CALL FOR CHAPTER PROPOSALS

Proposal Submission Deadline: October 31, 2008

Knowledge Management Strategies for Business Development

A book edited by Dr. Meir Russ

University of Wisconsin-Green Bay, USA

http://www.igi-global.com/requests/details.asp?ID=502

Introduction

As the new economy continues to evolve, knowledge is being recognized as a business asset and considered a crucial component of business strategy. Therefore, the ability to manage knowledge is rapidly becoming a crucial skill for securing and maintaining organizational success and surviving in the knowledge economy. The question this book is poised to answer is: How can companies succeed in this endeavor systematically? We see companies as distributed knowledge systems, or as knowledge repositories. Different companies manage their knowledge in different ways, in the same way that they differently manage their employees, capital and other assets. Companies use different strategies to utilize those assets: They diversify, they penetrate, and they develop new products. Knowledge Management (KM) requires obtaining skills that will allow managers to systematically develop knowledge-based strategies. In search of the sustainable competitive advantage within the new knowledge-based economy, companies invested heavily in information and communication systems. The effectiveness of such investments is questionable, however. We see KM as a socio-technical phenomenon where the basic social constituents such as person, team and organization require support from Information Systems/Knowledge Based Systems applications to support a strategy within their unique context and add value to the organization.

Objective of the Book

The objective of this book will be to educate the business audience of the relevance of knowledge management strategies for the development of business strategies and to educate this same audience on how to systematically transfer their knowledge base and core competencies into a sustainable competitive advantage.

The book will provide business practitioners with a comprehensive set of tools that are designed to systematically guide them through a process that will focus on data gathering, analysis, and decision making that culminates in a strategic plan of action.  We want the reader to understand and to see examples of how knowledge assets are a critical component in any strategic planning process and how they can help in creating value. 

Target Audience

We see a vast need for a practically oriented book that will provide a specific set of tools

to business practitioners who are struggling with the business dilemmas of embracing the management of knowledge in their strategic decision making. Specifically, we can identify the following target audiences:

·         Executives and managers with special interest in Business Strategy

·         Knowledge Management and Organizational Learning executives

·         Knowledge Management and Organizational Learning specialists and practitioners

·         HR officers

·         IT officers

·         MBA (and other graduate level students) students taking classes in Business Strategy and in Knowledge Management

Recommended topics include, but are not limited to, the following:

1. Conceptual theory - basic concepts 
2. KM strategic audit - framework
3. Example, or a case of a KM strategic audit
4. KM strategy, vision, mission, goals
5. Gap analysis (business/KM strategy gaps)
6. Closing the gap – frameworks of KM strategies
7. Example, or a case of KM strategy
8. KM strategy implementation - framework and/or guidelines
9. KM strategy validation and value
10. How can you start?

Submission Procedure

Researchers and practitioners are invited to submit on or before October 15, 2008, a 2-3 page chapter proposal clearly explaining the mission and concerns of his or her proposed chapter. Authors of accepted proposals will be notified by November 1, 2008 as to the status of their proposals, and will be sent chapter guidelines. Full chapters are expected to be submitted by January 15, 2009.  This book is scheduled to be published by IGI Global (formerly Idea Group Inc.), publisher of the "Information Science Reference" (formerly Idea Group Reference) and "Medical Information Science Reference" imprints. For additional information regarding the publisher, please visit www.igi-global.com.

Inquiries and submissions can be forwarded electronically (Word document) or by mail to:

Dr. Meir Russ

Associate Professor, Management and Marketing

Chair, Masters of Management

University of Wisconsin - Green Bay

2420 Nicolet Drive, WH460

Green Bay, WI 54311-7001, USA

Tel.: +1 920 465 2757  •  Fax: +1 920 465 2660 

E-mail: russm@uwgb.edu

Apologizes for cross-postings                                                                                                                                                                                                              

Call for Chapter proposals

Corporate Social Performance: Paradoxes, Pitfalls and Pathways To The Better World

Agata Stachowicz-Stanusch, Silesian University of Technology, Gliwice, Editor

The last decade had abundant corporate, national and international ethical and financial scandals and crises. After this epoch of moral catastrophes stakeholders expect that corporations which are considered as the most powerful institutions today and which have enormous impact on our planet's ecosystems and social networks will take more active roles as citizens within society and in the fight against some of the most pressing problems in the world, such as poverty, environmental degradation, defending human rights, corruption, and pandemic diseases.

