EUROPEAN INTEROPERABILITY FRAMEWORK & E-CODEX: An Assessment of both European Initiatives towards Interoperability

Due to the necessity of achieving greater interoperability among the European Union (EU) Member States’ public services, the European Interoperability Framework (EIF) was created. This framework provides guidelines to projects towards cross-border interoperability of EU Member States. One of such projects is the e-CODEX. The purpose of this thesis is, therefore, to assess how useful the EIF is, how e-CODEX stands in compliance to the EIF and ultimately answer whether the e-CODEX should fulfill its intended purpose or not. To answer these questions, I divided the research in two distinct sections: the first one compares the EIF against the American initiative towards interoperability, the Federal Enterprise Architecture (FEA); and the second one assesses to what extent the e-CODEX follows the EIF and to what extent the EIF covers e-CODEX’s needs in the form of a questionnaire sent to experts in e-CODEX’s Member States. By the conclusion, I summarize the findings in each section, derive some new findings by combining the previous ones, and finally suggest some recommendations and a topic for future research.

Enhancing the development of military capabilities by a systems approach

The political environment of security and defence has changed radically in the Western industrialised world since the Cold War. As a response to these changes, since the beginning of the twenty-first century, most Western countries have adopted a ‘capabilities-based approach’ to developing and operating their armed forces. More responsive and versatile military capabilities must be developed to meet the contemporary challenges. The systems approach is seen as a beneficial means of overcoming traps in resolving complex real -world issues by conventional thinking. The main objectives of this dissertation are to explore and assess the means to enhance the development of military capabilities both in concept development and experimentation (CD&E) and in national defence materiel collaboration issues. This research provides a unique perspective, a systems approach, to the development areas of concern in resolving complex real-world issues. This dissertation seeks to increase the understanding of the military capability concept both as a whole and with in its life cycle. The dissertation follows the generic functionalist systems methodology by Jackson. The methodology applies a comprehensive set of constitutive rules to examine the research objectives. This dissertation makes contribution to current studies about military capability. It presents two interdepen dent conceptual capability models: the comprehensive capability meta-model (CCMM) and the holistic capability life cycle model (HCLCM). These models holistically and systematically complement the existing, but still evolving, understanding of military capability and its life cycle. In addition, this dissertation contributes to the scientific discussion of defence procurement in its broad meaning by introducing the holistic model about the national defence materiel collaboration between the defence forces, defence industry and academia. The model connects the key collaborative mechanisms, which currently work in isolation from each other, and take into consideration the unique needs of each partner. This dissertation contributes empirical evidence regarding the benefits of enterprise architectures (EA) to CD&E. The EA approach may add value to traditional concept development by increasing the clarity, consistency and completeness of the concept. The most important use considered for EA in CD&E is that it enables further utilisation of the concept created in the case project.

Professionalization of controllers in Finland

Professions are a special category of occupations that possesses exclusive rights over its domain of expertise. Professions apply expert knowledge in their work by using professional discretion and judgment to solve their clients’ problems. With control over their expert knowledge base, professions are able to control the supply of practitioners in their field and regulate the practice in their market. Professionalization is the process during which occupations attempt to gain the status of a profession. The benefits of becoming a profession are extensive – professional autonomy, social and financial rewards, prestige, status, and an exclusive community are only a few of the privileges that established professions possess. Many aspiring occupations have tried and failed to gain the status of a profession and one of these groups is the occupation of controllers in Finland. The objective of this study to uncover, why controllers have not professionalized, which properties of the occupation correspond with the elements generally regarded to pertain to professions, and which aspects of the occupational group may hinder the professionalization project. The professionalization project of controllers is analyzed using a multi-actor model of professionalization, in which practitioners, clients, the state, training institutions, and employing organizations are considered to affect the project. The properties of the occupation of controllers are compared to features generally associated with professions. The research methodology for this thesis is qualitative, and the study is conducted as an exploratory research. The data is primarily gathered using semi-structured interviews, which were conducted between March and May 2013 lasting from 40 minutes to an hour. In total, four controllers were interviewed, who worked for different companies operating in different industries, and whose experience of working as a controller varied between a few years to nearly 15 years. The data in this study indicates that although controllers possess qualities that distinguish professions from other occupational groups, the professionalization of controllers may not be plausible. Controllers enjoy considerable autonomy in organizations, and they possess a strong orientation towards serving their clients. The more profound problem with the occupation is its non-exclusive, indistinct knowledge base that does not rely solely on a single knowledge base. Controllers’ expertise is relatively organization-specific and built on several different fields of knowledge and not just management accounting, which could be considered as their primary knowledge base. In addition, controllers have not organized themselves, which is a quintessential, but by no means a sufficient prerequisite for professionalization.

