To investigate the interdependence between organizational forms and the identities of managers and front line personnel in government services.
Abstract
Purpose
To investigate the interdependence between organizational forms and the identities of managers and front line personnel in government services.
Design/methodology/approach
A conceptual paper based upon and adding to theories and typologies developed by Douglas and Considine and Lewis. It also uses an empirical study of three Norwegian public services to support the hypothesis that distinct professional groups respond differently to new public management (NPM) reforms.
Findings
The transformation of government services towards market based and private sector management models is challenging traditional cultures and identities of service providers. In general there is opposition to the reforms because of their effect on the ability of professionals to do a good job. Professional groups are responding in different ways to new management systems and organisational forms and new identities are emerging. There is evidence that a hybrid form of bureaucracy is emerging which combines some virtues of the traditional procedural bureaucracy with flexibility, user focus, participation and professional pride.
Research limitations/implications
The data used in the paper was not originally collected to test models or theories. Further research, therefore, is necessary to specifically explore the link between professional and individual identities and organisational and management forms.
Originality/value
It contributes to the growing literature on the impact of NPM on professional civil servants' identity and their response to the changing cultures of the organisations in which they work.
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Marie-Anne Lorain, Raquel Pérez Estébanez, Miguel-Angel Villacorta, Monica Santos, Elisa Cano, Manuela Cañizares Espada, Gracia Rubio-Martin, Pilar López Sánchez, Alberto Martinez de Silva, Mercedes Ruiz de Palacios and Elena Urquia-Grande
The main goal of this study is to develop accounting students’ solidarity with and sensitivity to cooperation for sustainable development. This study also aims to analyze the role…
Abstract
Purpose
The main goal of this study is to develop accounting students’ solidarity with and sensitivity to cooperation for sustainable development. This study also aims to analyze the role of participatory learning activities in developing the dimensions of involvement, critical reflection and thinking analysis.
Design/methodology/approach
This empirical study analyzes a case study activity conducted in accounting seminars with students from different universities in Spain. After completing the activity, the students completed a questionnaire divided into four areas: sociodemographic information, involvement, critical reflection and creativity. Students also answered an open-response question that asked them to propose new activities to enhance their learning experience and contribute more to sustainable development. The study thus used mixed methods, complementing quantitative analysis with qualitative data.
Findings
The multivariate analysis obtained significant results showing that female students were more willing to help and that most students said they were more sensitive to these issues after the participatory learning activity. Furthermore, the items and dimensions analyzed revealed a positive impact of involvement, critical and creative thinking and participatory learning on accounting students’ commitment to cooperation for sustainable development. When students answered the open-response question, they proposed more activities to enhance their learning and improve the functioning of the Non-Governmental Organization’s (NGO’s) beneficiary. HEIs must design more transversal courses aligned with the Sustainable Development Goals in their social science degrees.
Originality/value
The study not only examines university education in sustainable development but goes a step further in trying to involve students in a real development project from a financial and accounting point of view. The study also focuses on education for sustainability, and the project invites the students to think critically, reflect and assess real situations.
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Amit Desai, Giulia Zoccatelli, Sara Donetto, Glenn Robert, Davina Allen, Anne Marie Rafferty and Sally Brearley
To investigate ethnographically how patient experience data, as a named category in healthcare organisations, is actively “made” through the co-creative interactions of data…
Abstract
Purpose
To investigate ethnographically how patient experience data, as a named category in healthcare organisations, is actively “made” through the co-creative interactions of data, people and meanings in English hospitals.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors draw on fieldnotes, interview recordings and transcripts produced from 13 months (2016–2017) of ethnographic research on patient experience data work at five acute English National Health Service (NHS) hospitals, including observation, chats, semi-structured interviews and documentary analysis. Research sites were selected based on performance in a national Adult Inpatient Survey, location, size, willingness to participate and research burden. Using an analytical approach inspired by actor–network theory (ANT), the authors examine how data acquired meanings and were made to act by clinical and administrative staff during a type of meeting called a “learning session” at one of the hospital study sites.
