Organizations can tap the wisdom of the crowd through digital platforms of crowdsourcing for ideation. However, we have limited understanding of factors affecting the innovativeness of ideas and solutions submitted by individual participants. Drawing upon self-determination theory and regulatory focus theory, we investigate how participants' regulatory focus and extrinsic motivation aroused by incentivizing mechanisms affect their creativity in crowdsourcing communities. Based on the data collected from 164 participants in a crowdsourcing platform, we find that promotion focus positively influences participants' creativity, and different types of extrinsic motivation have differential effects. Although external, identified, and integrated motivation positively affect participants' creativity, introjected motivation is not significantly related to participants' creativity. In addition, external and identified motivation strengthen the relationship between promotion focus and creativity. The theoretical contributions and managerial implications of this study are discussed.

This study examines the effects of social capital in the context of e-business and investigates how each of the three dimensions of social capital (structural, relational and cognitive) differentially influences a firm's substantive and symbolic performance. The study explores how structural capital and cognitive capital indirectly affect firm performance through relational capital. The research model is generally supported by data collected from a survey of 205 firms in China. The results suggest that structural and relational capital positively influence substantive and symbolic performance, respectively. However, cognitive capital does not have significant effects on substantive performance, though it positively affects symbolic performance. Also, the study found that structural capital and relational capital have stronger effects on substantive performance than symbolic performance. In contrast, cognitive capital has stronger effects on symbolic performance than substantive performance. Further, both structural capital and cognitive capital positively affect relational capital.

Integrating supply chain processes in e-business in emerging and transitional economies has attracted considerable attention from practitioners and researchers. Based on the theory of market orientation (MO) and the institution-based perspective, this paper investigates the effect of MO on supply chain integration (SCI) in e-business and examines the moderating role of ownership type in the relationship between MO and SCI in China. The results of a survey of 229 firms suggest that the MO dimensions have different effects on the supply and the demand process integration in e-business. Moreover, ownership type moderates the relationship between MO and SCI. Implications and suggestions for future research are likewise discussed.

Trialability has been conceptualised in prior research as a belief signifying opportunity to experiment with a technical innovation would facilitate its adoption. It has been found to be a weak predictor and though indications exist of possible significant impact in situations of high perceived risk, it has not received serious academic attention. In this research we argue that in situations of high perceived risk, the belief-based concept of trialability without actual evaluation of experimental outcomes is questionable. Based on the Theory of Trying, Expectancy Disconfirmation theory and prior research on risk and trust in e-business, we develop and validate propositions in the context of B2B e-market transactions by two small firms. Our findings indicate that due to high perceived risk of B2B e-market transactions, in contrast to the received notion of trialability as a belief-based factor, it was in the nature of an active post-intent recursive process of experimentation involving ‘Trying’ for trial transactions with controlled risk, execution of ‘Trial’ transactions and ‘Assessment of Trial Outcomes’. Also, in contrast to weak impacts observed in prior research, the trialability process was found to be a necessary condition for translation of initial intent to adoption. Other implications of the findings are discussed.

Abstract Knowledge Management Systems (KMS) have become increasingly popular as a knowledge‐sharing tool in contemporary corporations. Enticing employees to seek knowledge from KMS remains an important concern for researchers and practitioners. Trust has been widely recognized in many studies as an important enabling factor for seeking knowledge; however, the role of trust in promoting knowledge‐seeking behavior using KMS has not been adequately addressed. Drawing upon the extant literature on trust and information technology adoption, this article examines the relationships between the knowledge seekers' trust in the community of KMS users , their perceptions toward the system (perceived usefulness and perceived seeking efforts), and the intention to continually use the KMS. The results reveal that trust in the community of KMS users does not directly affect the employees' knowledge‐seeking continuance intention; rather, it happens indirectly through a mediated effect of perceived usefulness of the KMS. Furthermore, we find that trust seems to be a stronger determinant of perceived usefulness than of perceived seeking efforts. Our study thus demonstrates the indirect, but still crucial, role of trust in knowledge‐seeking behavior in the context of corporate KMS usage. Other findings and the implications of this study for both researchers and practitioners are correspondingly discussed.

Abstract User acceptance models such as the technology acceptance model, the theory of reasoned action, and the theory of planned behavior have been widely used to study a specific information system, a group of systems, or even computers in general. This study examines the usage of competitive information systems. It applies the theory of planned behavior (TPB) in a comparative frame of reference model (relative model) in which relative attitude, relative subjective norm, relative intention, and relative usage are examined. The study is set in the context of two instant messaging technologies. Based on a survey from 300 instant messaging users, the effects of attitude and subjective norm on intention in each model were different (i.e., when TPB is tested once for each application). This confirms that the behavioral model can show different effects for competitive products. In addition, correct competitive answers were given by the relative model; however, these may differ from the answers found from a single application model. The authors show the importance of studying the relative model for competitive products.