From KAPTUR to VADSR: Exploring Research Data Management in the Visual Arts

Poster at Open Repositories 2014, Helsinki, Finland, June 9-13, 2014

On advancing business intelligence in the electricity retail market

In recent decades, business intelligence (BI) has gained momentum in real-world practice. At the same time, business intelligence has evolved as an important research subject of Information Systems (IS) within the decision support domain. Today’s growing competitive pressure in business has led to increased needs for real-time analytics, i.e., so called real-time BI or operational BI. This is especially true with respect to the electricity production, transmission, distribution, and retail business since the law of physics determines that electricity as a commodity is nearly impossible to be stored economically, and therefore demand-supply needs to be constantly in balance. The current power sector is subject to complex changes, innovation opportunities, and technical and regulatory constraints. These range from low carbon transition, renewable energy sources (RES) development, market design to new technologies (e.g., smart metering, smart grids, electric vehicles, etc.), and new independent power producers (e.g., commercial buildings or households with rooftop solar panel installments, a.k.a. Distributed Generation). Among them, the ongoing deployment of Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI) has profound impacts on the electricity retail market. From the view point of BI research, the AMI is enabling real-time or near real-time analytics in the electricity retail business. Following Design Science Research (DSR) paradigm in the IS field, this research presents four aspects of BI for efficient pricing in a competitive electricity retail market: (i) visual data-mining based descriptive analytics, namely electricity consumption profiling, for pricing decision-making support; (ii) real-time BI enterprise architecture for enhancing management’s capacity on real-time decision-making; (iii) prescriptive analytics through agent-based modeling for price-responsive demand simulation; (iv) visual data-mining application for electricity distribution benchmarking. Even though this study is from the perspective of the European electricity industry, particularly focused on Finland and Estonia, the BI approaches investigated can: (i) provide managerial implications to support the utility’s pricing decision-making; (ii) add empirical knowledge to the landscape of BI research; (iii) be transferred to a wide body of practice in the power sector and BI research community.

Role of service and data reuse in enterprises

Digitalization has been predicted to change the future as a growing range of non-routine tasks will be automated, offering new kinds of business models for enterprises. Serviceoriented architecture (SOA) provides a basis for designing and implementing welldefined problems as reusable services, allowing computers to execute them. Serviceoriented design has potential to act as a mediator between IT and human resources, but enterprises struggle with their SOA adoption and lack a linkage between the benefits and costs of services. This thesis studies the phenomenon of service reuse in enterprises, proposing an ontology to link different kinds of services with their role conceptually as a part of the business model. The proposed ontology has been created on the basis of qualitative research conducted in three large enterprises. Service reuse has two roles in enterprises: it enables automated data sharing among human and IT resources, and it may provide cost savings in service development and operations. From a technical viewpoint, the ability to define a business problem as a service is one of the key enablers for achieving service reuse. The research proposes two service identification methods, first to identify prospective services in the existing documentation of the enterprise and secondly to model the services from a functional viewpoint, supporting service identification sessions with business stakeholders.

