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As any organisation chart illustrates, two essential features of organisations are formal authority and division of labour. “Formal authority” specifies those individuals and positions which have institutionalised power over others, while “division of labour” specifies those individuals and positions who are responsible for certain tasks in an organisation. In these respects organisations are a reflection of their environmental contexts of which class is a major feature (Clegg and Dunkerley, 1980). Broadly speaking what emerges in organisations are two classes of participants. One such class is represented by those who own the means of production (or capital) while the other such class is represented by those who own labour. This difference in capital ownership leads to disparities in the rights, powers and privileges—prerogatives—of the two classes (Clegg and Dunkerley, 1980). In practice, however, the capitalists are represented in organisations by “the management” who act as their agents. Thus the active participants in organisations become “management” and “labour” (Strauss and Rosenstein, 1970). Management with its power base grounded in its role as the owner's agent becomes the “elite” in the organisation.

A study of employee involvement in the management and ownership of NVC Australia Pty Ltd indicated high levels of work satisfaction, job security, decision influence, productivity, communication, commitment and involvement. Although only one organisation has been analysed, it is clear that employee ownership and participation provide interesting alternatives for organisations to face the challenges of the present social and economic situations.

Does participation equal power? The management prerogatives of employee‐owners are unequally distributed.

While it is often claimed that participative management systems have a substantial effect upon employee perceptions and attitudes, and labour productivity, there has been little empirical research conducted on this issue. The purpose of this article is to describe the functioning of a company which changed to a participative management system and to examine the effectiveness of this change. Effectiveness is judged in terms of changes in employee perceptions and attitudes and in labour productivity.

Performance evaluation in production and marketing involves the application of a wide range of measures. These encompass the activities specific to each department type and those in which there is a common organisation‐wide interest. The results of a questionnaire survey of 134 marketing and 155 production managers suggest that accounting data have to be supplemented by non‐accounting data to satisfy managers' information requirements. Hence the utility of accounting data in the task of departmental assessment may be limited. Implications for management accounting are that management reporting must recognise these differential information needs, given the premise that performance evaluation is one of the essential tasks of managerial accounting.

The librarian and researcher have to be able to uncover specific articles in their areas of interest. This Bibliography is designed to help. Volume IV, like Volume III, contains features to help the reader to retrieve relevant literature from MCB University Press' considerable output. Each entry within has been indexed according to author(s) and the Fifth Edition of the SCIMP/SCAMP Thesaurus. The latter thus provides a full subject index to facilitate rapid retrieval. Each article or book is assigned its own unique number and this is used in both the subject and author index. This Volume indexes 29 journals indicating the depth, coverage and expansion of MCB's portfolio.

Since the first Volume of this Bibliography there has been an explosion of literature in all the main areas of business. The researcher and librarian have to be able to uncover specific articles devoted to certain topics. This Bibliography is designed to help. Volume III, in addition to the annotated list of articles as the two previous volumes, contains further features to help the reader. Each entry within has been indexed according to the Fifth Edition of the SCIMP/SCAMP Thesaurus and thus provides a full subject index to facilitate rapid information retrieval. Each article has its own unique number and this is used in both the subject and author index. The first Volume of the Bibliography covered seven journals published by MCB University Press. This Volume now indexes 25 journals, indicating the greater depth, coverage and expansion of the subject areas concerned.

Information and communications technology (ICT) offers enormous opportunities for individuals, businesses and society. The application of ICT is equally important to economic and non-economic activities. Researchers have increasingly focused on the adoption and use of ICT by small and medium enterprises (SMEs) as the economic development of a country is largely dependent on them. Following the success of ICT utilisation in SMEs in developed countries, many developing countries are looking to utilise the potential of the technology to develop SMEs. Past studies have shown that the contribution of ICT to the performance of SMEs is not clear and certain. Thus, it is crucial to determine the effectiveness of ICT in generating firm performance since this has implications for SMEs’ expenditure on the technology. This research examines the diffusion of ICT among SMEs with respect to the typical stages from innovation adoption to post-adoption, by analysing the actual usage of ICT and value creation. The mediating effects of integration and utilisation on SME performance are also studied. Grounded in the innovation diffusion literature, institutional theory and resource-based theory, this study has developed a comprehensive integrated research model focused on the research objectives. Following a positivist research paradigm, this study employs a mixed-method research approach. A preliminary conceptual framework is developed through an extensive literature review and is refined by results from an in-depth field study. During the field study, a total of 11 SME owners or decision-makers were interviewed. The recorded interviews were transcribed and analysed using NVivo 10 to refine the model to develop the research hypotheses. The final research model is composed of 30 first-order and five higher-order constructs which involve both reflective and formative measures. Partial least squares-based structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) is employed to test the theoretical model with a cross-sectional data set of 282 SMEs in Bangladesh. Survey data were collected using a structured questionnaire issued to SMEs selected by applying a stratified random sampling technique. The structural equation modelling utilises a two-step procedure of data analysis. Prior to estimating the structural model, the measurement model is examined for construct validity of the study variables (i.e. convergent and discriminant validity).

