This book examines discourses of knowledge and innovation in post-industrial societies and knowledge-based organizations. The author investigates the value of knowledge and the question of innovation management in a fully commercial environment for a technology company. In contrast with most of the mainstream approaches to knowledge and innovation management this volume chooses as its starting point a critical examination of these assumptions before proceeding with further suggestions on how to manage knowledge. Using brand new empirical research, the author argues for the significance of addressing the political games and power struggles enacted in managing innovation processes, which result from the opportunity certain groups seek to acquire or extend their control over valuable resources. Again, in contrast to mainstream approaches that reduce power to the ability of individuals to negotiate in order to promote their ideas, the analysis adopts an extended view on power, and seeks to reveal the ambiguities and challenges of innovation management. This work will be of most interest to researchers and students of knowledge and innovation management, namely postgraduates and second degree students, as well as managers in knowledge-based organisations.

The technological age has seen a range of catastrophic and preventable failures, often as a result of decisions that did not appropriately consider safety as a factor in design and engineering. Through more than a dozen practical examples from the author 's experience in nuclear power, aerospace, and other potentially hazardous facilities, Choosing Safety is the first book to bring together probabilistic risk assessment and decision analysis using real case studies. For managers, project leaders, engineers, scientists, and interested students, Michael V. Frank focuses on methods for making logical decisions about complex engineered systems and products in which safety is a key factor in design - and where failure can cause great harm, injury, or death.

The technological age has seen a range of catastrophic and preventable failures, often as a result of decisions that did not appropriately consider safety as a factor in design and engineering. Through more than a dozen practical examples from the author 's experience in nuclear power, aerospace, and other potentially hazardous facilities, Choosing Safety is the first book to bring together probabilistic risk assessment and decision analysis using real case studies. For managers, project leaders, engineers, scientists, and interested students, Michael V. Frank focuses on methods for making logical decisions about complex engineered systems and products in which safety is a key factor in design - and where failure can cause great harm, injury, or death.

Business acumen has emerged as a critical competency for communicators. But if you're a public relations, advertising or communication professional that didn't go to business school, how can you make sure you have the abilities and skills to evolve along with your role? Business Acumen for Strategic Communicators is the book for you. Offering a critical primer for the world of business, Ragas and Culp equip you with the must-have business know-how needed to understand everything from the language and thinking of C-suites and boardrooms, to organizational agility, business models, rules and regulations, the money and the numbers, and even how to read financial statements and reports. Written for communicators by communicators, the concepts in each chapter are illustrated by expert insight essays written by a diverse group of senior communications leaders, and packed full of case studies, interviews, key terms and cutting-edge research. Brands profiled include Aflac, Costco, CVS Health, Levi Strauss, Mayo Clinic, Southwest Airlines, Target and YMCA of America. With these critical business literacy skills in hand, you will be set to serve with success as strategic counselors to the organizational leaders that are your colleagues, clients, and business partners.

The subject of "design thinking" is the rage at business schools, throughout corporations, and increasingly in the popular press-due in large part to the work of IDEO, a leading design firm, and its celebrated CEO, Tim Brown, who uses this book to show how the techniques and strategies of design belong at every level of business. The myth of innovation is that brilliant ideas leap fully formed from the minds of geniuses. The reality is that most innovations come from a process of rigorous examination through which great ideas are identified and developed before being realized as new offerings and capabilities. Change by Design explains design thinking, the collaborative process by which the designer's sensibilities and methods are employed to match people's needs, not only with what is technically feasible, but what is viable to the bottom line. Design thinking converts need into demand. It's a human-centered approach to problem solving that helps people and organizations become more innovative and more creative. Introduced a decade ago, the concept of design thinking remains popular at business schools, throughout corporations, and increasingly in the popular press-due in large part to work of IDEO, the undisputed world leading strategy, innovation, and design firm headed by Tim Brown. As he makes clear in this visionary guide-now updated with addition material, including new case studies, and a new introduction-design thinking is not just applicable to so-called creative industries or people who work in the design field. It's a methodology that has been used by organizations such as Kaiser Permanente, to increase the quality of patient care by re-examining the ways that their nurses manage shift change, or Kraft, to rethink supply chain management. Change by Design is not a book by designers for designers; it is a book for creative leaders seeking to infuse design thinking into every level of an organization, product, or service to drive new alternatives for business and society.