Hiljaisen tiedon hyödyntäminen verkostoituneen yrityksen ict-ryhmässä

Työn alustavana tavoitteena oli havaita yrityksen ict-ryhmässä käytettävien teknisten välineiden, informaation hallinnan järjestelmien ja ryhmän työtilojen vaikutus hiljasen tiedon jakamiseen tai sen estymiseen. Työssä tarkasteltiin myös vaikutusta ryhmän oppimiseen sekä ryhmään muodostuvan hiljaisen tiedon syntymisen ja henkilöitymisen syihin sekä hiljaisen tiedon laatuun. Lisäksi työssä pyritään löytämään tapoja, joiden avulla hiljaista tietoa voidaan hyödyntää ja jakaa ryhmässä siten että se mahdollistaa myös ryhmän oppimisen. Haastatteluissa nousivat esiin informaation hallintaongelmat, jotka johtuvat informaation hajautumisesta informaation eri hallinta järjestelmiin, tietoturvamääräysten aiheuttamiin esteisiin ja kriittisen teknisen dokumentaation tallentamiseen. Nämä vaikeuttavat tallennetun informaation hyödyntämistä ict-ryhmässä. Tämä osaltaan aiheuttaa hiljaisen tiedon henkilöitymistä ryhmässä ja hiljaisen tiedon jakamisen menetelmien jää hyödyntämättä. Haastatteluissa osoittautui, että hiljaisen tiedon hyödyntämisongelmat johtuvat osittain ryhmän sisäisten yhteyksien verkoston rakenteesta. Vahvojen linkkien vähyys ryhmässä ja vahvojen linkkien suuntautuminen ryhmän ulkoisiin verkostoihin vaikeuttaa hiljaisen tiedon siirtymistä ryhmässä ja aiheuttaa hiljaisen tiedon henkilöitymistä. Kiire todettiin ryhmän kannalta ongelmalliseksi hiljaisen tiedon jakamisen ja hyödyntämisen esteeksi. Tiedon adaptaatioon ja omaksumiseen liittyvät ongelmat ovat sidoksissa aikaan ja hiljaisen tiedon henkilöitymiseen ryhmässä. Ryhmätyö ja ryhmän päivittäisessä toiminnassa käytettävissä olevat hiljaisen tiedon jakamisen menetelmät osoittautuvat sopivimmiksi edistämään ryhmän yhteistyökykyä sekä sosiaalisen rakenteen ja luottamuksen kehittymistä. Ne poistavat myös tiedon omaksumisen ja adaptaation esteitä. Ryhmätyö vaikuttaa myönteisesti ryhmän kollektiiviseen osaamiseen ja ryhmän hiljaisen tiedon kehittymiseen. Lisäksi se parantaa teknisen dokumentaation ymmärrettävyyttä.

Suorituskyvyn johtamisen ja mittaamisen kehittäminen suuren yrityksen tutkimus- ja tuotekehitystoiminnassa

Tässä tutkimuksessa selvitettiin, miten suorituskyvyn johtamista ja mittaamista käytännössä toteutettiin suuressa tutkimus- ja tuotekehitystoimintaa Suomessa harjoittavassa elintarvikealan yrityksessä. Tutkimuksessa kartoitettiin tärkeimpiä suorituskykyyn vaikuttavia tekijöitä suorituskyvyn johtamisen ja mittaamisen näkökulmasta. Tutkimuksen tavoitteena oli saada kooste suosituksista tutkimus- ja tuotekehitystoiminnan suorituskyvyn johtamisen ja mittaamisen kehittämiseksi. Tutkimuksen laajuus rajattiin neljään case-yritykseen. Tutkimuksessa tehtiin empiirinen puolistrukturoitu kyselytutkimus, strukturoidut haastattelut sekä tulosten arviointi. Tutkimusote oli lähinnä toiminta-analyyttinen, koska tutkimuksessa käsiteltiin organisaation toimintaa, johtamista, ongelmanratkaisua, päätöksentekoprosesseja sekä kehitys- ja muutosprosesseja. Tutkimustulosten perusteella suorituskyvyn johtamista ja mittaamista case-yrityksissä toteutettiin BSC:n yleisten näkökulmien mukaisesti. Tutkimus- ja tuotekehitystoiminnan mittauksen tavoitteet poikkesivat toisistaan niiden toiminnan luonteesta johtuen. Tutkimustoiminnassa suorituskyvyn mittauksen tavoitteet painottuivat lähinnä innovatiivisuuteen, oppimiseen ja motivointiin. Tuotekehitystoiminnassa mittauksen tavoitteet olivat enemmän diagnostisia. Tuotekehitystoiminnassa tavoitteena olivat projektien seurantaan, toiminnan tulostenarviointiin, talouteen sekä koordinaatioon ja kommunikointiin liittyvät tekijät. Tutkimustulosten perusteella puutteita havaittiin suorituskyvyn viestinnän riittävyydessä ja vaikuttavuudessa, mittaustiedon hyödynnettävyydessä, aineettoman pääoman mittauksessa, projektien arviointikriteerien viestinnässä, prosessien selkeydessä ja toimivuudessa, projektiosaamisessa, suorituskyvyn mittauksessa, vaikutusmahdollisuuksissa, johtamisessa ja esimiestyössä.

