ACADFMIC LIBRARIESHAVP MADE A sI(:NIFIc:Awr investment in electronic information resources and associated computer-based technologies so that their users can gain access to those resources and services. The faculty response to the increase in these library technologies is not always known. Using an essential element from the theory of the diffusion of innovations (that individuals adopt innovat...

One resource playing a critical role in electronically supported decision-making groups is the facilitator. Facilitation is a complex task, encompassing social abilities, pre-meeting planning of decision-making processes and supervising the technology usage during meetings. We found two problems with previous support to electronic facilitation: (1) limited support to planning activities; and (2...

In recognition of the limitations of more traditional methods such as surveys and quantitative techniques, small business researchers are making increasing use of qualitative methods. This paper reports on a relatively novel qualitative method in small business research the use of longitudinal focus groups, conducted twice a year in 5 locations around England, as a means of tracking the experie...

Continuous improvement and development of a curriculum is an essential part of the success of information systems academic departments. In the current study, we facilitated focus group sessions with information technology executives to identify the critical skills they seek when hiring entry-level MIS graduates. The results follows the general trend that has recently been seen throughout the IT...

Web-based learning environments have become very popular and are used widely in universities. Thanks to their features, students are free to study with no limits of time or space, and teachers can take advantage of computer-based communication tools for creating discussion groups, shared exercises, and delivering multimedia content. But, for the teacher’s perspective, the physical distance betw...

Executive Summary Skills and employability have a direct impact on life opportunities. Understanding how skills are learned, developed, applied, maintained and adapted over time can facilitate improving the employability of individuals. Sports scholars are a unique population for investigation as they need to maintain a wide range of skills and acquire new ones in order to perform in two domain...

The main purpose of the paper is to investigate young peoples’ perspectives on mobile services in order to shed light on the acceptance of mobile services. The knowledge of and interest in mobile services of individuals using such services is analyzed. A second objective is to investigate the reasons for using/not using mobile services. In-depth focus group interviews and secondary empirical da...

The objective was to describe the utility of mixed methods to inform the development of an automated telephone intervention to improve patients' compliance with asthma medication. As part of intervention development for a larger trial, we conducted 15 focus groups (n = 53) to design and develop calls, and to identify factors influencing intervention acceptability and usefulness. We piloted four...

Beauville surfaces are a class of complex surfaces defined by letting a finite group G act on a product of Riemann surfaces. These surfaces possess many attractive geometric properties several of which are dictated by properties of the group G. In this survey we discuss the p-groups that may be used in this way. En route we discuss several open problems, questions and conjectures.