International Journal of Networking and Virtual Organisations

Quade, Michael H.; Leimstoll, Uwe

doi: 10.1504/IJNVO.2017.088457pmid: N/A

A majority of people in industrialised countries is using mobile devices like smartphones and tablets for private and business activities. The possibilities and opportunities of mobile business are considered in micro-enterprises as well as in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The question is: what is the perceived value of these devices? Do these devices have a positive impact on the productivity, flexibility and business processes of companies? The goal of this paper is to develop a model that helps to identify and explain this impact. The model is estimated using partial least square (PLS) structural equation modelling. The results show that the model has only a medium to weak predictive power when using the full data set. The reason is unobserved heterogeneity in the data. The model is becoming a high predictive power after applying a prediction-oriented segmentation (POS) with six segments.

Simons, Luuk P.A.; Hafkamp, Maurits P.J.; Bodegom, David Van; Dumaij, Adrie; Jonker, Catholijn M.

doi: 10.1504/IJNVO.2017.088485pmid: N/A

Work site healthy lifestyle interventions hold promise for improving health and employability. As part of a larger employer vitality program and a work site randomised controlled trial (RCT, n = 59 intervention arm) to assess cardiac risk impacts, we conducted a design analysis on a hybrid eHealth solution. The control condition was six weeks waiting list and then start of the hybrid eHealth support (n = 57). Our analysis supports three conclusions. First, the hybrid eHealth intervention did significantly improve physical risk factor variables after six weeks. Motivation and measurement alone (waiting list) did not. Second, theory on timing of health support for patients appeared generalisable to employees: it did help to offer support at a moment of high motivation, instead of later. Hence, offering employees active health support directly after physical measurements (health check-ups) is more effective for improving health and self-management than the common practice of focusing on the employee check-up itself. Third, a design analysis was conducted to help improve ICT-enabled health interventions. This resulted in several recommendations and improved user adoption.

Kari, Tuomas; Koivunen, Sanna; Frank, Lauri; Makkonen, Markus; Moilanen, Panu

doi: 10.1504/IJNVO.2017.088498pmid: N/A

Individuals and the healthcare sector have become increasingly interested to measure and improve health and well-being by using different self-tracking technologies. Physical activity, nutrition, and sleep are a few of the various measures that can be self-tracked by different technological solutions. This study investigates the expected and perceived well-being effects of short-term self-tracking technology use with focus on the implementation phase. The study is based on thematic analysis of ten semi-structured interviews. The results reveal that the perceived well-being effects of using a self-tracking technology are relatively minor during the implementation phase - in line with the pre-implementation expectations. The possible increase in well-being is expected to occur in a longer time scale. Perceived psychological well-being is found to be affected the most during the implementation phase. The results also reveal interesting findings regarding the use and acceptance of self-tracking technologies. Based on the results, theoretical and practical implications are presented.

Makkonen, Markus; Silvennoinen, Minna; Nousiainen, Tuula; Pesola, Arto J.; Vesisenaho, Mikko

doi: 10.1504/IJNVO.2017.088504pmid: N/A

Despite the central role of human resources in determining the success of software companies, relatively little academic research has been conducted on the well-being at work aspect of software professionals. This study aims to address the aforementioned gap by examining the effects of using standing instead of sitting workstations on the well-being at work of software professionals in terms of their physical activity, mental alertness, stress, and musculoskeletal strain. An intervention study consisting of two measurements was conducted for 29 employees of a large Finnish software company by using questionnaires and the Firstbeat Lifestyle Assessment service. The findings of the study suggest that the usage of standing instead of sitting workstations results in only modest promotions of physical activity, does not have an effect on mental alertness, actually tilts the stress-recovery balance towards stress, but decreases musculoskeletal strain in the neck and shoulders, although increasing it in the legs and feet.

Bhat, Swati Kaul; Pande, Neerja; Ahuja, Vandana

doi: 10.1504/IJNVO.2017.088459pmid: N/A

Advancement in technology has made the working style of organisations boundary-less. Shrinking the barriers of the teams spread across geographically disparate locations has led to the formation of 'virtual teams'. This paper aims to explain that it is vital for any organisation to understand the abilities of their employees which help them to function in a competent manner. Exploratory research method has been used for the study and factors affecting trust, information sharing and communication, in virtual teams were extracted. This study segregates the virtual team members on the basis of the score given to them by their managers on the factors identified. These composite scores are subjected to K-means cluster analysis where every cluster profile extracted, represents a detailed summary of the employees in the cluster. This forms the basis for creation of our tool - the employee profile configurator. The tool helps organisations and managers to identify the unique characteristics of the employees to classify them accordingly in a specific cluster.

Hong, Hong; Xu, Di

doi: 10.1504/IJNVO.2017.088462pmid: N/A

Recent fast advances in information technologies have dramatically expanded the use of mobile social apps (i.e., applications). Compared to other products or services, switching costs of mobile social apps are lower as a user can easily switch from one mobile social app to another. In order to figure out factors influencing users' continuance intention and provide practical implications on building users' loyalty, we integrate flow experience and switching costs to build an empirical model. Specifically, we take Wechat as an example to investigate due to its popularity in China. Survey and structural equation model (SEM) are used to test the research model. The results show that: perceived enjoyment has influence on flow experience, and further affects users' continuance intention; switching costs exert positive effect on continuance intention; flow experience exerts partial mediating effect between perceived enjoyment and continuance intention. Related theoretical and practical implications are also discussed.