The two-mode network approach to digital skills and tasks among technology park employees

Abstract

Objective: The article predicts how the performance of tasks understood as tasks shared between a dyad can be predicted based on the perceptual difference of behaviors in terms of the digital skills of technology park employees (social actors). Here, employees serve park tenants mainly from the creative, game, IT and multimedia industries, and broadly understood audiovisuals.

Research Design & Methods: The questionnaire previously validated by other authors was used to measure employees’ digital skills and two non-parametric network statistics tests based on data permutation were conducted: the quadratic assignment procedure (QAP) and the multiple regression quadratic assignment procedure (MRQAP), which are good at error autocorrelation.

Findings: The results show that there is a relationship between selected digital skills and tasks shared among employees; digital skills influence behavior patterns, thus increasing or decreasing tasks shared in the workplace; moreover, dyad embedded in an intra-organizational social network is more appropriate for anticipating inherently relational tasks sharing between employees in a knowledge-intensive organization.

Implications & Recommendations: The findings contribute to the literature on digital skills and shared tasks from a dyadic and organizational perspective by deepening the understanding of the relationship between a pair of employees. Organizations should apply digital skills training to influence interpersonal relationships and thus the effectiveness of task performance and business processes. It seems necessary to develop and implement policy’s assumptions about increasing the digital skill level of its employees.

Contribution & Value Added: The article shows digital skills (information management, information evaluation, communication sharing, communication building, communication networking, collaboration, critical thinking, creativity, problem solving) in connection with the tasks performed in the workplace in terms of dyads and two-mode networks (actors and digital skills; actors and tasks performed). In this perspective, the perceptual differences of behaviors in digital skills are considered, which from the network perspective have not yet been explored by other researchers.

Keywords

digital skills; dyad; two-mode network; tasks; social networks; social network analysis, QAP, MRQAP

Author Biography

Anna Ujwary-Gil

PhD, Habilitated Doctor, associate professor at the Institute of Economics, Polish Academy of Sciences, Laboratory of Process and Network Analysis, Poland. Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Entrepreneurship, Management and Innovation (JEMI). Her research interests include social (organizational) network analysis, knowledge management, intellectual capital, resource-based views, and dynamic approaches to organization and management.

Bianka Godlewska-Dzioboń

PhD., assistant professor at the Cracow University of Economics (UEK) in the Department of Public Policies, Faculty of Public Economy and Administration. The Vice-Rector for Cooperation and Development of the Podhale State Vocational University in Nowy Targ, Poland. Her research interests include labour market, employment, public policies, and investments.

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