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1 – 10 of 29Philip Bohle, Angela Knox, Jack Noone, Maria Mc Namara, Julia Rafalski and Michael Quinlan
The purpose of this paper is to examine relationships between work organisation, bullying and intention to leave (ITL) in the Australian hospitality industry, using pressure…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine relationships between work organisation, bullying and intention to leave (ITL) in the Australian hospitality industry, using pressure, disorganisation and regulatory failure (PDR) to measure work organisation.
Design/methodology/approach
Cross-sectional survey data were collected from 72 workers in Australian accommodation hotels. They were aged 20-65 years (M=38.26, SD=12.60) and 57.1 per cent were female. The proposed path model was tested with the Mplus (v.7) statistical package using Hayes’ (2009) procedure for mediation analysis.
Findings
There were positive bivariate correlations between all variables. The path model indicated that disorganisation and regulatory failure had direct positive associations with bullying. Financial pressure and bullying had direct positive associations with ITL.
Research limitations/implications
The small sample may not be representative and the cross-sectional design and self-report data risk common method variance effects and preclude attributions of causality. Future studies should use more representative samples and longitudinal designs to address common method variance issues and facilitate causal inferences.
Originality/value
Bullying and turnover are significant problems in the hospitality industry, but the contribution of work organisation variables is poorly understood. The present study provides promising preliminary evidence on the potential role of PDR as an antecedent of both bullying and ITL.
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Although equal employment opportunity (EEO) legislation was introduced in Australia two decades ago, women's position in the labour market has not improved markedly. This paper…
Abstract
Purpose
Although equal employment opportunity (EEO) legislation was introduced in Australia two decades ago, women's position in the labour market has not improved markedly. This paper seeks to understand the reasons for women's lack of progress by examining the processes that underpin the (gendered) division of labour in the hotel sector using the analytical framework of customer‐oriented bureaucracy.
Design/methodology/approach
The study is qualitative in nature, consisting of case studies within the Australian luxury hotel industry. The concept of customer‐oriented bureaucracy is applied as a lens for interpreting the data.
Findings
The findings suggest that gender segregation is established and maintained, at least in part, by the dual pressures of customer orientation and bureaucracy. In addition, however, the results highlight the importance of supply‐related factors. Thus, the concept of customer‐oriented bureaucracy, in its current form, only partially accounts for gender segregation. Policy regarding EEO in Australian firms requires re‐thinking if more substantive and lasting changes are to be achieved by women.
Research limitations/implications
The qualitative nature of the research may limit its “power” and generalisability. Future research could incorporate a quantitative analysis of gender segregation and EEO in Australian workplaces.
Practical implications
EEO policy responses in Australia should be sharpened in order to more effectively reflect and redress the factors contributing to women's disadvantaged position.
Originality/value
While customer‐oriented bureaucracy is a useful model for understanding gender segregation, the findings presented illustrate that it has limitations. These may be addressed by extending the concept and incorporating supply‐related issues, affected by employee preferences. The shortcomings of Australia's EEO legislation are also highlighted.
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The figure of the femme fatale is attached to a range of contested meanings around femininity, sexuality and violence. Despite its ambiguity and its origins in art, myth and…
Abstract
The figure of the femme fatale is attached to a range of contested meanings around femininity, sexuality and violence. Despite its ambiguity and its origins in art, myth and fiction, the term has proven popular in giving a name to violent articulations of female power in non-fictional settings by journalists. In this chapter, I outline the figure of the femme fatale as an archetype of women's violence that appears throughout Western popular culture, and provide an overview of the term's definitions and cultural meanings. In doing so, I trace the figure's movement across different forms and genres of popular culture. I identify a number of themes in the existing scholarship around the figure: feminist criticism of the figure; the value that feminist film scholars have found in the figure as a symbol of power and sexual transgression; the relationship between the femme fatale, race and the colonial imagination; and the way the idea of the femme fatale has been used in reporting of real-life women's violence.
Research on same-sex marriage has suggested that the transition to marriage is a symbolically meaningful experience that significantly changes sexual minority lives. This chapter…
Abstract
Research on same-sex marriage has suggested that the transition to marriage is a symbolically meaningful experience that significantly changes sexual minority lives. This chapter draws upon semi-structured, in-depth interviews with 28 married gay men and lesbians to examine how the life course trajectories they took en route to marriage shaped their experiences transitioning to marriage. A description of the short and direct and long and winding trajectories to marriage is provided. Subsequently, it is demonstrated that, although those who took the former report experiences much like those documented by research thus far, those who took the latter had smaller wedding ceremonies to which they attach relatively little meaning, and they report that getting married has done little to change their family relationships. These findings paint a more nuanced picture of the transition to same-sex marriage than has been documented to-date, and point to important directions for future research.
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Bharat Mehra, Vandana Singh, Natasha Hollenbach and Robert P. Partee
This chapter discusses the application of community informatics (CI) principles in the rural Southern and Central Appalachian (SCA) region to further the teaching of information…
Abstract
Purpose
This chapter discusses the application of community informatics (CI) principles in the rural Southern and Central Appalachian (SCA) region to further the teaching of information and communication technologies (ICT) literacy concepts in courses that formed part of two externally funded grants, “Information Technology Rural Librarian Master’s Scholarship Program Part I” (ITRL) and “Part II” (ITRL2), awarded by the Institute of Museum and Library Services’ (IMLS) Laura Bush 21st Century Librarian Program to the School of Information Sciences (SIS) at the University of Tennessee (UT).