Although Corporate Social Performance (CSP) has been a prominent concept in management literature and in the business world  in recent years  "it remains a fact that many business leaders still only pay lip service to CSR, or are merely reacting to peer pressure by introducing it into their organizations." (Bevan et al. 2004:4).

This book will invite and set the stage for the debate about the contemporary perspectives in Corporate Social Performance and Policy and the future of the Corporate Social Performance.

I invite proposals for chapters on CSP in the age of irresponsibility (which will presents a positive as well as a negative views, empirical reflections as well as normative thoughts) and proposals for chapters which will try to indicate the effective tools for humanizing of modern corporations.

Topics of interest include but are not limited to:

·         the fundamental reasons for corporate irresponsibility in and beyond a corporate context;

·         corporate social responsibility in the time of crisis;

·         sustainability in action at individual, corporate, national level;

·         the facts and the myths of social investing;

·         the benefits and costs of corporate social performance/ corporate irresponsibility for organizations;

·         cross-cultural perspective on corporate social performance;

·         corporate social performance and geographical diversification;

·         corporate social performance in developing, post-communism or emerging  markets;

·         corporate social performance at organizational and societal level;

·         the impact of nation-level institutions on corporate social performance;

·         the impact of social media on the development of corporate social performance  and corporate social responsibility;

·         extrinsic and intrinsic drivers of corporate social performance;

·         the light and the dark side of corporate social performance;

·         the whats, whys, and hows of corporate social responsibility;

·         the influence of positive psychology, social pressure on corporate social performance;

·         the role of positive psychology in consumer/employee sensitivity to corporate social performance;

·         the relationship between corporate diversification and corporate social performance;

·         social responsibility practices and evaluation of corporate social performance;

·         the relationship between corporate social performance and  organizational size,  or financial performance, and environmental performance;

·         the interactions of corporate social performance with innovation and industry differentiation;

·         the impact of corporate social performance on a firm's multinationality;

·         the role of governance in corporate social responsibility;

·         the role of organizational visibility on corporate social performance;

·         the impact of CEO pay structure/ CEO characteristics on corporate social performance;

·         the link between board gender diversity/ board reputation and corporate social performance;

·         measuring the impact of strategic philanthropy on a firm's financial performance;

·         the relationship between change in corporate social performance and financial performance;

·         corporate social responsibility and financial performance: correlation or misspecification?

·         corporate social performance, stakeholder orientation, and organizational moral development;

·         current efforts to measure corporate social performance;

·         the evolution and dimensions of corporate social performance.

PUBLICATION SCHEDULE:

Book chapter proposals received: December 4, 2013

Notification of accepted chapter proposals:  December 20, 2013

Receipt of full book chapters:  April 4, 2014

Chapter authors receive reviews with feedback:  May 4, 2014

Final revisions due:  June 20, 2014

Publisher Information

This book is scheduled to be published by Information Age Publishing (IAP) in its new  Contemporary Perspectives in Corporate Social Performance and Policy Book Series.

Submit a one-page or so chapter proposal.  Also, include for each of the co-authors a brief biography including terminal degree, current institutional affiliation and position, and a listing of any related publications. For each co-author include contact information, so I can readily contact you such as: email address, mobile phone, work phone, home phone, and Skype (if you do not mind me contacting you through these).

Send proposals and inquiries to:

Agata Stachowicz-Stanusch  agata.stachowicz@polsl.pl