After the IPSERA Conference - back in New Zillan

After the IPSERA conference my family and I enjoyed a nice holiday at the KariKari peninsula.  Our Honnipon, our old 4WD Honda had some long rides over white and very empty beaches which were covered with sea shells and other things two boys will enjoy. We probably enlarged or sea shell collection by at least 2 kilos. (What to do with them…). The boys also caught two snappers which we fried battered. For me it went down well with a local beer; the boys had their Australian Bunderberg. 

 We visited the Northern-most point of New Zealand, Cape Reinga. Although it rained and was foggy we did not feel the mysterious Maori souls going up to heaven. But then the boys loved sand surfing from the high dune tops. A good family holiday.

Getting back into the normal rhythm of AUT campus life proved somewhat more difficult. The IPSERA was a past highlight and then one has to focus on new goals. In part these were hidden in the literature: (1) on quality: how to ensure academic rigour and managerial relevance, and (2) on the content: how to further delineate the topic and improve the conceptual model. This took re-reading and additional lit review and (I hope) will strengthen my research proposal.

In parallel with much re-reading our joint Dutch research on purchasing within SMEs went into the empirical phase with cross-case studies conducted by a number of graduating bachelor students. At the same time we designed a Dephi study. These activities are all closely related to my own PhD research and help me on research content and on research methodology.

What also greatly helps is the fact that our IPSERA competitive paper has been shortlisted as an article for the Journal of Purchasing and Supply Management.
Asterix & Obelix would have said Hurray! 
Being shortlisted gives us some proof on the relevance and quality of our paper. In parallel Gert Walhof and I have been working on a paper discussing four purchasing case studies in Dutch SMEs in 2013. This all means writing, reflecting and re-writing.

Quite another strand of work has been preparing four sets of Master Classes for the Facilities Management association in New Zealand, the FMANZ. This builts on work of Hanze FM-graduate Herma Schutte. Developing these classes was done with some highly-motivated FMANZ & AUT people and some colleagues from my Hanze university. The Master Classes will run from September – December 2014. Moreover, we will try to get some Hanze graduates to NZ for an FM traineeships within NZ companies.

My research proposal now focusses on entrepreneurial construction firms and how they I purchase (procure / acquire) non-incremental 'green' innovations. I plan to defend my proposal in September, after having obtained some valuable feedback from people in Holland and in New Zealand. My empirical phase will then start with interviewing a number of experts and innovative entrepreneurs in the NZ construction industry. This promises to be a dynamic and interactive phase of my research.

Some work – Master classes and the IPSERA Purchasing Conference in South Africa

Preparing the post-grad supply management master-classes at the University of Pretoria was some hard work. Amazing that while lecturing this course for the 3rd time it still needed modifications on course contents and process. In the previous two years my colleague Marius van der Woude and I flew together from Amsterdam. This year my procurement professor Gert Walhof flew in from the Netherlands, and I flew all the way from Auckland. A horrible 24 hours flight. At least I can tell that saw the huge ice-masses of the Antarctic.

For me it was the third time to visit South Africa, a country with all the contrasts of a rainbow. On the streets one sees poverty and richness in one wink of the eye: beggars and BMWs. During the master-class we had a good discussion on ethics and fraudulent behavior. (See also PWC reports).  In fact at the IPSERA one week later, some presentations covered the same topic.  The highlight of the course was a tri-party negotiation game on trying to divide money between three football associations.

Gert and I were very happy with the hospitality of Mr. Wesley Niemann and his colleagues. We tasted some excellent wines over two excellent diners.

Rewarding work over the last months for meeting IPSERA deadlines for both my PhD proposal for a doctoral workshop and for our competitive paper. At the IPSERA conference it was nice & inspiring also to meet my research colleagues of Windesheim University: Geoffrey Hagelaar and Richard Holman. And of course lots of other nice people.
One of my areas of interest: innovation and procurement  is on the rise compared to a few years ago. The conference had some interesting presentations. Last year Spina et al. (2013) did a literature review and found that innovation is still in the second position, and costs are still leading. Let’s hope that in future our profession will not only the famous cost-cutter but can also bring new stuff to the table via e.g. supplier innovation. And increase top and bottom line relevance.

Modestly I must admit that my IPSERA presentations went smoothly but at the same time feedback from IPSERA attendants yielded in extra months of work. The informal networking over a glass of wine or a cup of coffee proved almost as valuable as the ‘formal’ feedback during the two presentations. Moreover, I feel that participating in other people’s presentations is very useful for an early-career researcher like me. The setting in the African wilderness was ‘awesome’ and for me IPSERA was a great success.