Design/Methodology/Approach
The chapter documents ICT use in ITRL and ITRL2 to extend librarian technology literacy training, allowing these public information providers to become change agents in the twenty-first century. It discusses aspects of CI that influenced these two projects and shaped the training of future rural library leaders embedded in traditionally underrepresented areas to further social justice and progressive changes in the region’s rural communities.
Findings
The chapter demonstrates the role that CI principles played in the context of ITRL and ITRL2 from project inception to the graduation of the rural librarians with examples of tangible IT services/products that the students developed in their courses that were directly applicable and tailored to their SCA contexts.
Originality/Value
ITRL and ITRL2 provided a unique opportunity to apply a CI approach to train information librarians as agents of change in the SCA regions to further economic and cultural development via technology and management competencies. These change agents will continue to play a significant role in community building and community development efforts in the future.
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In the last four years, since Volume I of this Bibliography first appeared, there has been an explosion of literature in all the main functional areas of business. This wealth of…
Abstract
In the last four years, since Volume I of this Bibliography first appeared, there has been an explosion of literature in all the main functional areas of business. This wealth of material poses problems for the researcher in management studies — and, of course, for the librarian: uncovering what has been written in any one area is not an easy task. This volume aims to help the librarian and the researcher overcome some of the immediate problems of identification of material. It is an annotated bibliography of management, drawing on the wide variety of literature produced by MCB University Press. Over the last four years, MCB University Press has produced an extensive range of books and serial publications covering most of the established and many of the developing areas of management. This volume, in conjunction with Volume I, provides a guide to all the material published so far.
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Angela Dettori, Michela Floris and Cinzia Dessì
This study aims to explore how customer-perceived quality is affected by innovation in traditional products in the bread, bakery and pastry industry. The study assesses whether…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to explore how customer-perceived quality is affected by innovation in traditional products in the bread, bakery and pastry industry. The study assesses whether innovating traditional products is an effective strategy, especially in traditional industries.
Design/methodology/approach
This study followed a quantitative method of analysis. Data were gathered from a sample of 200 Italian bread consumers and analysed using a two-pronged correlation analysis, and two hypotheses were tested using Pearson’s correlation.
Findings
The results showed the negative relationship between customer-perceived quality and innovating traditional products in traditional industries embedded in closed contexts.
Research limitations/implications
The study has several academic implications. First, by focusing on the traditional food industry, the study contributes to the theory by answering the call for research in this field; second, the findings contribute to the embeddedness construct and, third, to the studies of customer-perceived quality and to the literature on innovation.
Practical implications
The findings are particularly interesting for entrepreneurs and consultants in traditional industries who make decisions on whether it is better to innovate or to remain anchored to tradition.
Originality/value
The present study clarifies the shadowy side of innovation in traditional industries, such as the bread, bakery and pastry industry, and it reveals how tradition plays a meaningful role in those sectors.
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William Blackwood, the founder of the firm of the name, saw service in Edinburgh, Glasgow, and London before opening in 1804 as a bookseller at 64 South Bridge, Edinburgh…
Abstract
William Blackwood, the founder of the firm of the name, saw service in Edinburgh, Glasgow, and London before opening in 1804 as a bookseller at 64 South Bridge, Edinburgh. Blackwood continued in his bookselling capacity for a number of years, and his shop became a haunt of the literati, rivalling Constable's in reputation and in popularity. His first success as a publisher was in 1811, when he brought out Kerr's Voyages, an ambitious item, and followed shortly after by The Life of Knox by McCrie. About this time he became agent in Edinburgh for John Murray, and the two firms did some useful collaborating. Blackwood was responsible for suggesting alterations in The Black Dwarf, which drew from Scott that vigorous letter addressed to James Ballantyne which reads: “Dear James,—I have received Blackwood's impudent letter. G ‐ d ‐ his soul, tell him and his coadjutor that I belong to the Black Hussars of Literature, who neither give nor receive criticism. I'll be cursed but this is the most impudent proposal that was ever made”. Regarding this story Messrs. Blackwood say: “This gives a slightly wrong impression. Scott was still incognito. William Blackwood was within his rights. He was always most loyal to Scott.” There has been some controversy as to the exact style of this letter, and it has been alleged that Lockhart did not print it in the same terms as Sir Walter wrote it. Blackwood came into the limelight as a publisher when he started the Edinburgh Monthly Magazine in 1817, which was to be a sort of Tory counterblast to the Whiggish Edinburgh Review. He appointed as editors James Cleghorn and Thomas Pringle, who later said that they realised very soon that Blackwood was much too overbearing a man to serve in harness, and after a time they retired to edit Constable's Scots Magazine, which came out under the new name of The Edinburgh Magazine and Literary Miscellany. [Messrs. Blackwood report as follows: “No. They were sacked—for incompetence and general dulness. (See the Chaldee Manuscript.) They were in