Findings
The authors found that the processes of systematisation in healthcare organisations to act on patient feedback to improve to the quality of care, and involving frontline healthcare staff and their senior managers, produced shifting understandings of what counts as “data” and how to make changes in response to it. Their interactions produced multiple definitions of “experience”, “data” and “improvement” which came to co-exist in the same systematised encounter.
Originality/value
The article's distinctive contribution is to analyse how patient experience data gain particular attributes. It suggests that healthcare organisations and researchers should recognise that acting on data in standardised ways will constantly create new definitions and possibilities of such data, escaping organisational and scholarly attempts at mastery.
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Iris Wallenburg, Anne Marie Weggelaar and Roland Bal
The purpose of this paper is to empirically explore and conceptualize how healthcare professionals and managers give shape to the increasing call for compassionate care as an…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to empirically explore and conceptualize how healthcare professionals and managers give shape to the increasing call for compassionate care as an alternative for system-based quality management systems. The research demonstrates how quality rebels craft deviant practices of good care and how they account for them.
Design/methodology/approach
Ethnographic research was conducted in three Dutch hospitals, studying clinical groups that were identified as deviant: a nursing ward for infectious diseases, a mother–child department and a dialysis department. The research includes over 120 h of observation, 41 semi-structured interviews and 2 focus groups.
Findings
The research shows that rebels’ quality practices are an emerging set of collaborative activities to improving healthcare and meeting (individual) patient needs. They conduct “contexting work” to achieve their quality aims by expanding their normative work to outside domains. As rebels deviate from hospital policies, they are sometimes forced to act “under the radar” causing the risk of groupthink and may undermine the aim of public accounting.
Practical implications
The research shows that in order to come to more compassionate forms of care, organizations should allow for more heterogeneity accompanied with ongoing dialogue(s) on what good care yields as this may differ between specific fields or locations.
Originality/value
This is the first study introducing quality rebels as a concept to understanding social deviance in the everyday practices of doing compassionate and good care.
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Bernard Owens Imarhiagbe, George Saridakis and Anne-Marie Mohammed
The purpose of this paper is to examine empirically the determinants of owner manager financial self-confidence. In particular, it estimates the effect of bank credit rejection…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine empirically the determinants of owner manager financial self-confidence. In particular, it estimates the effect of bank credit rejection and financial education (FE) on the financial self-confidence of business owners.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper uses data from 2004 and 2008 surveys of 2,500 UK small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs). An ordered probit estimation is used to measure and assess the effect of bank credit rejection and FE variables on financial self-confidence for the two periods. The authors also explore potential differences in self-confidence between males and females.
Findings
The results show that outright bank credit rejection reduces financial self-confidence among owner managers whereas partial bank credit rejection is found to help boost confidence prior to the financial crisis. There is strong evidence that FE increases financial self-confidence. Finally, the authors find no association between gender and reported self-confidence in finance.
Research limitations/implications
Entrepreneurs and potential entrepreneurs are encouraged to explore financial literacy and knowledge with a view to increasing their financial self-confidence. This will help SMEs to deal with the banks or other finance providers more efficiently. In addition, better application procedures and information on lending criteria may help SMEs to minimize the probability of bank credit rejection. So the current study has implications for professional bodies as well. The study, however, is restricted to sole proprietor and partnership SMEs and in the UK context only.
Practical implications
Financial self-confidence has a progressive effect on entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial venture growth. The financial self-confidence of owner managers can support their entrepreneurial capability in starting and operating one or more businesses. As entrepreneurs successfully start and operate their own businesses, they are contributing to economic development through job creation, employment and tax contribution.
Originality/value
This paper makes an original contribution in highlighting the usefulness of FE in boosting financial self-confidence among entrepreneurs and potential entrepreneurs. It is also found that the experience of bank credit rejection reduces entrepreneurs’ financial self-confidence.