Wet and cold work. Our two boys Edsard and Sibren also experienced some hard work when they went surfing at the west coast near Auckland. (Tip top beaches in Bethels, Muriwai, and Piha). It was late in the season and the see was already quite cold. But the higher the surf, the more our boys enjoy their encounter with nature. It's good then that Aletta and I can enjoy the stunning & empty views with warm cups of coffee and sandwiches (with sand). Amazing that one can see this nature only a 30 minutes drive away from Auckland. New Zealand (to be pronounced ‘New Zillan’) is an amazing country. (Please click on the specific NZ dialect and the use of the hyperbolic word awesome).

Kia Ora!

The X-mas (summer) break was good. We visited almost all the beaches at the Hauraki Gulf and had some nice BBQs (in NZ: barbies) with newfound friends and colleagues. Our two kids had a three-day sailing course in small sailing boats called Optimists (in NZ: opties). Our English is improving and every day we hear Kiwi slang with a pronunciation far removed from the Queen’s English we learnt at school.

My research proposal for the PhD workshop at IPSERA in South Africa got accepted. (Hurray!) At the same time I need to further define the exact research subject and the related research design. Luckily I have a bunch of bright people around me (in the Netherlands and here in New Zealand) to help me with that. And Google Scholar can provide me with loads and loads of literature on all aspects of construction management, purchasing, disruptive innovations and sustainability. Sometimes I feel like a kid lost in a candy store. My subject circles around:

The role of purchasing in small construction firms when they want to introduce discontinuous waste-reducing (green) innovations. This focuses on the New Zealand situation but I will use international material for a better assessment.

Some say that the building industry is conservative and resists innovations. That however depends how you look at it (Sexton, 2004, 2006). In most countries the building industry is project-based and works in a complex setting. On a daily basis one sees incremental and day-to-day improvements on construction building sites. My current research proposal states that the construction industry could need discontinuous (or disruptive, or radical) innovations for drastic improvements. (For innovation info, please see the book of Christensen, 1997). I will focus on innovations with a technical nature and that can e.g. be protected by patents. These innovations relatively uncommon but when successful will make a big impact.

These discontinuous innovations I want to investigate complement the more incremental improvements. Definitions differ somewhat, but I see these as new or existent technologies not earlier applied in construction and new to the market or customers. Often the success lies not in the technologies per-se. Rather the success lies in new business models: how companies use these innovations in the market. I hope my research helps to give a better understanding on successfully introducing (absorbing / adopting) green technology. After all we all want good quality houses and buildings which are reasonably priced and can be built with little impact on our environment. Currently however building and living in houses has a huge negative impact on the environment as we use heaps of water and energy and material, and produce too much waste.

Disruptive innovations often come from small firms (Baumol, 2004; Manley 2008; Hardie 2011; Lambert 2010) from outside the industry or at the beginning of supply chains. These innovations must be purchased and adopted into such chains. For instance: innovative building materials that would work in a country without any earth quakes will not be immediately suitable in New Zealand. Just the other week there was a major (6.2) earth quake in Wellington but most buildings have only minor damage. The biggest thing that came down was the Hobbit eagle at display on Wellington airport.

When a small construction firm buys a new technology or product it has to be clever and purposeful and convince several stakeholders before this technology is successfully adopted by his customers, partners and building codes. I think that purchasing has a big role in this. At least that is the case in bigger companies (see e.g. research of Picaud and Johson). Smaller companies purchase their products and services differently (see e.g. research of Ramsey, Morrissey, or Paik). We know from e.g. Manley (2006) that manufacturers do sell technical innovations into construction supply chains. We know from Sexton that small construction firms focus on incremental improvements. Currently I do not know adequately how these small construction firms would successfully purchase and implement disruptive technologies. Let alone green technology. In the next few weeks I hope to find out more about this. Stay tuned on this blog!

BTW: Want to live in a grand mansion on the Dutch countryside? Just follow this link.

BTW: for some fresh family pictures, please visit our Staaltjesdownunder blog.

BTW: Please pose your questions and write down your remarks on this blog!

Starting my PhD - departing harbour, fine weather with sunny spells

TO ALL:
with either an interest in New Zealand; purchasing/procurement; disruptive innovations; or managing a PhD; to all good friends, good colleagues, professionals/researchers.

Where to begin this blog?

