Anna MacVicar and Gillian Brown
A management issue that is common in organizations today is how to keepon improving the quality of their products and services and ensure thatthere is a credible and creditable…
Abstract
A management issue that is common in organizations today is how to keep on improving the quality of their products and services and ensure that there is a credible and creditable commitment to outstanding customer service within each member of staff, guaranteeing that customers are satisfied. Which systematic approach should organizations take? Compares and contrasts BS 5750 with the Investors in People Award (IIP), provides a case study example, and offers some conclusions.
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Harm minimisation still gets a rough ride in some circles. In the US, harm minimisation is still seen as a failure among many professionals ‐ where abstinence‐based Alcoholic and…
Abstract
Harm minimisation still gets a rough ride in some circles. In the US, harm minimisation is still seen as a failure among many professionals ‐ where abstinence‐based Alcoholic and Narcotics Anonymous still hold the sway in public and political opinion. But what about the UK? Surely we have a more balanced view and put clients' needs before professional dogma. Not so says Brenda Coldwell. She reveals why some professionals are fighting to get controlled drinking back on the agenda and advocating something the drug treatment field takes for granted ‐ she makes the case for client‐centred alcohol treatment.
Men make war; women make peace. Men make war; women make children. Men make war because women make children. Because men make war, women make children. Women make peace because…
André Luiz Tavares Damasceno, Cristiano Morini and Gean Lucas Pannellini
The purpose of this paper is to analyze the process of why a Brazilian digital startup company reached unicorn status the fastest.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to analyze the process of why a Brazilian digital startup company reached unicorn status the fastest.
Design/methodology/approach
After the literature review, the authors conducted the questionnaire containing 13 questions used in 18 in-depth interviews conducted in the case study. Saturation point combined with the independent and in-depth analysis of the researchers is used to achieve internal and external validity. The primary data collected underwent an analytical approach, followed by a resource-based view (RBV). RBV does not deal with time. There is a gap in the literature and an opportunity here: to analyze the fastest company to become a unicorn under the RBV lens.
Findings
The case reveals that value can be found in traditional sectors, as is the case of the real estate sector. This is a case of a company in the direct home-buying space.
Practical implications
The contribution of this paper is both practical, with the seven lessons, and theoretical. Resources allocated to a specific context in a specific geographic region shift the attention away from the absolute value of resources to the timing of aggregating them. Thus, the contribution accounting for time is new to the RBV.
Originality/value
The originality lies in the analysis of the dynamics of digital businesses with exponential growth.
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Viviane Frings-Hessami, Anindita Sarker, Gillian Oliver and Misita Anwar
The purpose of this paper is to discuss the creation and sharing of information by Bangladeshi women participants in a community informatics project and to assess to what extent…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to discuss the creation and sharing of information by Bangladeshi women participants in a community informatics project and to assess to what extent the information provided to them meets their short and longer-term needs.
Design/methodology/approach
The analysis is based on data collected during a workshop with village women in Dhaka and focus group discussions in rural Bangladesh in March and April 2019. The information continuum model is used as a framework to analyse the data.
Findings
The study shows that the women document their learning and share it with their families and communities and that they are very conscious of the importance of keeping analogue back-ups of the information provided to them in digital format. They use notebooks to write down information that they find useful and they copy information provided to them on brown paper sheets hung in the village community houses.
Practical implications
This paper raises questions about how information is communicated to village women, organised and integrated in a community informatics project, and more generally about the suitability and sustainability of providing information in digital formats in a developing country.
Originality/value
The paper shows how village women participants in a community informatics project in Bangladesh took the initiative to create and preserve the information that was useful to them in analogue formats to remedy the limitations of the digital formats and to keep the information accessible in the longer term.
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Gillian Maree Vesty, Chao Ren and Sophia Ji
The purpose of this paper is to provide practical insights into a senior manager’s engagement with integrated reporting (IR). This paper theorises IR as an accounting compromise…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to provide practical insights into a senior manager’s engagement with integrated reporting (IR). This paper theorises IR as an accounting compromise and test of worth in an Australian IR pilot organisation.
Design/methodology/approach
In-depth interviews with the chairman of the IR pilot organisation are analysed in the context of Boltanski and Thévenot’s (1991, 2006) economies of worth (EW). A personal narrative approach was used to privilege the voice of an individual actor at the heart of decision making.
Findings
In contributing to van Bommel’s (2014) use of EW to examine IR as an accounting compromise, the authors find that ambiguity in IR does not mean that reporting is getting harder to operationalise. Instead, IR is getting harder to justify. The relativism issues that IR has revealed suggest that if all views are met, any significant contributions would not stand out. Interviews reveal that the challenge for IR is to provide the means to report on the organisation’s broader societal impacts, which go beyond measures of IR value creation.
Practical implications
This paper contributes to the accounting academy with practical insights on a dual-purpose organisation’s experiences with IR. The authors demonstrate how a chairman of the board uses accounting to navigate competing priorities and justify management decisions.
Originality/value
This study offers unique insights from the chairman of an IR pilot organisation. A personal narrative approach contributes to the limited empirical literature in accounting using EW as a micro-level analytic.
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Aileen O’Reilly, Alanna Donnelly, Jennifer Rogers, Olive Maloney, Gillian O’Brien and Elizabeth Doyle
Measuring parent satisfaction is regarded as essential but there is a paucity of research reporting on parental satisfaction with community youth mental health services. This…
Abstract
Purpose
Measuring parent satisfaction is regarded as essential but there is a paucity of research reporting on parental satisfaction with community youth mental health services. This study aims to examine parent satisfaction with Jigsaw – a primary care youth mental health service.
Design/methodology/approach
A measure of parent satisfaction was developed and administered to parents in 12 Jigsaw services over a two-year period (n = 510, age range: 28 to 70 years) when young people and parents were ending their engagement with these services.
Findings
Overall, parents had high levels of satisfaction with Jigsaw and their level of satisfaction did not vary depending on the parent or young person’s age and/or gender. Examination of qualitative feedback revealed three overarching themes relating to growth and change in young people, parents and their families; strengths of the service and; suggestions for future service development. Analysis of the psychometric properties of the measure provided evidence for a two-factor structure examining satisfaction with the intervention and outcomes and service accessibility and facilities.
Originality/value
This study represents one of the first efforts to measure parent satisfaction with primary care youth mental health services. It has resulted in the development of a brief measure that can be more widely administered to parents engaging with primary care youth mental health services.