This book presents 27 methods of the Multiple Attribute Decision Making (MADM), which are not discussed in the existing books, nor studied in details, using more applications. Nowadays, decision making is one of the most important and fundamental tasks of management as an organizational goal achievement that depends on its quality. Decision making includes the correct expression of objectives, determining different and possible solutions, evaluating their feasibility, assessing the consequences, and the results of implementing each solution, and finally, selecting and implementing the solution. Multiple Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) is sum of the decision making techniques. MCDM is divided into the Multiple Objective Decision Making (MODM) for designing the best solution and MADM for selecting the best alternative. Given that the applications of MADM are mostly more than MODM, wide various techniques have been developed for MADM by researchers over the last 60 years, and the current book introduces some of the other new MADM methods.

Modern organizations must constantly adapt to survive in today's rapidly changing environment. A stagnant organization that cannot innovate to meet evolving conditions will eventually find itself no longer competitive in an increasingly complex and technologically sophisticated economy. Innovation and Knowledge Management focuses on three issues critical to success: knowledge management, innovation, and consortia. The author examines the interplay of these factors during a critical four-year period in the operation of the Cancer Information Service (CIS) - a knowledge management organization charged with delivering up-to-date, authoritative information to the public. The forerunner of many other knowledge delivery organizations, CIS was under pressure not only to distribute knowledge but to generate it. A consortium was formed between practitioners within CIS and researchers outside it to explore various innovative intervention strategies. The intersection of knowledge management, innovation and consortial arrangements at CIS provides a unique opportunity to examine no less than the future of organizations. This distinctive study will be of great interest to scholars, students, practitioners and policymakers in the fields of health, communications, knowledge management, information science and management.

Just making a decision can be hard enough, but how do you begin to judge whether it's the right one? Chip and Dan Heath, authors of #1 New York Times best-seller Switch, show you how to overcome your brain's natural shortcomings. In Decisive, Chip and Dan Heath draw on decades of psychological research to explain why we so often get it very badly wrong - why our supposedly rational brains are frequently tripped up by powerful biases and wishful thinking. At the same time they demonstrate how relatively easy it is to avoid the pitfalls and find the best answers, offering four simple principles that we can all learn and follow. In the process, they show why it is that experts frequently make mistakes. They demonstrate the perils of getting trapped in a narrow decision frame. And they explore people's tendency to be over-confident about how their choices will unfold. Drawing on case studies as diverse as the downfall of Kodak and the inspiring account of a cancer survivor, they offer both a fascinating tour through the workings of our minds and an invaluable guide to making smarter decisions. Winner in the Practical Manager category of the CMI Management Book of the Year awards 2014.

Using a wide range of operational research (OR) optimization examples, Applied Operational Research with SAS demonstrates how the OR procedures in SAS work. The book is one of the first to extensively cover the application of SAS procedures to OR problems, such as single criterion optimization, project management decisions, printed circuit board assembly, and multiple criteria decision making. The text begins with the algorithms and methods for linear programming, integer linear programming, and goal programming models. It then describes the principles of several OR procedures in SAS. Subsequent chapters explain how to use these procedures to solve various types of OR problems. Each of these chapters describes the concept of an OR problem, presents an example of the problem, and discusses the specific procedure and its macros for the optimal solution of the problem. The macros include data handling, model building, and report writing. While primarily designed for SAS users in OR and marketing analytics, the book can also be used by readers interested in mathematical modeling techniques. By formulating the OR problems as mathematical models, the authors show how SAS can solve a variety of optimization problems.

The best leaders are born, not made. The best leaders are always in control. The best leaders are those with the highest IQs. But are they really? The thinking about what makes the greatest leaders is increasingly muddled by stereotypes, false promises and pseudo-science. The best leaders rely on fact, not fads. Myths of Leadership blasts away the fluff and confronts false legends head on. Jo Owen uses the most credible research to analyze each myth, using international business case studies, leadership theory and insightful interviews, to uncover the truth. This is a compelling examination of the most pervasive misconceptions about leadership that will help you elevate your own leadership abilities, better inspire your team and empower your organization by thinking differently. Entertaining and accessible Myths of Leadership throws out the management jargon and skewers over-hyped leadership trends to bring you the best practical tips you need to become a better leader. About the Business Myths series... The Business Myths series tackles the falsehoods that pervade the business world. From leadership and management to social media, strategy and the workplace, these accessible books overturn out-of-date assumptions, skewer stereotypes and put oft-repeated slogans to the test. Entertaining and rigorously researched, these books will equip you with the insight and no-nonsense wisdom you need to succeed.

