further develop the field.

Contracts form an integral part of strategic sourcing in modern supply chains. They bind people, customers, suppliers and organisations into a coherent working relationship whereby goods and services are exchanged in a mutually agreed framework. Contract management provides an introduction to the basic management principles of planning, organising, directing and control as an approach to managing contracts. Contract management explains the importance of managing the content of the contract as well as the contracting process so that unnecessary problems can be prevented and, as a result, important relationships can be maintained. The chapter on broad-based black economic empowerment has been removed from this edition as this is now well established, and new regulations in terms of the Preferential Procurement Policy Framework Act have been introduced. South African and US case studies are included, which should give learners a broad insight into some practical problems that may occur in contracts. The late Gideon Nieman is was professor emeritus and former head of the Department of Business Management at the University of Pretoria. He worked for more than 20 years in senior positions in trade and industry before joining academia. He also presents presented short courses on contract management and procurement.

Breakthroughs in science and technology increasingly happen outside of firms in informal interorganizational communities of innovators. The effort of a group on a specific topic across firms, expertise, and geography can function as an emergent organizational form, capable of great productivity. Using data from computer science, basic research, and management strategy to identify and study these intense clusters of innovators, or 'knowledge communities,' this book illuminates the new organizational logics that govern such collective success. The interplay between organizational boundaries and interorganizational collaboration reveals interesting and counterintuitive lessons about how science and technology work in practice. These insights fundamentally challenge the centrality of both firm boundaries and geographic clusters for innovation in favor of a decentralized network perspective. Academics seeking to understand innovation in science and technology, allocators of grants and research support, corporate R&D departments, policy makers and NGOs, venture capitalists, and management consultants will all benefit from this original and challenging work.

This important book considers the ways in which small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) can thrive in the age of big data. To address this central issue from multiple viewpoints, the editors introduce a collection of experiences, insights, and guidelines from a variety of expert researchers, each of whom provides a piece to solve this puzzle. Contributions address the limitations faced by SMEs in their access to data and demonstrate that the key to overcoming this issue is to be aware of these limitations, to work within them, and to use them to think creatively about how to overcome obstacles in new ways. They discuss Artificial Intelligence, revenue blueprinting, GDPR compliance, and other key topics related to the relationships between SMEs and data. Offering ideas to inspire big data-driven success by SMEs making smaller investments, the book argues that there must be a place for "ordinary" data-driven journeys that are available to firms of any size. Stimulating further thought and action, Big Data in Small Business will be of great interest to academics, researchers, and practitioners in areas such as strategic management, organizational and innovation studies, marketing, and sales. The ideas and information in this book will help fill knowledge gaps related to important aspects of capabilities, functions, and transformations of big data that drive business growth.

Engaging and accessible, The Entrepreneurial Solution to Poverty and the Science of What is Possible examines the systematic practice of poverty alleviation. Using the science of informational economics (IE), based on leveraging specific information, as well as decades' worth of experimental evidence, James Fiet demonstrates how poverty may be mitigated through entrepreneurial practices. This visionary book suggests a number of key practical methods by which poverty can be alleviated, even without resources or personal connections. Classifying IE as 'the science of what is possible', Fiet demonstrates how to substitute information - the lowest common denominator of what individuals already possess or can acquire - for resources. The book employs 30 years of experimental results as the basis for its entrepreneurial approach to poverty alleviation, inviting its readers to extend the science of what is possible and succeed regardless of their circumstances. Holding the potential to alter how work is approached and carried out in the area of poverty alleviation, the innovative ideas explored in this book will be of significant interest and inspiration to researchers and students, but also beyond academia to government agencies, foundations, and charities, as well as individuals and organizations invested in solving the problem of poverty.

Outlining an integrative theory of knowledge, Francisco Javier Carrillo explores how to understand the underlying behavioural basis of the knowledge economy and society. Chapters highlight the notion that unless a knowledge-based value creation and distribution paradigm is globally adopted, the possibilities for integration between a sustainable biosphere and a viable economy are small. This Modern Guide provides an overview of where we are regarding the knowledge economy and society, how its current form took shape and how our understanding has evolved, from the grounds of the philosophy of knowledge, to include the current branches of the sciences of knowledge. Carrillo further examines the challenges of the Anthropocene and how modern knowledge systems might need to change radically to meet them. The Modern Guide then moves to focus on the integration of epistemic, theoretical, technical and political developments in several fields of knowledge-related aspects of economy and society to offer a more integrated view. > Multidisciplinary and thorough, this will be an interesting read for scholars of knowledge, society and the environment, as well as students looking at ways to re-evaluate knowledge more broadly. Policymakers and governmental analysts will also benefit from the discussing of the unviability of our current economic culture and the potential options for the future.