Dai, Emma and Bal, Jay (2009) Harmonising culture in co-operative business ventures: using a simulation in a metaverse. In: 3rd European Conference on Games Based Learning, FH Joanneum University of Applied Science, Graz, Austria, October 12-13, 2009. Published in: Proceedings of the 3rd European Conference on Games Based Learning pp. 412-420. ISBN 978-1-906638-47-4.

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Abstract

In recent years, there has been and continues be an increasing numbers of company mergers and takeovers. However, many of them such as the AOL - Time Warner, merger destroy shareholder value instead of increasing it. Mirivis (1992) and Vansina (1992) observe that approximately half of all company mergers fail at some stage of the integration process with the blame generally going towards the inability to reconcile two different organizational cultures. Dealing with the human elements of a merger there is often a lack of understanding on how to integrate organizational cultures of the existing firms. Not only is the concept of organizational culture one that is hard to tackle due to its vague and subtle meaning, but also an issue which is hard to manage due to the large amount of resources often required when dealing with human issues. While attempts have been made in the past to manage culture, they have been notoriously difficult to execute. However, innovations in information technology have provided new opportunities for employee training and education which go beyond the traditional seminar and discussion such as employing low-cost simulations using virtual worlds as a platform for communication and interaction. Using a qualitative approach based on the interpretation of previous research, elements from a variety of subject areas will be investigated in order to suggest an outline for the creation of a prototype application. Looking first at the composition of organizational culture and its manageability, an attempt was made to analyze culture to the extent that key dimensions can be identified. Due the difficulty of tackling the culture problem as a whole, it has been tackled by targeting cultural dimensions by drawing upon experiences and learning objectives from existing serious games, commercial and educational, in order to identify the necessary specifications for establishing a simulation aimed at changing organizational culture. Consequently, an attempt will be made to enhance elements borrowed from traditional games into one simulation using key elements in behavior modification and drawing upon theories in education and learning, to achieve an ultimate goal of providing the outline for an innovative prototype scenario for SME and large organizations, capable of dealing with the culture problem in mergers and acquisitions. At current stage, virtual worlds and metaverses not only provide the ideal learning environments for tackling a group problems such as culture, but also they potentially do allow for the creation of complex extensive games. If one takes some of the key components of organizational culture and compares them to the learning objectives of some traditional games, it can be established that the ideal simulation needed to tackle the problem of culture within organizations, consists of a mixture of processes, random events, role-play and adaptable reward structures, conditioning and ultimately a complex emulation of reality.

Item Type:	Conference Item (Paper)
Subjects:	Q Science > QA Mathematics > QA76 Electronic computers. Computer science. Computer software L Education
Divisions:	Faculty of Science > WMG (Formerly the Warwick Manufacturing Group)
Journal or Publication Title:	Proceedings of the 3rd European Conference on Games Based Learning
Publisher:	Academic Conferences Ltd.
ISBN:	978-1-906638-47-4
Editor:	Pivec, M
Official Date:	2009
Dates:	Date Event 2009 Published
Number of Pages:	9
Page Range:	pp. 412-420
Status:	Peer Reviewed
Publication Status:	Published
Access rights to Published version:	Restricted or Subscription Access
Conference Paper Type:	Paper
Title of Event:	3rd European Conference on Games Based Learning
Type of Event:	Conference
Location of Event:	FH Joanneum University of Applied Science, Graz, Austria
Date(s) of Event:	October 12-13, 2009

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