Hiljaisen tiedon tallennusHämeen Puhelin Oy:ssä vuosina 2006-2010

Moderni liiketoiminta kohtaa uusia haasteita. Haasteiden aiheuttajia ovat mm. alenevat tuotantokustannukset ja kiihtyvä kilpailu. Jotta yritys kykenisi vastaamaan näihin moderneihin haasteisiin, sen tulee toimissaan hyödyntää tehokkaasti omat resurssit. Yrityksen suurimmat resurssit sijaitsevat henkilöstössä, heihin sitoutuneessa tiedossa. Tästä tiedosta iso osa on ns. hiljaista tietoa, jota ei voida perinteisin keinoin tallentaa. Tämä työ, tutkimus keskittyy tuon hiljaisen tiedon tallentamiseen. Tutkimuksen tavoitteena oli luoda malli, joka sisältää hiljaisen tiedon keruun, analyysin ja siirtämisen. Kokonaisuus muodostaa työkalun jolla teettävän yrityksen eläkkeelle jäävä henkilöstön hiljainen tieto tallennetaan yritykseen. Mallin lisäksi tutkimuksessa tuodaan esille aihetta koskevat erilaiset kehitysmahdollisuudet ja visiot.

Strategic Innovation Management Based on Three Dimensions

This thesis examines innovation development needs of firms in a remote rural region. The perspective of the study is in strategic innovation management and three dimensions of innovation development: innovation environment, value delivery and innovation capability. The framework is studied with a theoretical and methodological approach in the context of the development of a regional innovation system and the defining of innovation development needs. The thesis is based on existing innovation management literature, expanding it by examining the features of the three dimensions. The empirical data of the study comprise 50 purposefully selected firms within the region of Pielinen Karelia located in Eastern Finland. Most of the firms (70%) included in the study represent manufacturing firms, and over 90% are small and medium-sized enterprises. The research data consist of two questionnaires and an interview, which were done during 2011 in the connection of a regional development project. The point of view of the research is in regional development and harnessing the innovation capability of the firms within the region. The principal research approach applies soft systems methodology. The study explores the means to foster the innovativeness of firms from the viewpoints of innovation environment, innovation capability and value delivery. In closer detail, the study examines relations between the innovation capability factors, differences in innovation development needs within the value delivery system, between sectors and between firm size categories. The thesis offers three major contributions. First, the study extends earlier research on strategic innovation management by connecting the frameworks of innovation capability, innovation environment and value delivery process to the defining of innovation development needs at the regional level. The results deepen knowledge especially concerning practice-based innovation, peripheral regions and smaller firms. Second, the empirical work, based on a case study, confirms the existence of a structural connection integrating five factors of innovation capability. Statistical evidence is provided especially for the positive impacts of the improvement of absorption capability, marketing capability and networking capability, which are the main weaknesses of firms according to the study. Third, the research provides a methodological contribution by applying the innovation matrix in the defining of the innovation development needs of firms. The study demonstrates how the matrix improves possibility to target policy instruments and innovation services more efficiently through indicating significant differences between the innovation support needs regarding various time horizons and phases of innovation process.

Modelling the simultaneous effects of intellectual capital and knowledge management on the organisational performance of Finnish companies

