The influence of workforce agility on external manufacturing flexibility of Iranian SMEs

Alavi, Somaieh

doi:10.1504/ijtlid.2016.075185

Cited by 24 publications

(30 citation statements)

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“…Few studies have sought to identify the potential consequences of a more agile workforce. For example, Alavi (2016) assessed the influence of workforce agility in performance flexibility based on indicators of a company's ability to introduce new products in the market and vary its product mix and production volume. This author's findings suggest that workforce agility is a greater predictor of such indicators, considering that agile workers tend to be more creative and better at solving problems and dealing with task diversity and task-related stress.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…All empirical studies were quantitative and collected research data through surveys; the only exceptions were the studies by Van-Oyen et al (2001), which includes modeling and simulation, and Harsch and Festing (2020), which adopts an exploratory and qualitative approach through a semi-structured interview. Our search also signaled a high incidence of statistical analysis through structural equation models for examining relations between multiple variables, as observed in the works of Alavi et al (2014), Sherehiy and Karwowski (2014), Alavi (2016), and Sumukadas and Sawhney (2004). Table 3 summarizes each paper included in our study.…”

Section: Characterization Of Current Research On Workforce Agilitymentioning

confidence: 97%

“…In addition to the difficulties in conceptualizing workforce agility, it is also hard to understand how promote this business strategy in real life. Many researches have attempted to identify cause-effect relationships between a particular aspect (predictor variable) and workforce agility (dependent variable) (Cai et al, 2018;Muduli & Pandya, 2018;Storme et al, 2020), whereas some others examine workforce agility in specific contexts or workers (Alavi, 2016;Qin & Nembhard, 2010;Tamtam & Tourabi, 2020). However, few studies seek to classify and analyze different ways to obtain greater agility, and they do so only from the perspective of operations management (Alavi & Abd-Wahab, 2013;Qin & Nembhard, 2015).…”

Section: Promoting Workforce Agilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Moreover, the incorporation of agility models may significantly improve the quality of service delivery. Micro and small enterprises are also object of few studies (Alavi, 2016;Sherehiy & Karwowski, 2014;Varshney & Varshney, 2020), therefore establishing multiple possibilities for research from the peculiarities intrinsic to business size and the way they relate with customers, suppliers, and employees.…”

Section: Implications -A Research Agendamentioning

confidence: 99%

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Workforce agility: a systematic literature review and a research agenda proposal

Tessarini

Saltorato

2021

Innovar

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Workforce agility has been described as a management strategy that allows companies to respond quickly and effectively to threats and opportunities arising from a competitive and unstable business environment. In the current literature, there is still a lack of efforts to systematically review the state of the art on this subject. The aim of this paper is to address this gap by studying the academic progress on workforce agility. A systematic literature review was carried out to analyze the academic articles within the workforce agility topic that were published online until the end of June 2020 in three electronic databases: Web of Science (WoS), Scopus, and Science Direct. The bibliometric indicators present how the field has developed and which actors (authors, institutions, countries, journals) are the most relevant. Regarding the conceptual aspects, the findings allowed us to identify that an agile workforce consists of four interrelated and interdependent dimensions: proactivity, flexibility and adaptability, resilience, and competence. These attributes can be promoted through strategies related to i) learning and training, ii) forms of work organization, iii) human resource management; and iv) culture and organizational structure. Our findings also allowed us to propose an agenda for future studies on workforce agility and other related topics. This paper contributes by promoting a debate on a subject still incipient in the literature, especially in Latin America, and by highlighting the potential competitive advantage associated with workforce agility for companies.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Characterization Of Current Research On Workforce Agilitymentioning

confidence: 97%

Section: Promoting Workforce Agilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Implications -A Research Agendamentioning

confidence: 99%

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Workforce agility: a systematic literature review and a research agenda proposal

Tessarini

Saltorato

2021

Innovar

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“…For example, in task autonomy, employees can work alone and control their own work speed, timing, and sequence of their task. Employees who have control and freedom about their capabilities normally react well when acting to unexpected environmental changes (Alavi, 2016). Hence, we hypothesized the mediating role of autonomy as follows:…”

Section: Mediating Effect Of Perceived Task Structurementioning

confidence: 99%

Enhancing Employee Agility Through Information Technology Competency: An Empirical Study of China

et al. 2021

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This study investigated how employees’ information technology (IT) competency is associated with employee agility via perceived task structure. Most scholar’s emphasis is on the impact of IT competency on individual work performance; however, it seems as if no attention has been given to explore the relationship between IT competency on employee’s agility through perceived task structure. This research offers and tests a new comprehensive model that links the individual’s IT competency with perceived task structure and employee agility. Data were gathered from 167 representatives who used various IT applications for daily work routines in the organization. Findings showed that IT competency is positively related to task interdependence and autonomy. Task autonomy also has significant effect on employee agility; however, task interdependence has shown insignificant effect on employee agility. Furthermore, work expertise positively moderates the relationship between IT competency and perceived task structure. Theoretical and managerial implications of study are also discussed in the last section.

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Human Resource Development in Global Manufacturing: Agility and Leadership

Kim

Song²,

Hsu

2020

Human Resource Development in South Korea

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The influence of workforce agility on external manufacturing flexibility of Iranian SMEs

Cited by 24 publications

References 0 publications

Workforce agility: a systematic literature review and a research agenda proposal

Workforce agility: a systematic literature review and a research agenda proposal

Enhancing Employee Agility Through Information Technology Competency: An Empirical Study of China

Human Resource Development in Global Manufacturing: Agility and Leadership

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