Exploring knowledge-based business analytics resources in executive decision-making
Orjatsalo, Johanna (2025-05-09)
Väitöskirja
09.05.2025
Lappeenranta-Lahti University of Technology LUT
Acta Universitatis Lappeenrantaensis
School of Business and Management
School of Business and Management, Kauppatieteet
Kaikki oikeudet pidätetään.
Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:ISBN:978-952-412-233-7
https://urn.fi/URN:ISBN:978-952-412-233-7
Tiivistelmä
Business analytics (BA) enables firms to process and analyse data and then use it to generate insight to support their decision-making. The use of BA to support the operational-level, routine-type of decisions has already helped firms achieve significant performance improvements. While the ability of BA to also support the complex and future-oriented executive decisions made by firms as part of their strategic planning and management is continuously improving, it has traditionally been viewed as playing a less central role in this context.
BA is a compilation of tangible resources, such as data and technology, and intangible, knowledge-based resources (KBRs), such as human skills and data-driven culture. This dissertation identifies KBRs that are most relevant in executive decision-making and describes how firms can address these resources to ensure that they can leverage BA in this context. Building on the resource-based view and knowledge-based view (KBV) of the firm, as well as the findings of a systematic review of the BA literature and two qualitative empirical studies, this dissertation focuses on exploring KBRs in connection to top managers (TMs), who make executive decisions, and analytics professionals (APs), who offer BA support for these decisions.
This dissertation contributes to the extant BA literature by describing how individual-level KBRs of TMs and APs, comprising human skills and human perceptions, continuously develop in mutual interaction and knowledge exchange between the two roles; how such knowledge exchange impacts the use of BA in executive decision-making; and how firms can facilitate the interaction between the two roles by creating conditions that promote collaboration and support skills development. Moreover, this dissertation helps scholars and managers understand the role of knowledge and KBRs in leveraging BA, connecting BA literature to KBV literature and to the related knowledge management practices that have already been developed to facilitate knowledge exchange and collaboration within firms.
BA is a compilation of tangible resources, such as data and technology, and intangible, knowledge-based resources (KBRs), such as human skills and data-driven culture. This dissertation identifies KBRs that are most relevant in executive decision-making and describes how firms can address these resources to ensure that they can leverage BA in this context. Building on the resource-based view and knowledge-based view (KBV) of the firm, as well as the findings of a systematic review of the BA literature and two qualitative empirical studies, this dissertation focuses on exploring KBRs in connection to top managers (TMs), who make executive decisions, and analytics professionals (APs), who offer BA support for these decisions.
This dissertation contributes to the extant BA literature by describing how individual-level KBRs of TMs and APs, comprising human skills and human perceptions, continuously develop in mutual interaction and knowledge exchange between the two roles; how such knowledge exchange impacts the use of BA in executive decision-making; and how firms can facilitate the interaction between the two roles by creating conditions that promote collaboration and support skills development. Moreover, this dissertation helps scholars and managers understand the role of knowledge and KBRs in leveraging BA, connecting BA literature to KBV literature and to the related knowledge management practices that have already been developed to facilitate knowledge exchange and collaboration within firms.
Kokoelmat
- Väitöskirjat [1110]