As organizations have grown in scale and scope of activities, so have social pressures on every aspect of organizational activity from personnel policies to waste disposal practices. This volume is a rare example of a multidisciplinary approach to an important theoretical problem--the proper means of interorganizational decision making in light of these new pressures. This complex subject is here attacked by nineteen prominent behavioral scientists from a variety of disciplines.

The study of interorganizational decision-making is aimed at moving game situations from conditions of conflict or mixed conflict-cooperation to conditions of pure cooperation. It seeks means of facilitating the coordination of decisions whenever interdependencies exist between the decision units. The book discusses variables, which may affect decision making, including awareness of individual and collective payoffs, choice of an organizational structure, response of boundary personnel, and the decision technology that exists to guide the decision makers.

The book contains studies on all interorganizational decision making situations, including individual and joint decisions, those at the interface of government and business, and decision making at the international level. Contributions are balanced between quantitative building approaches and practical empirical applications, suggesting avenues for both theoretical and practical work in this new field. The book will be of profound interest to all behavioral and management scientists.

"Matthew F. Tuite" is associate professor emeritus of Managerial Economics and Decision Sciences at the Kellogg School of Management.

"Roger K. Chisholm" is professor emeritus of finance / economics at the University of Arkansas, Little Rock. He is coauthor of "Forecasting Methods" and has prepared reports on Indian land cessions for the Indiana Claims Commission.

"Michael Radnor" is professor of management and organizations at the Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University. He held the position of chair in this department from 1968-1975. He has had professional experience in business in the United States and abroad. The coauthor of "Management Sciences in Government," he has contributed widely to professional journals.

This is a book about traders in financial markets: what they do, the kind of people they are, how they perceive the world they inhabit, how they make decisions and take risks. This is also a book about how traders are managed-the best and the worst examples-and about the institutions they inhabit: firms, markets, cultures and theories of how the world works. How these institutions function, how traders are managed, and how traders view the world, all have profound effects on the wider financial environment. This book explores these relationships and their implications theoretically and empirically. The data discussed in this book on a three-year project researching the psychological and social influences on the behavior and performance of traders in investment banks. One hundred and eighteen traders and managers in four leading organizations participated. Data was collected through semi-structured interviews supplemented by questionnaries, measures of personality, risk propensity and a novel computer based measure designed to assess illusion of control and other cognitive biases. The authors' approach to writing this book is explicitly interdisciplinary. hey draw on sociology, psychology and econics in order to illuminate the work of traders and the world they inhabit. The book is a significant contribution to the growing body of research and literature suggesting that if we are to effectively understand financial markets and the actors who inhabit them, the insights of neo-classical financial economics need supplementing with a broader range of social science approaches. The book will be of value to researchers interested in the functioning of financial institutions and markets, to those with an interest in market regulation and to practitioners wishing to benefit from an analytical perspective on the challenges facing traders and their managers.

Trust is an important factor in risk management, affecting judgements of risk and benefit, technology acceptance and other forms of cooperation. In this book the world's leading risk researchers explore all aspects of trust as it relates to risk management and communication. Drawing on a wide variety of disciplinary approaches and empirical case studies (on topics such as mobile phone technology, well-known food accidents and crises, wetland management, smallpox vaccination, cooperative risk management of US forests and the disposal of the Brent Spar oil drilling platform), this is the most thorough and up-to-date examination of trust in all its forms and complexities. The book integrates diverse research traditions and provides new insights into the phenomenon of trust. Factors that lead to the establishment and erosion of trust are identified. Insightful analyses are provided for researchers and students of environmental and social science and professionals engaged in risk management and communication in both public and private sectors. Related titles The Tolerability of Risk (2007) 978-1-84407-398-6

Optimizing Digital Strategy explores the choices facing organizations in the rapidly changing world of technology-enabled business. From performance marketing through to personalization, on-demand retailing and AI, this book maps out commercial and customer-focused challenges and explains how leaders can get the most out of their digital strategies. Rather than rushing headlong into adopting the latest digital platforms, tools and technologies, the book challenges leaders to step back from the demands for constant investment in new technology and drive better returns from existing assets. Presenting a sustainable model of e-commerce that is appropriate to any individual organization's needs, Optimizing Digital Strategy addresses the repetitive dilemma between even more investment in technology and the need to improve margins and grow revenue. Illustrated by the authors' own digital work for global brands such as The Economist, Sky, O2, Regus, the Financial Times, Lidl and L.K.Bennett, this book shows how to balance the need to remain competitive, fully deliver customer expectations, and put resources behind investments that will deliver the best return.

