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Article
Publication date: 5 June 2024

Greg Watts

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) provide a blueprint for UN member states to achieve prosperity and peace. A resilient construction industry should positively contribute…

119

Abstract

Purpose

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) provide a blueprint for UN member states to achieve prosperity and peace. A resilient construction industry should positively contribute to the achievement of all SDGs. Yet it is currently unclear if the industry helps or hinders SDG achievement. This research aims to explore if the industry is positively engaging with all SDGs.

Design/methodology/approach

This research is split into two phases. The first is an objectivist Qualitative Content Analysis (QCA) of sustainability reports from the ten leading UK contractors to identify direct and indirect SDG references. The second research phase adopts a subjectivist ontological position consisting of twenty-one semi-structured interviews with a range of construction industry project-based professionals. Narrative analysis is used to structure the interview questions and analyse the data gained.

Findings

Many SDGs are excluded from sustainability reports, and where discussed, only some are engaged with substantially. The SDG knowledge held by construction professionals is reduced further still, and SDG progress is rarely measured. The ambiguity surrounding the SDGs enables discrepancies between reporting and professional perceptions. There is also a lack of regard for fellow contractor collaboration through fear of reduced competitive advantage.

Originality/value

This paper addresses a gap in the literature between contractor SDG knowledge and action. This serves as a platform for future research agendas regarding how the SDGs can be better understood and actioned in a construction management context. For industry, inconsistencies between organisational sustainability reporting and the knowledge and awareness of staff are exposed, due to the lack of collaborative practices currently adopted.

Details

Built Environment Project and Asset Management, vol. 14 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2044-124X

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Article
Publication date: 15 December 2022

Greg Watts, Peter McDermott and Shaba Kolo

“Transforming construction” is a wide-ranging strategic term, under which sit numerous initiatives. It is the latest, in a long line of strategies and reports introduced to with…

425

Abstract

Purpose

“Transforming construction” is a wide-ranging strategic term, under which sit numerous initiatives. It is the latest, in a long line of strategies and reports introduced to with the intention of industry improvement. Arguably, many of these fail to achieve their aim. The barriers preventing the adoption of transforming construction initiatives are therefore limiting the potential benefits of the strategy. The aim of this research is to formally identify and understand how these barriers are framed and how these frames can be changed so that the barriers can be overcome, and the wider strategy benefits realised.

Design/methodology/approach

A literature review is undertaken to identify “transforming construction” initiatives. A total of 15 semi-structured interviews are then undertaken with construction professionals and analysed via narrative analysis to identify and understand perceived barriers to these initiatives. Framing is utilised as a theoretical lens to categorise these barriers and understand how “shifts” in the frames held can be achieved and the barriers overcome.

Findings

Barriers to transforming construction initiatives are identified as wicked problems. This allows a new perspective on such initiatives to be gained. The results also reveal how construction professionals frame such barriers, viewing themselves as bystanders with initiatives and practices “bigger” than themselves and their roles. How these frames can be “shifted” from bystander to active participant is identified. Such a shift can serve as a blueprint for industry professionals so that the initiatives identified can be successfully implemented thereby increasing the success of the transforming construction strategy.

Originality/value

This paper addresses a gap in current research around the perceptions held by construction professionals of the initiatives that sit under the transforming construction strategy. Addressing this gap allows the diagnosis of barriers that have previously served to prevent initiatives gaining traction. The findings contribute to both the existing literature and current industry practice by highlighting how the barriers are framed, and how such frames can be “shifted” to support the realisation of long promised strategy benefits.

Details

Built Environment Project and Asset Management, vol. 13 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2044-124X

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Article
Publication date: 18 October 2018

Greg Watts, Scott Fernie and Andy Dainty

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is a prominent topic of debate, and yet remains subject to multiple interpretations. Despite this ambiguity, organisations need to…

1117

Abstract

Purpose

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is a prominent topic of debate, and yet remains subject to multiple interpretations. Despite this ambiguity, organisations need to communicate their CSR activity effectively in order to meet varied stakeholder demands, increase financial performance and in order to achieve legitimacy in the eyes of clients and various stakeholders. The purpose of this paper is to explore how CSR is communicated, and the impact such communication methods have on CSR practice. More specifically, it examines the disconnect between the rhetoric espoused in CSR reports and the actualities of the ways in which CSR is practiced.

Design/methodology/approach

A qualitative content analysis of 100 CSR reports published by nine construction contractors informed the design of qualitative interviews. In total, 17 interviews were then conducted with contractors and public body clients.