Abstract Recent studies have found organizational learning capacity to be a key factor in influencing organizational assimilation and exploitation of knowledge‐intensive innovations. Despite its increasing importance, the impact of organizational learning capacity on technology assimilation is not well understood. Distilling from extant works on organizational learning and technology assimilation, this study identifies four components of organizational learning capacity, namely, systems orientation, organizational climate for learning orientation, knowledge acquisition and utilization orientation, and information sharing and dissemination orientation. The authors subject these components to structural equation modeling analyses to better understand their structure and dimensionality. The analyses strongly support the proposed four major dimensions underlying organizational learning capacity. Organizational learning capacity, as a higher‐order factor, has a significant impact on attitude towards organizational adoption of knowledge‐intensive innovations. Implications for practice and research are discussed.

This paper uses organizational learning as a lens to study how firms implement the enterprise system. The core research questions are: What are the critical organizational factors affecting organizational learning in ES implementation? How do these elements shape the learning process and thereby influence ES implementation outcomes? To address these questions, we conducted comparative case study with two organizations that have recently adopted ES and achieved significantly different results. Based on the empirical findings, we propose a framework that describes how organizational factors affect the four constructs of organizational learning in ES implementation context — knowledge acquisition, information distribution, information interpretation and organizational memory.

The sharing of knowledge, including information and know-how, if properly managed, allows the participating firms to enhance operation efficiency and decision making effectiveness. While there is a substantive research on the potential benefits of knowledge sharing, we do not have enough understanding of the factors leading firms to share knowledge. Drawing upon Transaction Cost Economics and Socio-political theories, we derive a research model to study the antecedent factors of firm's decision on whether to share knowledge with its trading partners. The theoretical model derived is tested by data collected with six companies, which had been sharing information and know-how with some of their trading partners. Implication and contributions of this study are discussed.

This paper presents the result of an empirical study that investigates user involvement and user satisfaction in the context of information-seeking activity. This study adopts the definition of user involvement as the psychological state of the importance and personal relevance that users attach to a given system. Following Celsi and Olson, intrinsic and situational motivators were considered as two antecedents of user involvement. These two types of motivator were treated as formative exogenous variables, while user involvement and user satisfaction were treated as reflective mediating endogenous variable and final endogenous variable, respectively. Five hypotheses were proposed, and all were supported by the data from a laboratory experiment. This paper also reports two other interesting findings. First, intrinsic motivators have a stronger positive effect on user involvement than situational motivators have. Second, situational motivators have a stronger positive effect on user satisfaction than intrinsic motivators have. The discussion part explains these interesting findings.

Abstract Knowledge is a critical resource that can help organizations to sustain strategic advantage in competitive environments. Organizations in Asia and elsewhere are turning to knowledge management (KM) initiatives and technologies to leverage their knowledge resources. As a key component of KM initiatives, electronic knowledge repositories (EKRs) are deployed by organizations to store codified knowledge for future reuse. Although EKRs have been used for some time, there is a lack of understanding of what motivate employees' usage of an EKR. This study formulates and empirically tests a theoretical model relating potential antecedents to EKR usage for knowledge seeking. The model was operationalized and the survey instrument subjected to a conceptual validation process. The survey was administered to 160 knowledge professionals in public‐sector organizations in Singapore who had accessed EKRs in the course of their work. Results reveal that perceived output quality directly affects EKR usage for knowledge seeking. Further, resource availability affects EKR usage for knowledge seeking particularly when task tacitness is low and incentives affect EKR usage particularly when task interdependence is high. Implications of these results for further research and improving EKR implementation are discussed.

Users see the database interface as the database system. A good interface enables them to formulate queries better. The semantics communicated through the interface can be classified according to abstraction levels, such as the conceptual and logical levels. With the conceptual interface, interaction is in terms of real-world concepts such as entities, objects and relationships. Current user-database interaction is mainly based on the logical interface, where interaction is in terms of abstract database concepts such as relations and joins. Many researchers argue that end users will perform better with the conceptual interface. This research tested this claim, as well as the effects of query complexity and learning, on the visual query performance of users. The experiment involved three tests: an initial test, a retention test and a relearning test. The results showed that, for complex queries, conceptual interface users achieved higher accuracy, were more confident in their answers, and spent less time on the queries. This is persistent across retention and relearning tests.

This paper deals with the use of a group support system (GSS) to support virtual team-building. Literature review on Group Support Systems (GSS) indicates that most prior GSS research focuses on supporting face-to-face teamwork, and few studies were conducted in supporting virtual teamwork and team-building. When virtual teamwork becomes more common in modern organizations, how GSS can be used to enhance virtual team-building is becoming an important research issue. This paper proposes a conceptual team-building framework. By embedding this conceptual framework into a GSS, the GSS may have the potential to support virtual team-building. Based on the framework, a set of testable research propositions is formulated, and some suggestions for future GSS research are discussed.

