Het industriële MKB ervaart in toenemende mate problemen met het aantrekken, opleiden en inzetbaar houden van medewerkers. De problematiek komt deels voort uit demografische omstandigheden, vergrijzing en ontgroening, en deels uit veranderende marktomstandigheden. De behoefte aan goed opgeleid personeel voor het industriële MKB is in 2004 systematisch in kaart gebracht en gepubliceerd . De behoefte aan HBO-ers is nog diepgaander geïnventariseerd via een onderzoek van enkele branches onder de paraplu van MKB-Nederland. De resultaten van beide onderzoeken worden bevestigd door het recent verschenen rapport van het ROA dat aangeeft dat voor de komende jaren grote tekorten verwacht worden voor de technische en industrieberoepen. Naast de demografische problematiek heeft het industriële MKB te maken met de veranderingen in de markt als gevolg van de mondialisering van de industriële productie, de veranderingen in de relaties tussen toeleveranciers en uitbesteders en het opereren in meerdere productieketens. Meer dan ooit is het noodzakelijk om tot strategische positiebepaling te komen voor elk industrieel MKB bedrijf en op basis van de daaruit voortvloeiende keuzen veranderingen door te voeren op het gebied van productvernieuwingen, aanpassing van productieprocessen en inzetbaarheid en productiviteit van werknemers. Een onderling samenhangende innovatie op deze drie onderdelen lijkt meer dan ooit noodzakelijk. Dat heeft ook gevolgen voor het opleiden van nieuwe vakmensen en voor het up-to-date houden van het vakmanschap van zittend personeel. Verder krijgt het industriële MKB in de komende jaren te maken met vernieuwing van het beroepsonderwijs, waarbij de eindtermen uit de leerplannen verdwijnen en plaats maken voor beschrijvingen van beroepscompetenties.
This relationship between external knowledge providers, e.g. consultants and academic institutions, and small and medium enterprises (SMEs) is a difficult one. SME entrepreneurs think external advice is expensive, not required and/or not useful. In this paper these arguments are explored against the specific characteristics of SMEs. The argument of price probably tells more about the consultants inability to quantify the returns on their advice than about the cost of their services. Support policies enable free consults for SMEs on numerous topics, but the use of these facilities is relatively low. The suggestion that SME entrepreneurs do not need external knowledge is contradicted by their own assessment of their qualities. Typically the entrepreneurs lack expertise in supporting business functions like HR, IT, Finance and Legal. In SMEs these blank spots are not compensated by specialist staff members because the of the scale of the organization. The argument that the advice of an external consultant is generally not useful raises the question whether the insights gained in several business sciences only apply to large companies. This seems unlikely. Given the characteristics of SMEs the difference is probably more the context in which the insights are applied than the content of the insights itself. From the analysis of the characteristics of SMEs the dominant influence of the person of the owner/director, together with the absence of specialist staff, appeared as two of the most significant differences between SMEs and large companies. Given the personal profiles of these owners/directors as studied by Blom (Blom, 2001), the external knowledge providers should realize the three ways in consulting. The first way is the way of thinking. For this way it was stated already that the content of business sciences is not likely to differ for SMEs. The second way, the way of working, represents for the way information is gathered and the entrepreneur and his staff is involved in the process of developing the advice. In this way the consultant should allow for interaction and should make it fun for the participants. In this aspect, the process approach of consulting shows promising. The third way, the way of communicating, represents the way the knowledge is transferred from the advisor to the entrepreneur. In this way it is crucial to acknowledge the different personal profiles of SME entrepreneurs and consultants and to adjust the communication accordingly. Taking the three ways into account, the conclusion could be that the transfer of knowledge should be more the sharing of experiences. The Chair of Management Consulting will adjust her activities to explore this insight further.
Symbiotic Urban Agriculture Networks (SUANs) are a specific class of symbiotic networks that intend to close material and energy loops from cities and urban agriculture. Private and public stakeholders in SUANs face difficulties in the implementation of technological and organisational design interventions due to the complex nature of the agricultural and urban environment. Current research on the dynamics of symbiotic networks, especially Industrial Symbiosis (IS), is based on historical data from practice, and provides only partly for an understanding of symbiotic networks as a sociotechnical complex adaptive system. By adding theory and methodology from Design Science, participatory methods, and by using agent-based modelling as a tool, prescriptive knowledge is developed in the form of grounded and tested design rules for SUANs. In this paper, we propose a conceptual Design Science method with the aim to develop an empirically validated participatory agent-based modelling strategy that guides sociotechnical design interventions in SUANs. In addition, we present a research agenda for further strategy, design intervention, and model development through case studies regarding SUANs. The research agenda complements the existing analytical work by adding a necessary Design Science approach, which contributes to bridging the gap between IS dynamics theory and practical complex design issues.