Unleash the transformative power of face to face groups

The third edition of this ground-breaking book continues to advance its mission to support groups to do their best thinking. It demonstrates that meetings can be much more than merely an occasion for solving a problem or creating a plan. Every well-facilitated meeting is also an opportunity to stretch and develop the perspectives of the individual members, thereby building the strength and capacity of the group as a whole.

This fully updated edition of The Facilitator's Guide to Participatory Decision-Making guides readers through the struggle and the satisfaction of putting participatory values into practice, helping them to fulfill the promise of effective group decision-making. With previous editions already embraced by business and community leaders and consulting professionals around the world, this new book is even more insightful and easy to use.

New for this edition: 60 pages of brand new skills and toolsMany new case examplesMajor expansion and reorganization of the advanced sections of the book.New chapter: Teaching A Group About Group DynamicsDoubled in size: Classic Facilitator Challenges.Substantially improved: Designing Realistic Agendas - now three chapters, with wise, insightful answers to the most vexing questions about meeting design.

Why do we make the decisions we do? And how can we understand what influences our decisions? Non-Corporeal Actant Theory explores decisions and outcomes through the perspective of values, beliefs, ideas, and concepts - all integral parts of our everyday lives and the actor-networks that we take part in as decision-makers. Connecting Values to Action: Non-Corporeal Actants and Choice brings together a cast of expert contributors to delve into this theory and its ramifications for our lives. With chapters that analyze decisions made by death-defying free climbers, indigenous people facing the loss of their culture, and corporates responding to the #MeToo movement, editor Christopher M. Hartt examines how decisions are affected by the widening range of actor-networks that come with social media and technological development. For anyone struggling to understand how a decision is made, Connecting Values to Action offers a pathway to finding the causes of that decision. Exploring the role of non-corporeal actants on the very real consequences of decisions, this is an unmissable book for students and researchers of management and decision-making.

Learn how to take risks, thrive and build your dream career. 'Sukhinder is one of Silicon Valley's most well-respected leaders. Her unique style of authenticity, optimism and hustle will help anyone unlock their career potential' - Eric Schmidt, former chairman & CEO, Google Each one of us dreams of possibility - in our careers and in our personal lives. But our pursuit of possibility is hamstrung by 'The Myth of the Single Choice' that has led us to believe that one large choice stands between us and success, and that a single failure may topple us should we choose 'wrongly'. We let fear trump possibility: we become paralyzed. Sukhinder Singh Cassidy is one of the most well-respected leaders in Silicon Valley, but her path to success has been far from linear. While she has started three companies including theBoardlist, and has served as president of StubHub, she's also encountered failed choices, misfires, and all other types of pitfalls that she had to learn how to overcome and incorporate into her new path forward. Drawing on her own experience and those of other leaders, Sukhinder shows that when people thrive, it's because their fear of missing out on an opportunity overtakes their fear of failure, and compels them to take action. Better yet, they keep acting, building a fundamental risk-taking muscle that under weighs the importance of any single choice in favour of continually 'choosing'. Choose Possibility is a thrilling and insightful new way to approach risk-taking and achieve lasting success. 'An excellent guide to help anyone learn how to take risks in their own careers and thrive' - Kai-Fu Lee, chairman & CEO, Sinovation Ventures and author of bestseller AI Superpowers

Knowledge acquisition and organisation are central to the operation and marketing of many service-providing organisations. These requirements motivate the organisations' structure, their relationships to other organisations, the location of their operations and their entry into new markets. Because the nature of knowledge requirements varies by service sector, as do the organisations' structure and location, studies are necessary to explore the nature of these contingent relationships. An international and interdisciplinary team of leading academics examines the special attributes of knowledge acquisition and diffusion within and across organisations, and the consequent roles that these structurally important firms and institutions play in regional economic development.

