David Gunsberg, Bruce Callow, Brett Ryan, Jolyon Suthers, Penny Anne Baker and Joanna Richardson
The purpose of this paper is to identify the baseline model required to measure whole-of-organisation agility within a university information services division. The paper seeks to…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to identify the baseline model required to measure whole-of-organisation agility within a university information services division. The paper seeks to analyse the process of identifying and applying such a model.
Design/methodology/approach
The qualitative methodology applied is that of a single case study. The organisation analysed was an Australian university’s information services division. A structured survey, based on Wendler (2014), was administered to all staff as part of a multi-phased approach, thus facilitating a triangulation process.
Findings
The current research has confirmed the applicability of Wendler’s model to the higher education information technology sector. Application of the model establishes not only a baseline agility maturity score across the whole-of-organisation but also provides granular scores based on organisational units. Triangulation of survey results is recommended to achieve a more in-depth perspective.
Research limitations/implications
Further research comparing similarly and differently sized universities could provide valuable insights. More research is needed to extend the applicability of Wendler’s model to a wider range of domains and industries.
Practical implications
The grouping of survey questions under particular broad themes reflected the strategic focus of the division being surveyed. Organisations implementing the proposed model will need to select themes that correspond with their respective strategic goals and culture.
Originality/value
The paper has extended the research and resultant model developed by Wendler by applying them not only to both managers and staff but also to a different domain, specifically higher education.
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Anne Baker, Hazel Burke, Patricia Callaghan and Catherine Saunders
Lack of opportunities in further education for people with mental health problems in the Borough of Rochdale prompted a small group of mental health workers from a range of…
Abstract
Lack of opportunities in further education for people with mental health problems in the Borough of Rochdale prompted a small group of mental health workers from a range of agencies to develop an innovative partnership with the local further education college to research and create new education opportunities in 1997/1998. To date over 50 users of mental health services who hitherto would not have accessed mainstream further education services have participated in a range of newly established courses.
Who is ultimately responsible for the harms that befall us? Corporations who make dangerous products, or the consumers who use them? The answer to this question has a profound…
Abstract
Who is ultimately responsible for the harms that befall us? Corporations who make dangerous products, or the consumers who use them? The answer to this question has a profound impact on how personal injury lawyers screen products liability cases. In this chapter, I analyze results from an experimental vignette study in which 83 lawyers were asked to evaluate a hypothetical products liability case. Half of the lawyers practice in states considered to be difficult jurisdictions for the practice of personal injury law due to tort reform and conservative political climates (Texas and Colorado), while the other half work in states that have been relatively unaffected by tort reform and are considered to be more “plaintiff friendly” (Pennsylvania and Massachusetts). While lawyers in reform states and non-reform states were equally likely to accept the hypothetical case with which they were presented, they approached the case in different ways, used different theories, and made different arguments in order to justify their acceptance of the case. Lawyers in states with tort reform were most likely to accept the case when they focused on the issue of corporate social responsibility – that is, what the defendant did wrong, how they violated the rules, and how they could have prevented the injury in question. Lawyers in non-reform states, however, were most likely to accept the case when they believed that jurors would feel sorry for the injured child and not find their client at fault for the injury.
Sadaf Taimoor, Javaria Abbas and Beenish Tariq
The learning outcomes of this case study are to understand and apply the PESTLE framework with a special focus on sociocultural nuances of a conservative society, appreciate the…
Abstract
Learning outcomes
The learning outcomes of this case study are to understand and apply the PESTLE framework with a special focus on sociocultural nuances of a conservative society, appreciate the role of innovation and effective leadership in the success of entrepreneurial ventures, understand the bricolage theory to critically evaluate the role of entrepreneurs as agents of social change and develop monetization strategies for digital start-ups and recommend strategies that would help social enterprises to strike the right balance between their social aspirations and commercial goals.
Case overview/synopsis
In March 2020, Kanwal Ahmed, founder of the much-lauded Facebook group Soul Sisters Pakistan (SSP), was posed with a critical situation. SSP’s first face-to-face member meetup, which had been hyped up by Pakistanis residing in Canada for months, had to be called off due to the advent of COVID-19. What worried Ahmed was not just the immediate impact of the postponement; rather, she was more concerned about how her social enterprise would sustain in the longer run. The new normal had changed the way businesses operated; tried and tested revenue generation strategies of SSP would neither be feasible in a COVID-stricken world nor reap the same results. Ahmed knew that her social enterprise could have a far-reaching impact in a pandemic-stricken world. However, she was unsure about how to monetize her business model so as to ensure steady revenue generation streams that would keep the enterprise afloat. Ahmed knew that the clock was ticking, and she had to act quickly and think of ways to ensure SSP’s long-term sustenance.
Complexity academic level
This case study is suitable for undergraduate students enrolled in courses of entrepreneurship and strategy.
Supplementary materials
Teaching notes are available for educators only.
Subject code
CSS 3: Entrepreneurship.