Risk management in transportation companies: Russian and Finnish practices

Development of risk management practices became significant part of transportation companies’ strategy. Evolution from insurance management into enterprise risk management (ERM) led to development of risk management tools and methods. The purpose of this thesis is to design technique for evaluation of risk management practices of national transportation companies. The empirical research is made on the example of Russian and Finnish transportation companies. The required data was conducted with a help of survey. The result of the thesis is designed technique for risk management practices evaluation that allows to compare practices of different countries and organizations with different characteristics. The Master thesis has novelty in theoretical and practical contribution. It was designed new technique based on realization of the method of APIS. Moreover, it has practical implication as managers can utilize this method for comparison of practices between different countries, different organization and even different units within particular organization.

Muutosjohtaminen liikkeenjohdon konsultointiyrityksissä, Case: Kolme konsultointiyritystä

Tutkielma tutkii konsultointiyritysten harjoittamaa muutosjohtamista. Tutkielman tavoitteena on selvittää millaisia menetelmiä konsultointiyritykset käyttävät muutoksen johtamiseen. Tutkielma esittää organisaatiomuutoksen ilmiönä ja selvittää miten muutosta johdetaan. Tutkielma keskittyy konsultointiyritysten muutoksen johtamisessa käyttämiin muutosmalleihin ja -palveluihin. Tutkimusmetodologiana tutkielmassa käytettiin laadullista tapaustutkimusta ja tutkimusaineistonakonsultointiyritysten internet - sivuja. Tutkielmassa havaittiin kirjallisuudessa esiteltyjen muutosmallien identtisyys konsultointiyritysten käyttämien mallien kanssa. Tutkielman tuloksena luotiin synteesi muutosjohtamisen malleista. Tutkielmassa selvisi myös muutospalveluiden kehittyminen laajaksi, kaikkia palveluita tukevaksi funktioksi liikkeenjohdon konsultointiyrityksissä.

Performance Measurement as Part of Management

To achieve success in a constantly changing environment and with ever-increasing competition, companies must develop their operations continuously. To do this, they must have a clear vision of what they want to be in the future. This vision can be attained through careful planning and strategising. One method of transforming a strategy and vision into an everyday tool used by employees is the use of a balanced performance measurement system. The importance of performance measurement in the implementation of companies' visions and strategies has grown substantially in the last ten years. Measures are derived from the company's critical success factors and from many different perspectives. There are three time dimensions: past, present and future. Many such performance measurement systems have been created since the 1990s. This is a case study whose main objective is to provide a recommendation for how the case company could make use of performance measurement to support strategic management. To answer this question, the study uses literature-based research and empirical research at the case company's premises. The theoretical part of the study consists of two sections: introducing the Balanced Scorecard and discussing how it supports strategic management and change management. The empirical part of this study determines the company's present performance measurement situation through interviews in the company. The study resulted in a recommendation to the company to start developing the Balanced Scorecard system. By setting up this kind process, the company would be able to change its focus more towards the future, beginning to implement a more process-based organisation and getting its employees to work together towards common goals.

Kokonaistoimittajan operatiivisen toiminnanohjauksen tietojärjestelmät imuohjatun tuotannon verkostossa

Tutkimuksen tavoitteena oli kehittää kansainvälisesti toimivan suuren yrityksen johtaman verkoston kokonaistoimittajatason yritysten käyttöön yksinkertainen viitekehys, jota yritykset voivat käyttää operatiivista toimintaa ohjaavien tietojärjestelmien hallinnassa. Kirjallisuuskatsauksen lisäksi suoritettiin empiiristä tutkimusta tarkastelemalla verkostoyritysten toimintaa operatiivisten toiminnanohjausjärjestelmien kehitysprojektien kannalta. Samalla tarkasteltiin kahden pohjoiskarjalaisen yritysverkoston kokonaistoimittajien nykytilannetta toiminnanohjauksen tietojärjestelmien osalta ja verkostotoiminnan vaikutusta niihin. Tutkimuksessa havaittiin, että kokonaistoimittajien on kasvatettava osaamistaan nykyaikaisten tietojärjestelmien osalta kyetäkseen vastaamaan kansainvälisen päähankkijan asettamiin vaatimuksiin kiristyvässä kilpailutilanteessa. Imuohjatun verkoston toiminnanohjauksen kannalta on ensiarvoisen tärkeää että verkoston toiseksi ylimmällä portaalla toimivien kokonaistoimittajien tietojärjestelmät tukevat moderneja toimintatapoja niin sanomavälityksen kuin tuotannon- ja materiaalin ohjauksen osalta. Tulosten perusteella voidaan todeta, että tyypillisen kokonaistoimittajayrityksen tietämys tietojärjestelmäasioista on varsin matalalla tasolla. Tutkimuksen tuloksena syntyi myös kuusiportainen viitekehys operatiivisen toiminnanohjauksen tietojärjestelmien jatkuvan kehittämisen tueksi.