A laboratory experiment was carried out to partially test the task-medium fit proposition in a GSS environment. Communication medium was varied using a face-to-face GSS and a dispersed GSS setting. Task type was varied using an intellective and a preference task. Group decision outcome variables of interest were (actual and perceived) decision quality, decision time, decision satisfaction, and decision process satisfaction. With the intellective task, there were no significant differences between face-to-face GSS and dispersed GSS groups for all group decision outcome variables. With the preference task, face-to-face GSS groups performed significantly better than dispersed GSS groups for all group decision outcome variables. These findings suggest that group decision outcomes in a GSS environment tend to be adversely affected when the communication medium is too lean for the task but not when the communication medium is too rich for the task. Consequences of providing groups with too rich and too lean a communication medium for their task are discussed. Implications of these findings, and other related results, for practice and for future revisions of media richness theory are explored.

This study investigates the impact of the electronic communication capability of a group support system (GSS) on status differentials in small groups. A laboratory experiment was used to answer the research questions. Three support levels were studied: manual, face-to-face GSS, and dispersed GSS. Two task types were examined: intellective and preference. Five dependent variables reflecting different aspects of status differentials were measured: status influence, sustained influence, residual disagreement, perceived influence, and decision confidence. The results show that manual groups had higher status influence, sustained influence, and decision confidence, but lower residual disagreement than face-to-face GSS and dispersed GSS groups. Preference task groups also produced higher status influence and sustained influence, but lower residual disagreement compared to intellective task groups. In addition, manual groups working on the preference task reported higher perceived influence than face-to-face GSS and dispersed GSS groups working on the same task. These findings suggest that when groups are engaged in activities for which status differentials are undesirable, a GSS can be used in both face-to-face and dispersed settings to dampen status differentials. Moreover, when a task amplifies status differentials, the use of a GSS tends to produce corresponding stronger dampening effects.

This study investigates the impact of the electronic communication and anonymity capabilities of a group support system (GSS) on group polarization. Three support levels were studied: verbal support, identified GSS support, and anonymous GSS support. Information exposure was varied at two levels: exposure to positions without arguments and exposure to positions with arguments. The dependent variables were preference change and choice shift. Anonymous GSS groups produced higher choice shift than verbal groups. Anonymous GSS groups who were exposed to positions with arguments also had higher preference change than groups in other treatments. These results indicate that the anonymity and electronic communication capabilities of a GSS can be used conjointly to stimulate group polarization, especially when groups exchange mutual positions and arguments.

This paper reports the findings of an empirical research on the effect of group support system (GSS) and task type on social influences in small groups. It examines the task type with an intellective task and a preference task, and analyzes social influences in terms of informational and normative influence. The main findings are: (1) informational influence dominated in intellective task groups whereas normative influence dominated in preference task groups; and (2) a GSS amplified informational influence in intellective task groups and attenuated normative influence in preference task groups. The paper suggests further research using varying levels of GSS support and different task types to gain a deeper understanding of the impact of GSS and task type on social influences in small groups.

There have been many experiments comparing query languages. Their findings are difficult to combine as the experiments have used different settings and procedures. Before a meta-analysis combining the experiments, it is proposed that these differences be checked for any possible effect. The most important measure of user performance in these experiments is query accuracy, which has been determined using many different grading schemes. The different schemes are therefore checked for possible effects on hypothesis rejection. These grading schemes are applied to two sets of queries from two different experiments. The outcomes are examined to identify any effects resulting from the grading schemes. The results show that the experimental outcomes are robust and immune to the grading schemes.

There are two main approaches to improving the effectiveness of database interfaces. One is to raise the level of abstraction for the content of the user-database interaction. The relational model belonging to the logical level has replaced the hierarchical and network models that belong to the lower physical level. It is likely that the relational model will eventually be replaced by models belonging to the even higher conceptual level, such as entity relationship models and object-oriented models. The second approach is to enhance the actual interaction process. This can be done by providing better feedback to the user. Feedback can be in the form of more comprehensible error messages, and the provision of a natural language interpretation of user's query. Such a feedback system was developed, and its effectiveness tested in an experiment. The results showed that the feedback system enhanced user performance greatly. Specifically, users who used the feedback system were 12.9% more accurate than those without the feedback system. They were also 41.2% more confident of their answers, and they took 29.0% less time than those without the feedback system.

This study investigates the effects of a GSS on the decision outcome of five-person, face-to-face groups performing two distinct but related task types. A controlled laboratory experiment with a 3/spl times/2 factorial design was employed. The independent variables were support level and task type. A total of 68 groups were randomly assigned to different support levels (no support, structure support, of GSS support). Half of these groups performed an intellectual task while the other half performed a preference task. The empirical findings show that task type affects consensus change and influence equality. Moreover, support level and task type jointly affect decision scheme satisfaction. This paper attempts to reconcile the body of empirical findings from related GSS studies. It discusses the implications of task type for GSS design and use.>