Mobile computing: Enabling virtual management

The growing power of mobile computing, with its constantly available wireless link to information, creates an opportunity to use innovative ways to work from any location. This technological capability allows companies to remove constraints of physical proximity so that people and enterprises can work together at a distance. Mobile computing is expected to enhance the implementation of a virtual management environment in the office, which will enable workers to do their job away from management much of the time. Dealing with essentially virtual employees will mean changes to management procedures. Management will need to make a choice when implementing mobile computing to either use Theory X practices that can inhibit employees, or to use Theory Y practices that will enable virtual management to bring productivity increases. With Moore’s Law predicting that technology doubles every 18 to 24 months, management must be prepared to adapt with these innovations and new capabilitiMobile Computing 1 MOBILE COMPUTING ENABLING VIRTUAL MANAGEMENT Mobile Computing: Trends Enabling Virtual Management by Alan E. Kuyatt Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Maryland University College, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Management 2011 Dissertation Committee: Kathleen F. Edwards, Ph.D. Dennis E. Winters, Ph.D. Mobile Computing 2 Dedication Working through the entire process to complete this dissertation has taken a lot of time and effort, which has meant a sacrifice from the family, especially my wife, Debra. She has endured the many hours of classes, homework, research, and writing. I could not have reached this point unless she was totally behind the effort. Her encouragement and fortitude have helped to get through the many times where the last thing I wanted to do was spend the time to work through the task at hand. The culmination of this work is dedicated to her sacrifice. Alan Kuyatt © 2011 Mobile Computing 3 Acknowledgement The accomplishment of this dissertation has been a team effort that has worked through many long hours to create the finished product. It started off with Dr. Jim Gelatt who flamed an interest in technology, futures, and management. The real work building, shaping, and molding the raw work into a finished product was artfully handled by Dr. Kay Edwards through the rest of the journey. I want to thank her for all the thought, effort, and expert guidance with a lot of tolerance along the way. It made all the difference. Mobile Computing 4 Abstract The growing power of mobile computing, with its constantly available wireless link to information, creates an opportunity to use innovative ways to work from any location. This technological capability allows companies to remove constraints of physical proximity so that people and enterprises can work together at a distance. Mobile computing is expected to enhance the implementation of a virtual management environment in the office, which will enable workers to do their job away from management much of the time. Dealing with essentially virtual employees will mean changes to management procedures. Management will need to make a choice when implementing mobile computing to either use Theory X practices that can inhibit employees, or to use Theory Y practices that will enable virtual management to bring productivity increases. With Moore’s Law predicting that technology doubles every 18 to 24 months, management must be prepared to adapt with these innovations and new capabilities to allow the organization to remain competitive. When management considers the changes mobile computing will bring to the organization, the specifics of the technology or architecture are not the major focus. It is more important to see the trends that are coming and know where they can lead. It is not a matter of whether or not a technology will be feasible, but how to use it. Management must be aware of both the positive and negative aspects of technology in order to balance the implementation of mobile computing in the organization. Remaining competitively positioned ahead of the competition may involve implementing virtual management and its disruptive innovation into the organization to keep the business at a competitive edge. KEYWORDS: Mobile Computing, Virtual Management, Innovation Mobile Computing 5 Table of Contents DEDICATION........................................................................................................................................... 2 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT......................................................................................................................... 3 ABSTRACT............................................................................................................................................... 4 TABLE OF CONTENTS ........................................................................................................................... 5 LIST OF FIGURES................................................................................................................................... 9 CHAPTER 1 – INTRODUCTION.........................................................................................................10 STATEMENT AND SIGNIFICANCE OF THE PROBLEM......................................................................................... 10 IMPORTANCE TO MANAGEMENT ......................................................................................................................... 11 DEFINITION OF TERMS......................................................................................................................................... 13 Mobile computing............................................................................................................................................. 13 Virtual management ....................................................................................................................................... 13 RESEARCH QUESTION(S); WARRANT(S); ASSUMPTIONS OR PROPOSITIONS............................................. 14 RQ1: What are the trends in mobile computing technology and what will projections of those trends indicate for the workplace? ................................................................................................................ 14 RQ2: What are the ways mobile computing is being used in the workplace and what do those trends indicate? ..................................................................................................................................................... 15 RQ3: As mobile computing becomes pervasive in the workplace, will the technology enable management to operate in a virtual environment?............................................................................. 16 ORGANIZATION OF THE DISSERTATION ............................................................................................................. 17 CHAPTER 2 – LITERATURE REVIEW..............................................................................................20 CRITICAL REVIEW AND ANALYSIS OF THE LITERATURE, BY TOPIC .............................................................. 