BALANSED SCORECARDIN IMPLEMENTOINTI JA HYÖDYNTÄMINEN CASE: PROAGRIA ETELÄ-KARJALAN MAASEUTUKESKUS

Tutkimuksen tavoitteena oli tutkia ProAgria Etelä-Karjalan Maaseutukeskuksen balanced scorecard -mittaristoa. Tutkimuksessa selvitettiin mittariston käyttöönottoprosessia muodostamispäätöksestä hyödyntämiseen. Tutkimusmetodologiaksi on valittu case-tutkimus. Teoriaosassa käsitellään strategista johtamista yleisesti ja asiantuntija- ja voittoa tavoittelemattomien organisaatioiden osalta sekä balanced scorecardin muodostumista, suorituskyvyn mittaamista ja mittariston käyttömahdollisuuksia. Tutkimuksen empiirisessä osassa analysoidaan Maaseutukeskuksen mittariston käyttöönottoprosessin nykytilaa ja esitetään tulosten perusteella muodostetut kehitysehdotukset. Tutkimuksen perusteella voidaan todeta, että Maaseutukeskuksen käyttöönottoprosessi ei ole sujunut odotusten mukaisesti, mutta strategian ja mittariston yhteyden selvittämisen jälkeen voi sisäistämisprosessi alkaa koko organisaation laajuudessa. Mittariston tavoitteiden mukainen hyödyntäminen vaatii koko henkilöstön sitoutumista strategiaan ja seuraamista henkilökohtaisten ja koko organisaation tavoitteiden toteutumista mittariston avulla.

Strategic Orientation of Knowledge Management: Influence on Company's Performance

Nowadays, the huge part of the most important research is done in the area of interaction of two or more fields of research. They open doors for new ideas and help to find that was not possible to find before, explain simple things, which was missed because of narrow vision. This research investigates the interconnection of strategy study and knowledge management. Well-known researches (e.g. Michael Zack, 2003) point out that organization should align its' knowledge management to strategy to gain success. But this is not well developed area yet. This research contributes to the growing knowledge of knowledge management - strategy alignment. The research tests the relation between strategic orientation of knowledge management and performance of the company. It also investigates the nature of strategy typology influence on strategic orientation of knowledge management. These two points have critical importance for development of this area. Moreover, it has management implication for those practitioners, who cares about sustainable success of their company based on knowledge.

Supply management capability

The objective of this thesis is to define supply management capability. The thesis study what factors consist of supply management capability, and which of those factors are critical to achieving competitive advantage. One objective is also to study how firms can measure their supply management capability. This study is a qualitative research. The thesis examines the literature regarding to supply management and the context of capability and there are used Delphi panel to examine the current and future insights of supply management professionals concerning of supply management skills and capability. The empirical data of the thesis was collected by interviews. The Delphi panel was used in data collection and analysis and for prioritization of the factors of supply management capability. The thesis includes lists of factors of supply management capability. Main findings of the study were that there is no one clear, generally suitable set of supply management skills which bring competitive advantage for all firms and the most important factors of supply management capability, according to the experts, are total cost analysis, customer focus, general business view, market knowledge and supplier relationships. In this study the supply management capability is defined as organization’s overall capacity and ability to achieve a holistic understanding of purchasing needs, manage its suppliers and collaborative partners, and conduct its internal tasks, routines and responsibilities in a way that achieves desired results. The results of this thesis show also that Finnish firms need more right kind of supply management knowledge.