Add value with every decision using a simple yet powerful framework Few things are as valuable in business, and in life, as the ability to make good decisions. Can you imagine how much more rewarding your life and your business would be if every decision you made were the best it could be? Decision Quality empowers you to make the best possible choice and get more of what you truly want from every decision. Dr. Carl Spetzler is a leader in the field of decision science and has worked with organizations across industries to improve their decision-making capabilities. He and his co-authors, all experienced consultants and educators in this field, show you how to frame a problem or opportunity, create a set of attractive alternatives, identify relevant uncertain information, clarify the values that are important in the decision, apply tools of analysis, and develop buy-in among stakeholders. Their straightforward approach is elegantly simple, yet practical and powerful. It can be applied to all types of decisions. Our business and our personal lives are marked by a stream of decisions. Some are small. Some are large. Some are life-altering or strategic. How well we make those decisions truly matters. This book gives you a framework and thinking tools that will help you to improve the odds of getting more of what you value from every choice. You will learn: * The six requirements for decision quality, and how to apply them * The difference between a good decision and a good outcome * Why a decision can only be as good as the best of the available alternatives * Methods for making both "significant" and strategic decisions * The mental traps that undermine decision quality and how to avoid them * How to deal with uncertainty a factor in every important choice * How to judge the quality of a decision at the time you're making it * How organizations have benefited from building quality into their decisions. Many people are satisfied with 'good enough' when making important decisions. This book provides a method that will take you and your co-workers beyond 'good enough' to true Decision Quality.

New Generation Whole-Life Costing presents an innovative approach to decision-making and risk management for construction and real estate. It applies the options-based approach that has revolutionized the management of uncertainty in the business world. Based on government-sponsored research at Cambridge Architectural Research Ltd., the book introduces the idea of 'lifecycle options'. The desirability of whole-life costing is widely accepted, but take-up levels have been low. One problem is that traditional techniques fail to take account of future uncertainty. In contrast, the new options-based approach considers a diversity of possible futures, and favours flexible strategies that incorporate lifecycle options. This approach leads to more cost-effective and sustainable decisions, minimizing the risk of under- or over-investment. This book is structured around realistic case studies that demonstrate the prevalence of lifecycle options. These case studies are backed up by clear presentation of basic principles and mathematical techniques allowing the book to be read either as a stimulating introduction to new concepts, or as a guide to mathematical methods.

The phenomenon of entrepreneurship has attracted researchers from a variety of disciplines and a diverse number of analytical approaches. Currently, there is a considerable amount of confusion and a variety of conflicting theories which are being used interchangeably and ambiguously.

In this important new book, the authors argue that there are analytically distinct forms of entrepreneurship, each of them having an individual logic of their own. They highlight the role of individual economic agents with endowments of new knowledge or new combinations of old knowledge as entrepreneurs, and thus identify them as dynamic factors in the knowledge economy.

Overall, this book not only provides a contemporary overview of current research in the field, but also summarizes the policy conclusions that can be drawn from current research.

A surprisingly simple approach to help everyday people become everyday innovators. The pressure to generate big ideas can feel overwhelming. We know that bold innovations are critical in these disruptive and competitive times, but when it comes to breakthrough thinking, we often freeze up. Instead of shooting for a $10-billion payday or a Nobel Prize, the most prolific innovators focus on Big Little Breakthroughs-small creative acts that unlock massive rewards over time. By cultivating daily micro-innovations, individuals and organizations are better equipped to tackle tough challenges and seize transformational opportunities. How did a convicted drug dealer launch and scale a massively successful fitness company? What core mindset drove LEGO to become the largest toy company in the world? How did a Pakistani couple challenge the global athletic shoe industry? What simple habits led Lady Gaga, Banksy, and Lin-Manuel Miranda to their remarkable success? Big Little Breakthroughs isn't just for propeller-head inventors, fancy-pants CEOs, or hoodie-donning tech billionaires. Rather, it's a surpassingly simple system to help everyday people become everyday innovators.

An Innovative, Tool-Based Process for Creating More Rational, Creative, and Mutually Beneficial Deal Structures and Valuations

Real Options Analysis (ROA) and Monte Carlo Analysis (MCA) are two of today’s most significant tools in the valuation and negotiation of high-potential-value, high-ambiguity deals. Dealmaking Using Real Options and Monte Carlo Analysis outlines a new approach for creating flexible, practical valuation models by combining ROA and MCA into one innovative and proven successful process.

This results-based book takes you beyond uneven, rule-of-thumb negotiation tactics and strategies to discuss how you can:

• Accurately evaluate the potential costs of going forward with–or scuttling–a business project
• Ensure that both sides in every negotiation work from similar valuation terms and processes
• Develop and implement efficient strategies for bringing negotiations to closure

In preparing for any business negotiation, the goal is to identify opportunity and characterize risk; during the actual negotiation, the goal is to capture value while arriving at terms that are favorable to everyone. Dealmaking Using Real Options and Monte Carlo Analysis introduces a process for achieving both goals, by focusing on practical tools and procedures that take into account the full range of opportunities–and lead all sides to the identification and selection of optimal choices.