office for six months only.”] Blackwood changed the name of The Edinburgh Magazine to Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, and became his own editor, with able henchmen in John Wilson, Christopher North, John Gibson Lockhart, and James Hogg as contributors. It was a swashbuckling magazine, sometimes foul in attack, as when it told John Keats to get “back to the shop, back to plaster, pills, and ointment boxes”. Lockhart had a vigour of invective such as was quite in keeping with the age of Leigh Hunt, an age of hard‐hitting. The history of Blackwood in those days is largely the history of the magazine, though Blackwood was at the same time doing useful publishing work. He lost the Murray connexion, however, owing to the scandalous nature of some of the contributions published in Maga; these but expressed the spirit of the times. John Murray was scared of Blackwood's Scottish independence! Among the book publications of Blackwood at the period we find Schlegel's History of Literature, and his firm, as we know, became publisher for John Galt, George Eliot, D. M. Moir, Lockhart, Aytoun, Christopher North, Pollok, Hogg, De Quincey, Michael Scott, Alison, Bulwer Lytton, Andrew Lang, Charles Lever, Saintsbury, Charles Whibley, John Buchan, Joseph Conrad, Neil Munro—a distinguished gallery. In 1942 the firm presented to the National Library of Scotland all the letters that had been addressed to the firm from its foundation from 1804 to the end of 1900, and these have now been indexed and arranged, and have been on display at the National Library where they have served to indicate the considerable service the firm has given to authorship. The collection is valuable and wide‐ranging.
Nancy J. Adler (USA), Sonja A. Sackmann (Switzerland), Sharon Arieli (Israel), Marufa (Mimi) Akter (Bangladesh), Christoph Barmeyer (Germany), Cordula Barzantny (France), Dan V. Caprar (Australia and New Zealand), Yih-teen Lee (Taiwan), Leigh Anne Liu (China), Giovanna Magnani (Italy), Justin Marcus (Turkey), Christof Miska (Austria), Fiona Moore (United Kingdom), Sun Hyun Park (South Korea), B. Sebastian Reiche (Spain), Anne-Marie Søderberg (Denmark and Sweden), Jeremy Solomons (Rwanda) and Zhi-Xue Zhang (China)
The COVID-19 pandemic and its related economic meltdown and social unrest severely challenged most countries, their societies, economies, organizations, and individual citizens…
Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic and its related economic meltdown and social unrest severely challenged most countries, their societies, economies, organizations, and individual citizens. Focusing on both more and less successful country-specific initiatives to fight the pandemic and its multitude of related consequences, this chapter explores implications for leadership and effective action at the individual, organizational, and societal levels. As international management scholars and consultants, the authors document actions taken and their wide-ranging consequences in a diverse set of countries, including countries that have been more or less successful in fighting the pandemic, are geographically larger and smaller, are located in each region of the world, are economically advanced and economically developing, and that chose unique strategies versus strategies more similar to those of their neighbors. Cultural influences on leadership, strategy, and outcomes are described for 19 countries. Informed by a cross-cultural lens, the authors explore such urgent questions as: What is most important for leaders, scholars, and organizations to learn from critical, life-threatening, society-encompassing crises and grand challenges? How do leaders build and maintain trust? What types of communication are most effective at various stages of a crisis? How can we accelerate learning processes globally? How does cultural resilience emerge within rapidly changing environments of fear, shifting cultural norms, and profound challenges to core identity and meaning? This chapter invites readers and authors alike to learn from each other and to begin to discover novel and more successful approaches to tackling grand challenges. It is not definitive; we are all still learning.
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Hannah Grannemann, Jennifer Reis, Maggie Murphy and Marie Segares
Shortages of personal protective equipment (PPE) across the United States at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic created entrepreneurial opportunities for sewists and makers. In…
Abstract
Shortages of personal protective equipment (PPE) across the United States at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic created entrepreneurial opportunities for sewists and makers. In the United States in March and April 2020, masks were not readily available to the general public from existing retailers and PPE for medical use was being rationed for healthcare workers. Sewists and crafters, professionals and amateurs alike, began making and selling and/or donating masks. For individuals with sewing skills and time, sewing and selling masks became a lifeline financially, personally, and socially. To understand the experiences of people who made and distributed handmade masks during the early months of the pandemic in the United States, an interdisciplinary team developed an online cross-sectional survey instrument using a qualitative-dominated approach with both open and closed questions. This chapter explores themes identified from a sample of 94 participants, predominantly female-identifying, who created an enterprise or added a product line to an existing business. The sample includes individuals who did not identify as a ‘creative entrepreneur’ prior to the pandemic but did identify as an entrepreneur after starting a mask-making venture. Informed by entrepreneurship literature, the authors observed that these nascent entrepreneurs articulated recognisable motivations for social entrepreneurship, showed signs of pre-existing entrepreneurial mindsets, and employed business models and marketing tactics of entrepreneurs, largely without any business training. Implications for the study include increased recognition of latent entrepreneurial readiness, interest of women in social entrepreneurship, and higher levels of business knowledge among women than previously recognised.
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