The estimates show cognitive evaluation as an important antecedent for expectation which is shaped primarily by the entrepreneurs’ beliefs (perception) and also influenced by the owners’ innovativeness and culture. Culture further influences expectation. The study finds that facilitating condition, environmental pressure and country readiness are important antecedents of expectation and ICT use. The results also reveal that integration and the degree of ICT utilisation significantly affect SMEs’ performance. Surprisingly, the findings do not reveal any significant impact of ICT usage on performance which apparently suggests the possibility of the ICT productivity paradox. However, the analysis finally proves the non-existence of the paradox by demonstrating the mediating role of ICT integration and degree of utilisation explain the influence of information technology (IT) usage on firm performance which is consistent with the resource-based theory. The results suggest that the use of ICT can enhance SMEs’ performance if the technology is integrated and properly utilised. SME owners or managers, interested stakeholders and policy makers may follow the study’s outcomes and focus on ICT integration and degree of utilisation with a view to attaining superior organisational performance.

This study urges concerned business enterprises and government to look at the environmental and cultural factors with a view to achieving ICT usage success in terms of enhanced firm performance. In particular, improving organisational practices and procedures by eliminating the traditional power distance inside organisations and implementing necessary rules and regulations are important actions for managing environmental and cultural uncertainties. The application of a Bengali user interface may help to ensure the productivity of ICT use by SMEs in Bangladesh. Establishing a favourable national technology infrastructure and legal environment may contribute positively to improving the overall situation. This study also suggests some changes and modifications in the country’s existing policies and strategies. The government and policy makers should undertake mass promotional programs to disseminate information about the various uses of computers and their contribution in developing better organisational performance. Organising specialised training programs for SME capacity building may succeed in attaining the motivation for SMEs to use ICT. Ensuring easy access to the technology by providing loans, grants and subsidies is important. Various stakeholders, partners and related organisations should come forward to support government policies and priorities in order to ensure the productive use of ICT among SMEs which finally will help to foster Bangladesh’s economic development.

Prior research suggests both formal and informal norms influence employee behavior. While increased training is a typical recommendation to strengthen formal norms by increasing adherence to organizational codes of conduct, and therefore improve ethical behavior, there is little empirical evidence that code training actually strengthens formal norms or improves ethics-related behavior. Conversely, prior observations of unethical behavior serve as strong indicators of informal norms. These observations may be unknown to management and therefore difficult to moderate using other means, including with training on a code.

We test the impact of prior observations of unethical behavior and training for a code of conduct on intentions to report unethical behavior in the future, as well as possible mediators of these relationships. We find some support that training on the code increases intention to report and strong support for the notion that prior observations of unethical behavior decrease intentions to report. Responsibility to report and norms against whistle-blowing both mediate the prior observation-to-reporting intentions relationship, but not the training-to-reporting intentions relationship. An interesting by-product of training seems to be that, by increasing awareness of unethical behavior, and therefore the salience of prior observation, training may have indirectly influenced intentions in the opposite direction intended.

This paper proposes a framework that focuses on instilling feelings of gratitude within consumers. Participant sports events are often funded largely by sponsorship revenues, and their consumer base is considered to represent an identifiably unique market. These conditions are argued to be favourable for integrating a gratitude framework. A model is presented that depicts gratitude as a mediating mechanism within a reciprocal relationship between the sponsor and the consumers. It includes purchase intentions as the behavioural outcome of gratitude. The findings suggest that incorporating feelings of gratitude may prove to be advantageous for potential sponsors within the participant sports industry.