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Rohit Markan, Navneet Seth, Vishal Vinayak and Gagandeep S. Salhan
Introduction: The effectiveness of management faculty members depends on several factors, including self-efficacy. Albert Bandura coined the term ‘self-efficacy’, defined as ‘the…
Abstract
Introduction: The effectiveness of management faculty members depends on several factors, including self-efficacy. Albert Bandura coined the term ‘self-efficacy’, defined as ‘the capacity to do things as per one’s ability’ – the self-belief that one ‘can-do’ something.
Purpose: The study aims to discuss the effects of high and low degrees of self-efficacy. Faculty members with high-order competencies achieve higher positions, whereas those with low self-efficacy will generally have less self-belief in achieving success, translating into not progressing either at all or as quickly. There exists a need to study the levels of self-efficacy among faculty members to determine issues that create skill gaps and lead to both high and low efficacy. For better general performance, all faculty members should have high degrees of self-efficacy as it leads to high enthusiasm, increased commitment, and a capacity to dilute and address a range of challenges.
Methodology: This chapter falls under the category of a review paper. As different papers/studies have been reviewed and compared in this study, it does not need to conform to any particular methodology.
Findings: Various findings and practical implications shall be discussed in this chapter regarding self-efficacy among management faculty members. To improve youth’s future abilities by 2030, teachers ought to have higher levels of self-efficacy. Self-efficacy is imperative in accomplishing objectives, achieving results, and accomplishing educational difficulties in instructing understudies (Tumkaya, 2020).
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Muthmainnah, Ahmad Al Yakin, Muhammad Massyat, Luís Cardoso and Andi Asrifan
Purpose: This study aims to identify communication speech acts and transaction terms in online stores (Olshop) during live streaming on Facebook amid the COVID-19 pandemic and to…
Abstract
Purpose: This study aims to identify communication speech acts and transaction terms in online stores (Olshop) during live streaming on Facebook amid the COVID-19 pandemic and to understand communication patterns between sellers and buyers when shopping on Facebook live streaming in Indonesia.
The Need for Research: This research is motivated by the skill gap arising from increasing buying and selling transactions through live streaming on Facebook. Cultural and demographic shifts, along with the widespread availability of modern technologies and marketing 2.0 have resulted in the global population adopting social media at rates far beyond our use of the Internet, making a compelling case by example and analogy that social media has the potential to level the playing field and is effective in reaching their target market.
Methodology: The type of research is descriptive-qualitative using corpus data instruments. The data collection technique in this study was carried out by reading and observing the data and listening to speeches about buying and selling women’s equipment from various online stores on Facebook. Then select and sort the data designated as forms, strategies, and functions of speech acts in buying and selling transactions during live streaming on Facebook. The data analysis technique has three steps: (1) reducing the amount of data; (2) presenting the data; and (3) concluding.
Findings: The results show that there are four types of speech acts between sellers and buyers in the live-streaming online shop on Facebook, namely, assertive, directive, expressive, and commissive speech acts.
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This article responds to the concern of small libraries that their size puts them at a disadvantage when it comes to advocating for public funds. By means of interviews with…
Abstract
This article responds to the concern of small libraries that their size puts them at a disadvantage when it comes to advocating for public funds. By means of interviews with public library administrators and local government agents, it is shown that small libraries can be successful in local public funding when they use some of the same techniques of making themselves fundable that large libraries use. These are: emphasizing the dollar value of their activities to local government; taking into account local government agendas; involving the business community as spokespersons; and astutely managing library opposition. Research for the article is based in two states where local public funding has been notoriously weak, California and Pennsylvania. Libraries discussed (selected by convenient sampling) are in library service areas ranging in population from 9,278 (Borough of Carnegie, Pennsylvania) to 54,400 (San Rafael, California).
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Aim of the present monograph is the economic analysis of the role of MNEs regarding globalisation and digital economy and in parallel there is a reference and examination of some…
Abstract
Aim of the present monograph is the economic analysis of the role of MNEs regarding globalisation and digital economy and in parallel there is a reference and examination of some legal aspects concerning MNEs, cyberspace and e‐commerce as the means of expression of the digital economy. The whole effort of the author is focused on the examination of various aspects of MNEs and their impact upon globalisation and vice versa and how and if we are moving towards a global digital economy.