My family and I are making a journey. We started from a cosy village in Northern part of The Netherlands, flew around the globe and settled in Auckland New Zealand. We love the climate and the relaxed way of living. What would we want more:  a nice & clean (though small) house, a bay view with only 200 mtrs from the Takapuna beach & cliffs & islands, and the stunning  Hauraki Gulf.  

Kiwis are a friendly folk, and Auckland is full of friendly folk from all over the world.  Not a bad place to live and to study.  We hope to make many trips with our old Honda 4WD (nicknamed Honnepon, which means sweetheart in Dutch) and long strolls along the beach.

Parallel to this physical journey I started my journey on my PhD.

In fact this journey had started much earlier, somewhere in 2009. At that time I was lecturing undergraduates at Stenden University on what we had coined “Green Logistics”. When our students calculated the milage of an average food basket, we realised that big improvements on sustainability would take a long time. A step-by-step approach seemed most feasible (and more convenient).

Later-on at the Institute of Facility Management of Hanze University I became more involved in applied purchasing and supply research supervised by Professor Gert Walhof. My focal area was (and still is) on:  How small firms (SMEs) can improve their purchasing capabilities.

We conducted some interesting case-studies, read some articles and soon realised that this purchasing research area was both relevant to business and new to academics. (See publications of Paik, Ellegaard, Ramsey, Pressey, Morressey).

In 2012 I attended the IFPSM PhD Summer School in Salzburg. (As a matter of fact: now listening to Mozart while writing this blog). This was a mind-breaking experience with a good mixture of experienced professors and ambitious PhD students. I had prepared a powerpoint presentation on “How do small firms (SMEs) purchase innovations”.

However my most important two slides where the famous quote from Alice in Wonderland:  If you do not know where you are going – any road will take you there. And the poem of Robert Frost on Two roads diverged in a wood … And I did not know which one to take….

I came back in Holland exhausted, but then knew I wanted to start a PhD.

I received a good lot of support from many people within the Hanze University. In late November 2012 my wife Aletta and I flew to Australia & New Zealand where I discussed PhD possibilities at a number of great universities.  Nice weather, interesting people, good discussions.

My subject was by then narrowed down to: “How do SMEs purchase patented innovations”.  My research proposal was later reviewed at the WION, the annual Dutch workshop on academic purchasing research. (People were more enthousiastic than I was at the moment, my proposal arriving at its 10th version). The WION is a wonderful environment to discuss research with colleagues.

In May 2013 Professor John Tookey of the Auckland University of Technology (AUT) invited me to submit a (yet amended) research proposal more focused on sustainable innovations in the New Zealand construction industry, which got accepted. My research will [somehow] relate to current SME purchasing research conducted at Hanze University and Windesheim University as sponsored by the Dutch Purchasing Association NEVI.

Meanwhile (still somewhat to my own surprise) the pieces of the jigsaw puzzle came together as my Hanze dean mr. Ron van der Weerd arranged funding by Hanze University, and as John Tookey arranged a scholarship. Together with the family savings this allowed the four of us to walkabout to New Zealand. (Kiwis: sorry for this nice Australian phrase).

We have said good bye to all our good friends, family, colleagues. Departed our save Dutch harbour and landed up North Shore. The academic weather is fine; with some good sailing winds for e.g. editing our South Africa IPSERA paper and reading interesting stuff. Lots and Lots of PhD-things to do in the coming 36 months.  My (current) research question:

“What is the role of procurement on disruptive waste-reducing innovations in

small New Zealand construction firms?”

With this research I hope to give a better understanding of the adoption of radical innovations in Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises (SMEs). The context is the currently booming New Zealand construction industry.  After my literature research I intend to conduct a survey amongst SME owners/users of (non)-patented radical waste-reducing innovations.  Being mode II innovations I will also scan other stakeholders and hope to conduct (action-research) case studies. Meanwhile I will draw parallells to NZ and e.g. Dutch practices. I plan to conclude my PhD in the end of 2016.

 

My next 400-word blogs could cover some thoughts & ideas on:

Dec: Rigor and relevance in academic research.

Jan: Purchasing in Small firms / SMEs.
Feb: Purchasing in Holland; versus procurement in New Zealand.
Mch: Procurement in Construction Industry.
Apr: Innovation with(out) procurement.
May: On IPSERA in South Africa.
Jun:  Purchasing / Procurement Education.
etc.

In parallel we run a Dutch language family blog called Staaltjesdownunder.
Hope you enjoy reading my blog. Look forward to your comments!

Best regards
Anne Staal