Findings

Strategic ambiguity explains how contractors circumvent the problem of attending to conflicting stakeholder CSR needs. However, this results in a paradox where CSR is simultaneously sustained as a corporate metric and driver, whilst being simultaneously undermined in being seen as a rhetorical device. By examining this phenomenon through the lens of legitimacy, the study reveals how both the paradox and subsequent actions of clients that this provokes, act to restrict the development of CSR practice.

Originality/value

This is the first study to use the lens of legitimacy theory to analyse the relationship between CSR reporting and CSR practice in the construction industry. In revealing the CSR paradox and its ramifications the research provides a novel explanation of the lack of common understandings and manifestations of CSR within the construction sector.

Details

International Journal of Building Pathology and Adaptation, vol. 37 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2398-4708

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Available. Content available
296

Abstract

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Journal of Financial Management of Property and Construction , vol. 28 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1366-4387

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Article
Publication date: 1 February 2002

39

Abstract

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Pigment & Resin Technology, vol. 31 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0369-9420

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Article
Publication date: 1 January 1995

Joanne Locke and Greg Tower

A cross‐cultural model of international accounting compatibility is offered by blending Perera's (1989) cultural schema with other dynamic theories. Rahman's (1990) explanatory…

435

Abstract

A cross‐cultural model of international accounting compatibility is offered by blending Perera's (1989) cultural schema with other dynamic theories. Rahman's (1990) explanatory variables of the accounting regulator and the profession are included along with costly contracting theories (Watts and Zimmerman, 1990) regarding management's behaviour. These latter perspectives help explain the dynamic changes in the external environment. An application of the resulting cross‐cultural model follows through an examination of the potential accounting impact of the emerging free trade zone between New Zealand and Australia. The ability of the tuo national systems to harmonise is suggested by similarities in the environmental factors identified by the extended model. Differences in the regulatory approach between New Zealand and Australia are shown to be supported by underlying cultural factors and may be a persistent barrier. Recent initiatives are les sening this gap. The implications for the New Zealand Society of Accountants' ability to retain control over the standard setting process in New Zealand are also considered.

Details

Asian Review of Accounting, vol. 3 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1321-7348

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Article
Publication date: 1 January 2006

Greg Hearn and Cassandra Pace

This paper sets out to describe and illustrate an emerging shift in the conceptualisation of value creation in business, namely the emergence of value ecology thinking.

4119

Abstract

Purpose

This paper sets out to describe and illustrate an emerging shift in the conceptualisation of value creation in business, namely the emergence of value ecology thinking.

Design/methodology/approach

This paper examines shifts in the understanding of value creation in key business, economic and innovation literature and focuses on developments in creative industries at the forefront of technology and innovation – film, TV, computer games, e‐business, mobile phones – to illustrate how business increasingly creates value through ecologies.

Findings

This paper identifies five important shifts in the conceptualization of value creation by highlighting a growing prevalence in the literature of several ecological metaphors used to explain business processes, namely: the shift from thinking about consumers to co‐creators of value; the shift from thinking about value chains to value networks; the shift from thinking about product value to network value; the shift from thinking about simple co‐operation or competition to complex co‐opetition; and the shift from thinking about individual firm strategy to strategy in relation to value ecologies.

Originality/value

This paper synthesizes emerging trends in the literature in relation to value creation and defines the concept of a value‐creating ecology. In the process it sheds light on the structure of next generation business systems.

Details

Foresight, vol. 8 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1463-6689

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Article
Publication date: 1 October 2005

Barrie Gunter

Television has long been cited by viewers as their primary and most trusted source of news, especially in relation to news of national and international affairs. Aims to explore…

3545

Abstract

Purpose

Television has long been cited by viewers as their primary and most trusted source of news, especially in relation to news of national and international affairs. Aims to explore the issue of trust in the television news.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper combines narrative and analysis. Questions whether public trust in the BBC was damaged by the Hutton inquiry: would the BBC's reputation as the nation's premier news service be tarnished in the longer‐term and had public trust in journalism been severely compromised.

