A closer look at a Zone 2 item research task in the agile literature review approach with an example

A closer look at a Zone 2 item research task in the agile literature review approach (ALRA) with an example.

Zone 2 is about organizational capabilities, which indicates the overall concern on the core competence of an organization. An example of a theoretical framework level-0 with special regard to zone 2 is provided as follows:

The theoretical framework level-0, with prime attention on Zone 2, of ABC Ltd.

Let us now examine the Zone 2 item research task 4 of "to evaluate human resource management (HRM) competence of ABC Ltd". In this case, the basic elements of HRM competence to be evaluated includes: 

(i) the human resources, 

(ii) the non-human resources, and 

(iii) the managerial competence to  manage manage those resources [i.e. (i) and (ii)] in the human resource management domain, 

They, together, constitute the HRM competence of ABC Ltd. 

You will then ask, HRM competence for what? On this "for what" topic, I list the following purposes [i.e., the competence evaluation criteria] specific to item research task 4:

1. for "achieving HRM function performance" [this is the linkage research task topic between the item research task 4 and the item research task 7].  {evaluation effort: 75%}

[the item research task of "to evaluate the HRM function performance may not be explicitly identified in the theoretical framework level 0]

2. for "influencing the IT management competence of ABC Ltd" [this is the linkage research task topic between the item research task 4 and the item research task 5] {evaluation effort: 15%}

3. for "contributing to the core competence of ABC Ltd" to achieve superior competitive advantage [this is the main concern of all the Zone 2 items] {evaluation effort: 10%}

Note: (i) I suggest % of evaluation effort related to the three evaluation criteria above. (ii) When studying the item research task 4, the researcher should be aware of the relevant findings on Zone 1, notably how the HRM competence is affected by particular influencing factors studied in Zone 1 (i.e. the incoming arrows to item research task 4).

Specifically, we need to deal with the extended research task 4 by paying attention to its associated linkage research tasks and its duty as a zone 2 item (core competence oriented); as such, there are three research sub-tasks for the Zone 2 extended research task 4:

1. to evaluate the HRM competence of ABC Ltd, with regard to its contribution to the HRM function performance of ABC Ltd.

2. to evaluate the HRM competence of ABC Ltd with regard to its influence on the IT management competence of ABC Ltd.

3. to evaluate the HRM competence of ABC Ltd with regard to its contribution to the core competence of ABC Ltd.

Note: the concepts of item research task, linkage research task and extended research task are explained in another blog article (click embedded link).