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Researchers of the history of women teachers have included fiction, as well as memoirs and history, as an important part of that testimony. The aim of this article is to examine…
Abstract
Researchers of the history of women teachers have included fiction, as well as memoirs and history, as an important part of that testimony. The aim of this article is to examine the novel, Anne of Avonlea (1925) by Lucy Maude Montgomery as both a source of information about the working life of a woman teacher and, due to the immense popularity of the book, as a shaper of how women understand and enact teaching. Anne is a young teacher in her first posting consisting of a rural Canadian one‐ teacher school. She struggles to resist using corporal punishment in favour of winning her students respect, stimulating their minds and finding a ‘genius’. However, the local community, fellow teachers and her students have different notions of how teachers should behave. Her beliefs are further undermined when in a fit of anger she succumbs to beating one her students. Her reflections on what drove her actions are realistic and contain warnings for contemporary teachers to appreciate the often fragile hold they have on their espoused educational philosophy. Another danger revealed is the unconscious leaking of the shadow side of the psyche in the necessary close but dangerous relationships between students and teacher thereby providing a complex view of what motivates young women to teach and how they approach their work.
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Anne Grodzins Lipow is a whiz at helping people satisfy needs they never knew they had. Who would have suspected a market for small wooden dreidls (first‐of‐a‐kind in California…
Abstract
Anne Grodzins Lipow is a whiz at helping people satisfy needs they never knew they had. Who would have suspected a market for small wooden dreidls (first‐of‐a‐kind in California) when she and a partner began to make and sell these special children's tops a few years ago? Now it is a Berkeley tradition: just step up to Anne's Berkeley street‐stand during the holiday season to buy one of these attractive, inexpensive Chanukah offerings. Not enough time for your library research? Call the University of California at Berkeley Library's Baker service (dial 64‐BAKER) and order campus‐mail delivery of copies of one or more articles or books, located on the Berkeley campus or elsewhere. Lipow began this service for Berkeley faculty and students in 1974, an advance that generated many an “Of course!” from colleagues at the time and scores of “copycat” services since. If you were hunting for a list of female judges in California, you would look in the state almanac, naturally; but a California almanac for adults did not exist until this year. That was when librarian Lipow, having again heard opportunity tapping, joined with political scientist James Fay, and American literature scholar Stephanie Fay, to bring out the inaugural edition of California Almanac (Novato, CA: Presidio Press, 1984; $12.95).
Anthony Beudaert, Nil Özçağlar-Toulouse and Meltem Türe
This paper aims at revealing the process of identity reconstruction for individuals who have acquired sensory disabilities, as well as the contribution of consumption to this…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims at revealing the process of identity reconstruction for individuals who have acquired sensory disabilities, as well as the contribution of consumption to this process.
Methodology/approach
The data was collected through both interviews conducted in France and autobiographical accounts.
Findings
When disability occurs, individuals go through a rite of passage that shapes their identity reconstruction process. Two forms of liminality appear: acute and sustained liminality. These phases can foster or hamper individuals’ identity reconstruction.
Research limitations/implications
The mechanisms leading from one stage of the identity reconstruction process to another should be deepened through further research.
Practical/social implications
Given the fluctuating behaviors of consumers with disabilities, especially in view of their identity reconstruction process, this research encourages retailers and public policy actors not to consider them as a homogeneous consumer segment.
Originality/value
While scholars dealing with consumers with disabilities have mainly focused on the accessibility of the marketplace, this research disentangles their identity issues.
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Noelle Blackman, Konstantinos Vlachakis, Anna Annes, Sally Griffin and Peter Baker
Research and anecdotal clinical work indicate that complex post-traumatic stress disorder (CPTSD) in families that have children and adults who have a learning disability and/or…
Abstract
Purpose
Research and anecdotal clinical work indicate that complex post-traumatic stress disorder (CPTSD) in families that have children and adults who have a learning disability and/or are autistic may be prevalent. This paper aims to provide a preliminary formulation of complex trauma in families.
Design/methodology/approach
This report is based on a review of clinical psychotherapeutic work with six families. The themes are derived from the assessment period through examining the assessment reports and clinical supervision notes for thematic patterns.
Findings
This report suggests that the prevalence of CPTSD in families of people who have a learning disability and/or are autistic needs to be researched across the family lifecycle and that there are specific factors that mediate complex trauma symptomatology.
Originality/value
CPTSD symptomatology in these families is inadequately conceptualised and this is one of the first papers suggesting this as a potentially helpful framework to consider the experiences of families.
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Anne Swenson Ticknor and Paige Averett
The purpose of this paper is to provide an emic view of how one researcher negotiated complex relationships in teacher education research and learned to employ the principles of…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to provide an emic view of how one researcher negotiated complex relationships in teacher education research and learned to employ the principles of the relational cultural theory (RCT) to create a research design aimed at building and sustaining relationships with participants.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors offer illustrative qualitative data examples from teacher education research to highlight complexities in research relationships, essential elements of the RCT, and the affordances RCT can offer qualitative researchers invested in similar work.
Findings
By engaging pre-service teachers and ourselves as mutually engaged in this process, the authors put into practice a sense of community and relationship building the authors hope pre-service teachers will practice with their future students.
Research limitations/implications
This paper provides a qualitative research design employing tenets of the RCT which centers relationships as critical to the research process. The authors offer affordances and limitations to using the RCT in research.
Practical implications
Several affordances are offered to researchers interested in engaging in similar work.
Originality/value
This paper offers an original perspective of how one researcher in teacher education negotiated complex relationships and learned to employ the principles of the RCT within these to build a research design aimed at widening research and practice in teacher education through productive and lasting relationships.