20 Mobile Computing 6 U.S. management trends leading to virtual management............................................................... 20 Mobile computing............................................................................................................................................. 28 Technological growth and competition................................................................................................... 33 International innovation and mobile computing................................................................................ 36 The different generations and mobile computing............................................................................... 51 Positive indicators for using mobile computing................................................................................... 52 Negative indicators that detract from using mobile computing.................................................. 56 DISCUSSION OF THEORETICAL LENSES .............................................................................................................. 60 McGregor Theory X/Theory Y ...................................................................................................................... 60 Creative destruction and disruptive innovation .................................................................................. 62 Adoption and diffusion of technology along the S­curve.................................................................. 65 RESEARCH PROPOSITIONS AS THEY EMERGE FROM AND ARE REFLECTED IN THE LITERATURE REVIEW .................................................................................................................................................................................................. 69 Proposition One – there are identifiable trends towards virtual management..................... 69 Proposition two – the pace of change in increasing towards virtual management ............ 69 Proposition three – Theory Y enables virtual management ........................................................... 69 Proposition four – the increasing pace of technology change necessitates adoption......... 70 Proposition five – management must determine the best changes to adopt .......................... 70 Proposition six – management must incorporate mobile computing to compete ................ 70 Proposition seven – management has a choice in implementation ............................................ 71 Summary .............................................................................................................................................................. 71 CHAPTER 3 – CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK..................................................................................73 GRAPHICAL ANALYSIS AND SYNTHESIS.............................................................................................................. 73 Model – management and mobile computing ...................................................................................... 73 Mobile Computing 7 INTEGRATION OF SCHOLARSHIP INTO THE FRAMEWORK............................................................................... 75 Mobile computing............................................................................................................................................. 75 Technology and competition ........................................................................................................................ 77 International uses............................................................................................................................................. 78 Theory Y enabled .............................................................................................................................................. 80 Millennials............................................................................................................................................................ 81 Management decision..................................................................................................................................... 82 Summary of trends and management ...................................................................................................... 82 CHAPTER 4 – METHODOLOGY.........................................................................................................84 DISCUSSION OF THE THEORY AND PRACTICE OF EVIDENCE‐BASED RESEARCH AS IT PERTAINS TO MOBILE COMPUTING AND VIRTUAL MANAGEMENT........................................................................................................ 84 DISCUSSION OF THE SCHOLARLY RESEARCH EVIDENCE SPECIFIC TO MOBILE COMPUTING AND VIRTUAL MANAGEMENT ....................................................................................................................................................................... 85 Scholarly Research Practices....................................................................................................................... 86 Rationale for Selection and Exclusion of Literature........................................................................... 88 DISCUSSION OF THE USE OF THE EXPERT PANEL AS EVIDENCE OR SUPPORT............................................ 89 Summary .............................................................................................................................................................. 90 CHAPTER 5 – ANALYSIS OF FINDINGS...........................................................................................91 PRESENTATION AND SUMMARY OF FINDINGS RESULTING FROM THE LITERATURE REVIEW AND OTHER EVIDENCE................................................................................................................................................................................ 91 RESEARCH QUESTIONS IN LIGHT OF FINDINGS ................................................................................................ 93 RQ1: What are the trends in mobile computing technology and what will projections of those trends indicate for the workplace? ................................................................................................................ 93 Mobile Computing 8 RQ2: What are the ways mobile computing is being used in the workplace and what do those trends indicate? ..................................................................................................................................................... 94 RQ3: As mobile computing becomes pervasive in the workplace, will the technology enable management to operate in a virtual environment?............................................................................. 95 CONCLUSIONS......................................................................................................................................................... 96 CONSIDERATION OF OTHER POINTS OF VIEW THAN THAT PRESENTED IN THIS DISSERTATION ........... 97 SUMMARY................................................................................................................................................................ 99 CHAPTER 6 – IMPLICATIONS FOR MANAGEMENT................................................................. 