Page 129 - Crossing Cultural Boundaries - Cees den Teuling

(i) How/why are AR projects initiated? AR focuses on existing problems or problematic situations. The researcher-driven approach is when action researcher is familiar with a theoretical approach or model to address certain problem or situation and is in search for characteristic settings, to imply the theories. In the underlying study, researcher became aware of the lack of scientifically based information on the results of wide-scale projects of trans-boundary KT and their influence on SVC in the advised organisations. The problem driven direction appears when practitioners are confronted with an overwhelming, maybe seemingly insoluble problem and searching for assistance by theoretical specialists/researchers. The gain for researchers, confronted with requests from practice, is to acquire experiences, to draw conclusions, which can be instrumental in theoretical expansion and deepening. A mixed approach of two directions of initiation (research-driven versus problem driven) occurs from discussions between practitioners and researchers, often as a result of consultancy work. The approach applied for the underlying study can be characterized as a research-driven initiative.
(ii) The determination of authority in AR projects can be rather complex. Decisions should be made on a number of issues e.g. project structure, re-negotiation and cancellation processes and action warrant determination. Action warrants define the authority under which any action can be implemented. For underlying research, an action warrant is provided by the principal organisation, which is ORANGE BUSINESS IMPROVEMENT (OBI). The responsible AR team is composed by both researchers of OBI and KFU as well as practitioners from the organisations of interest. The research is initiated and implemented by the mentioned researchers to bring clarity in the level of the obtained knowledge, transferred through external (foreign) consultants, advisers and business-trainers, and of interest for the principal, initiating and sponsoring organisation (OBI).
(iii) Formalisation of the goals in the AR project is commonly defined in contracts or agreements. The legal basis for carrying out the research is a contract under Russian Law as concluded between CASD (KFU) and CDT Business Support CEE LLC (Kazan) the Russian affiliate of OBI, as obligatory for service agreements under Russian jurisdiction.
For measurement of the short-term effects of the KT process experienced within the respondent organisations, objective data regarding e.g. growth of turnover, size of market share and profitability are not researched and consequently not available. For
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