Findings

Events that followed the transmission of a report about the veracity of the government's case for going to war carried by a BBC radio news broadcast on 29 May 2003 called into question the Corporation's competence as a reliable news provider. The story alleged that an informed source had told BBC correspondent Andrew Gilligan that the government had exaggerated the immediacy of dangers posed to the west by Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction. The source who was eventually exposed was a Ministry of Defence expert on Iraq, Dr David Kelly, who later killed himself. The Prime Minister ordered a public inquiry into Dr Kelly's death, led by Lord Hutton, who severely criticised the competence of the BBC's senior management and the quality of its journalism practices. These conclusions prompted the resignation of the Corporation's Chairman and Director General. Hutton's findings had wider implications for the future governance of the BBC and invoked far‐reaching questions about the trust that the public could place in journalism. The evidence indicates that while the public felt that the BBC had been culpable for failing to launch its own internal inquiry into the Gilligan report, the public perceived this incident as a one‐off aberration rather than as being symptomatic of some wider malaise. Indeed, the Hutton inquiry had impacted more upon public trust in the government and led people to question the independence of the Hutton inquiry.

Practical implications

While trust in journalists is far from universal, the public differentiate among journalists in terms of the news organisations they work for. Among these, the BBC remains one of the most widely trusted.

Originality/value

An exploration of the issue of trust in the television news following the Dr David Kelly/Andrew Gilligan report on “The Today Programme” and subsequent Hutton enquiry.

Details

Aslib Proceedings, vol. 57 no. 5
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0001-253X

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Article
Publication date: 1 February 2000

Wee Lin Chong, Greg Tower and Ross Taplin

This paper examines accounting harmonisation and determinants explaining accounting measurement policy choice decisions by Asia‐Pacific listed manufacturing companies. Using…

264

Abstract

This paper examines accounting harmonisation and determinants explaining accounting measurement policy choice decisions by Asia‐Pacific listed manufacturing companies. Using Thomas' (1991) theoretical framework, four contingent variables (country of reporting, company size, profitability and debt leverage) are examined as possible determinants of firms' accounting choices concerning non‐current asset valuation measurement base, goodwill and depreciation. 130 listed manufacturing companies' annual reports were examined from Australia, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore. This study involves two phases. The first phase evaluates accounting harmonisation measurement indices in comparison with the extant literature. An important innovation is the operationalisation of Archer et. al. (1995) between‐country and within‐country C indices. Computed comparability indices indicated variations in the level of harmony across the five countries for all three accounting measurement practices. The second phase employed logistic regression to examine possible determinants of accounting policy choice decisions. Such a combined research approach should lead to a better understanding of de facto accounting harmonisation and practices.

Details

Asian Review of Accounting, vol. 8 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1321-7348

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Article
Publication date: 1 January 2013

Rusmin Rusmin, Glennda Scully and Greg Tower

Managers may “creatively” choose accounting methods in order to smooth income figures. Using a sample of 1,094 transportation firm‐year observations before and throughout the…

4594

Abstract

Purpose

Managers may “creatively” choose accounting methods in order to smooth income figures. Using a sample of 1,094 transportation firm‐year observations before and throughout the global financial crisis (GFC) period of 2006‐2009 in seven Asian countries, the purpose of this study is to investigate whether managers' smooth reported earnings to meet the benchmark target of last year's earnings figure.

Design/methodology/approach

Following previous research (e.g.,Burgstahler and Dichev; Degeorge, Patel, and Zeckhauser; Holland and Ramsay; Burgstahler and Eames; Daske, Gebhardt, and McLeay; Gore, Pope, and Singh; Charoenwong and Jiraporn), this study uses an earnings benchmark of sustaining last year's performance as the key indicator of earnings management.

Findings

The empirical evidence reveals that corporate managers seem to opportunistically smooth income to beat earnings targets. The results also show that the AuditQuality, EcoCrisis and Size are not explanatory for the smoothing behavior of the above target firms. However, the independent variables EcoCrisis and Size are predictors for the smoothing behavior of the sample firms that engage in income‐increasing earnings management. The coefficient on EcoCrisis is negative and significantly (at p=0.001) related to the earnings management measure, suggesting that during a period of economic stress, transportation firm managers engage in less aggressive income‐increasing discretionary accruals strategy. Furthermore, the findings confirm that large size firms exhibit less aggressive income‐increasing earnings management behavior. Specifically, the coefficient on Size is negative and moderately significant (p=0.056) associated with earnings management measure.

Originality/value

This study strongly supports the political costs hypothesis which argues that larger firms are subject to more public scrutiny and political actions therein exhibiting less aggressive income‐increasing earnings management behavior. The authors further note a “big bath” phenomenon during the GFC period suggesting that corporate managers manipulate their reported earnings downward to make poor results even worse in the current financial period, artificially enhancing future year's earnings.

Details

Managerial Auditing Journal, vol. 28 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0268-6902

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