The aim of this study was to contribute to the current knowledge-based theory by focusing on a research gap that exists in the empirically proven determination of the simultaneous but differentiable effects of intellectual capital (IC) assets and knowledge management (KM) practices on organisational performance (OP). The analysis was built on the past research and theoreticised interactions between the latent constructs specified using the survey-based items that were measured from a sample of Finnish companies for IC and KM and the dependent construct for OP determined using information available from financial databases. Two widely used and commonly recommended measures in the literature on management science, i.e. the return on total assets (ROA) and the return on equity (ROE), were calculated for OP. Thus the investigation of the relationship between IC and KM impacting OP in relation to the hypotheses founded was possible to conduct using objectively derived performance indicators. Using financial OP measures also strengthened the dynamic features of data needed in analysing simultaneous and causal dependences between the modelled constructs specified using structural path models. The estimates were obtained for the parameters of structural path models using a partial least squares-based regression estimator. Results showed that the path dependencies between IC and OP or KM and OP were always insignificant when analysed separate to any other interactions or indirect effects caused by simultaneous modelling and regardless of the OP measure used that was either ROA or ROE. The dependency between the constructs for KM and IC appeared to be very strong and was always significant when modelled simultaneously with other possible interactions between the constructs and using either ROA or ROE to define OP. This study, however, did not find statistically unambiguous evidence for proving the hypothesised causal mediation effects suggesting, for instance, that the effects of KM practices on OP are mediated by the IC assets. Due to the fact that some indication about the fluctuations of causal effects was assessed, it was concluded that further studies are needed for verifying the fundamental and likely hidden causal effects between the constructs of interest. Therefore, it was also recommended that complementary modelling and data processing measures be conducted for elucidating whether the mediation effects occur between IC, KM and OP, the verification of which requires further investigations of measured items and can be build on the findings of this study.

Perception of privacy in smartphone applications: profiling users based on personality types.

This document is focused on studying privacy perception and personality traits of users in the context of smartphone application privacy. It is divided into two parts. The first part presents an in depth systematic literature review of the existing academic writings available on the topic of relation between privacy perception and personality traits. Demographics, methodologies and other useful insight is extracted and the available literature is divided into broader group of topics bringing the five main areas of research to light and highlighting the current research trends in the field along with pinpointing the research gap of interest to the author. The second part of the thesis uses the results from the literature review to administer an empirical study to investigate the current privacy perception of users and the correlation between personality traits and privacy perception in smartphone applications. Big five personality test is used as the measure for personality traits whereas three sub-variables are used to measure privacy perception i.e. perceived privacy awareness, perceived threat to privacy and willingness to trade privacy. According to the study openness to experience is the most dominant trait having a strong correlation with two privacy sub-variables whereas emotional stability doesn’t show any correlation with privacy perception. Empirical study also explores other findings as preferred privacy sources and application installation preferences that provide further insight about users and might be useful in future.

Reasoning over knowledge-based generation of situations in context spaces to reduce food waste

With the ever-growing amount of connected sensors (IoT), making sense of sensed data becomes even more important. Pervasive computing is a key enabler for sustainable solutions, prominent examples are smart energy systems and decision support systems. A key feature of pervasive systems is situation awareness which allows a system to thoroughly understand its environment. It is based on external interpretation of data and thus relies on expert knowledge. Due to the distinct nature of situations in different domains and applications, the development of situation aware applications remains a complex process. This thesis is concerned with a general framework for situation awareness which simplifies the development of applications. It is based on the Situation Theory Ontology to provide a foundation for situation modelling which allows knowledge reuse. Concepts of the Situation Theory are mapped to the Context Space Theory which is used for situation reasoning. Situation Spaces in the Context Space are automatically generated with the defined knowledge. For the acquisition of sensor data, the IoT standards O-MI/O-DF are integrated into the framework. These allow a peer-to-peer data exchange between data publisher and the proposed framework and thus a platform independent subscription to sensed data. The framework is then applied for a use case to reduce food waste. The use case validates the applicability of the framework and furthermore serves as a showcase for a pervasive system contributing to the sustainability goals. Leading institutions, e.g. the United Nations, stress the need for a more resource efficient society and acknowledge the capability of ICT systems. The use case scenario is based on a smart neighbourhood in which the system recommends the most efficient use of food items through situation awareness to reduce food waste at consumption stage.

Compaction of growth media based on Sphagnum peat during one-year culturing of container seedlings

Tiivistelmä: Turvepohjaisten kasvualustojen tiivistyminen yksivuotisessa paakkutaimikasvatuksessa

Supply of nutrients and productive responses in dairy cows given diets based on restrictively fermented silage

Selostus: Ravintoaineiden saantiin ja maidontuotantoon vaikuttavat tekijät runsaalla säilörehuruokinnalla