This paper aims to analyze how the level of adherence to sustainable development principles has evolved and also how the integration of new “good” governing rules has evolved in…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to analyze how the level of adherence to sustainable development principles has evolved and also how the integration of new “good” governing rules has evolved in conjunction with the formation and functioning of the boards of directors and their committees.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper reports the results of a comparative case study – three French companies in the building sector – based on both primary and secondary data for the period 2002 to 2007.
Findings
It is found that the companies showed that they were capable of integrating sustainable development principles into their way of management; they also developed their rules of governance – in particular with regard to the constitution and the operating rules of their board of directors.
Originality/value
This study provides recent developments regarding sustainable development applied to company management, in the building sector in France. It also gives precise and recent information on the development of corporate governance rules.
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Jean‐Pierre Rieder, Alejandra Casillas, Gérard Mary, Anne‐Dominique Secretan, Jean‐Michel Gaspoz and Hans Wolff
In the past, health management in Geneva's six post‐trial prisons had been variable and inconsistent. In 2008, the unit of penitentiary medicine of the Geneva University Hospitals…
Abstract
Purpose
In the past, health management in Geneva's six post‐trial prisons had been variable and inconsistent. In 2008, the unit of penitentiary medicine of the Geneva University Hospitals was mandated to re‐organize and provide health care at all six prison facilities. The specific aim of this paper is to outline the example as a practical solution to some of the common challenges in unifying the structure and process of health services across multiple small facilities, while meeting European prison health and local quality standards.
Design/methodology/approach
Geneva's post‐trial prisons are small and close to one another in geographical proximity – ideal conditions for the construction of a health mobile team (HMT). This multidisciplinary mobile team operated like a community ambulatory care model; it was progressively launched in all prison facilities in Geneva. The authors incorporated an implementation strategy where health providers partnered with prison and community stakeholders in the health delivery model's development and adaption process.
Findings
The model's strategic initiatives are described along the following areas, in light of other international prison health activity and prior care models: access to a health care professional, equivalence of care, patient consent, confidentiality, humanitarian interventions, and professional competence and independence.
Originality/value
From the perspective of the HMT members, the authors provide the “lessons learned” through this experience, especially to providers who are working on prison health services reform and coordination improvement. The paper particularly stresses the importance of partnering with community health stakeholders and prison staff, a key component to the approach.
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Annick Hortense Dominique Van Rossem
The present research offers insights into the generational stereotypical beliefs that different generations of nurses hold about the own and the other generations and the…
Abstract
Purpose
The present research offers insights into the generational stereotypical beliefs that different generations of nurses hold about the own and the other generations and the implications on the work floor.
Design/methodology/approach
This cross-sectional, exploratory study employs a cognitive mapping approach known as the repertory grid. The sample consisted of 15 Generation Y, 15 Generation X and 15 Baby Boomer nurses.
Findings
Beliefs of nurses about their own and the other generations direct social categorization and generational stereotypes of the in-group and out groups. These stereotypes mold nurses' beliefs and attitudes towards their coworkers and are enacted leading to self-fulfilling prophecies. Especially Generation Y and Baby Boomer nurses are negatively stereotyped and have their ways to deal with these negative stereotypes.
Practical implications
Nurses and their managers who hold generational stereotypes may unknowingly create cliques within an organization and adopt behaviors and expectations based on generational (self-) stereotypes. The author offers noteworthy insights for fostering intergenerational synergies amongst nurses, which are important since the level of interdependent relations amongst nurses required to provide care.
Originality/value
The present study moves away from the research about the typical characteristics of nurses across the generational workforce. Instead, mental models about how different generations of nurses construe their coworkers belonging to different generations including their own generation are drawn. Employing the repertory grid technique (RGT), an established method for uncovering people's personal and collective belief systems, the present study shows how generational stereotyping and self-stereotyping among nurses belonging to varying generational cohorts occurs and debates its implications.
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Patrice François, Dominique Bertrand, Jose Labarere, Magali Fourny and Jean Calop
This paper aims to evaluate the effectiveness of a program designed to improve the quality of drug prescription‐writing at a university hospital in France. Improvement actions…
Abstract
This paper aims to evaluate the effectiveness of a program designed to improve the quality of drug prescription‐writing at a university hospital in France. Improvement actions included feed‐back from yearly audits and the dissemination of recommendations on how best to write the prescriptions. A random sample of 30 stays was selected from among the hospitalizations for the year 1996. From each patient, medical records were searched for the first prescription order of the stay and its quality was assessed according to standards. A total of 872 records were relevant and included 3,289 medications. The results were compared to those obtained for the two previous years. Actions to sensitize prescribers resulted in an insufficient improvement of most indicators of prescription‐writing quality with results remaining well below ideal standards. The hospital staff concerned had a positive opinion of the program which led to an awareness of prescription problems. This assessment showed that the program had a moderate impact on prescribers’ practice and efforts must be continued.
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It has often been said that a great part of the strength of Aslib lies in the fact that it brings together those whose experience has been gained in many widely differing fields…
Abstract
It has often been said that a great part of the strength of Aslib lies in the fact that it brings together those whose experience has been gained in many widely differing fields but who have a common interest in the means by which information may be collected and disseminated to the greatest advantage. Lists of its members have, therefore, a more than ordinary value since they present, in miniature, a cross‐section of institutions and individuals who share this special interest.
This chapter attempts to offer a clearer look at the historical roots of the founding of mutualist finance. Without denying that the various forms of financial mutualism may have…
Abstract
This chapter attempts to offer a clearer look at the historical roots of the founding of mutualist finance. Without denying that the various forms of financial mutualism may have legal and organizational roots in ancient times, the author considers what, for contemporary mutualist banks, may constitute the soul.
In its first part, the document presents the individual constructions that existed in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, in a context in which economic development and the industrial revolution banished the rules and standards of the former society. It refers to Utopian socialisms as opposed to the scientific solutions proposed for a new social organization and to the new solidarism according to Léon Bourgeois. Christian sources are also called to mind with social Christianity (Protestant) and social Catholicism until the birth of the social doctrine of the Church.
This frenzy of ideas as well as the confrontation with reality led to the birth, in Germany, of the first experiments with alternative finance. This is the subject of the second part of this chapter, which then develops the bank mutualism created by the founding fathers, F.W. Raiffeisen and H. Schulze-Delitzsch.
The historical description of the creation of mutualist banks brings up two major problems when talking about the “other finance”: the interest and activity of the bank. Is an ethical finance capable of proposing a credible alternative? This is a question that needs to be answered in the light of history.
This chapter attempts, more than 150 years after the fact, to demonstrate the ponderous presence of the question and the permanence of the founding ideas in order to comprehend the facts and propose ideas for analysis and construction of an “other finance.”