101 OVERALL CONCLUSIONS.....................................................................................................................................101 IMPLICATIONS FOR MANAGEMENT ...................................................................................................................102 IMPLICATIONS OF TRENDS.................................................................................................................................107 LIMITATIONS OF THIS RESEARCH......................................................................................................................110 AREAS FOR FUTURE RESEARCH........................................................................................................................111 SUMMARY..............................................................................................................................................................114 REFERENCES...................................................................................................................................... 116 APPENDIX A – EXPERT PANEL...................................................................................................... 135 Mobile Computing 9 List of Figures Figure 1: Computing the growth curve over five levels of technology (Kurzweil, 2005) 35 Figure 2: Exponential growth of computing, past and future (Kurzweil, 2005) 36 Figure 3: Five innovation adoption levels and S-curve (Rogers, 2003) 67 Figure 4: Model for mobile computing enabling virtual management 75 Mobile Computing 10 Chapter 1 – Introduction Statement and Significance of the Problem Technology is becoming powerful enough to begin to enable people to work in a mobile environment; management must learn what these changes can mean for the workplace. The ability for everyone to use mobile computing can allow operations to take place away from a fixed office location. Management will need to adapt to this increased mobility for both its management function and the operations of the organization (Alexander, 1997). Over the last few decades, the computer technology that has become available has become smaller and more powerful while the Internet has significantly improved connectivity. In addition, the power of cell phones have benefited from the same technology and a new capability to use handheld mobile computing devices that can connect to the Internet over cellular technology has appeared. That new capability has enabled workers to have access to communication and information away from their desks and use that availability of knowledge to empower them to get work done quickly using the new mobile computing capabilities (Chesbrough & Teece, 2002). This technology is starting to change how people work and it has the potential to change things significantly more. For instance, a major technology change began when laptop computers enabled people to work away from their offices. Some recent technological advancements that enable a more mobile work environment are netbooks, tablets, and smartphones, which can access and share data anywhere. The younger generations, in particular, the Millennials, are beginning to use mobile computing technology to connect with others using these tools, and they accomplish work in ways very different from the traditional office (Davis, 2002). The ability to Mobile Computing 11 move towards virtual organizations allows the management to flatten the structure and reduce the limitations from being in a physical space to conduct operations. It can also facilitate finding the best value capabilities for the organization’s output and thus reduce costs (Kotorov, 2001). Allowing the organization to expand beyond a physical location can improve customer service while reducing the cost of that service (Alexander, 1997). The virtual capabilities allow more flexibility and adaptability in work location, team member selection, and how operations can change when necessary (Jackson, 1999). There is also a reduction in the time limitations for accomplishing tasks and gaining access to those with the essential information (Davis, 2002). Importance to Management Mobile computing has started to change the way employees, customers, and the organizations operate, which can create both challenges and opportunities for management. The spread of mobile computing devices that provide connectivity for people has created a communication capability that is continuously available almost anywhere someone may work or travel. The use of this continuous communication capability has started to become part of the business world and employees are currently using smartphones to find information wherever they are and even submit orders. Management can also use mobile computing to communicate with employees using multiple tools including social networks, texting and teleconferencing (Alexander, 1997). There is also a rapid growth of data availability, which improves the ability for businesses to serve customers by giving out product or service information. The data availability will also create challenges for those businesses to determine how much information is appropriate to share. Company information, employee information, and other parts of operations Mobile Computing 12 that are not essential for other entities to know may need to have a limited sharing capability. Limiting the information sharing while protecting it will be a challenge (Davis, 2002). The growing power of mobile computing and the constant wireless link to information will create an opportunity for people to find information and communicate with others. It will also create the need for management to quickly determine the value of these capabilities for the organization and how to incorporate it. Millennials are already using mobile computing for regular communication with their friends and can feel cut off when the tools they use regularly in their outside life are not available at work. At the very least, productivity for these employees will be down and the dissatisfaction level will be up. At the worst, for those employers that decide to not make this technology available to the employees, they may not be able to hire and retain the best help (“The Millennials,” 2010; Martin, 2005). All of these aspects of mobile computing are currently in at least limited availability and they will start to propagate into more social and business environments. The big question will be how fast, to what extent, and how effectively management sees a benefit to implementing them in the organization. Management will need to monitor technology developments to see how the diffusion of technology is progressing. They will need to determine if there are opportunities to implement for managing employees, customers, or strategies (Davis, 2002). The development and implementation of technology is moving faster each year, which means that the time between the introduction of a technology and the acceptance of that technology by a majority of the population is growing even shorter. This rapid adoption of mobile computing will mean two things for management. The first is that the time to implement a technology will be shorter, so preparations for monitoring technolog