Nick Goodwyn, Nick Beech, Bob Garvey, Jeff Gold, Richard Gulliford, Tricia Auty, Ali Sajjadi, Adalberto Arrigoni, Nehal Mahtab, Simon Jones and Susan Beech
The “Germanwings” air crash in 2015 in which 150 people were killed highlighted the challenges pilots working in the aviation industry face. Pilots regularly work for extensive…
Abstract
Purpose
The “Germanwings” air crash in 2015 in which 150 people were killed highlighted the challenges pilots working in the aviation industry face. Pilots regularly work for extensive periods in inhospitable and high-pressure operational conditions, exposing them to considerable work-related stress. This has raised calls for a more systemic cultural change across the aviation industry, championing a more holistic perspective of pilot health and well-being. The study aims to explore how peer coaching (PC) can promote an inclusive psychosocial safety climate enhancing pilot well-being and can mitigate hazardous attitudes and dysfunctional behaviours.
Design/methodology/approach
Adopting an interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA), semi-structured interviews and questionnaires were conducted with military and civilian peer coach/coachee pilots and key industry stakeholders, totalling 39 participants. The research provided significant insights into the perceived value of PC in promoting both pilot health and mental well-being (MW) and flight safety across the aviation industry.
Findings
The study highlights four key PC superordinate themes, namely, coaching skills, significance of well-being, building of peer relationships and importance of confidentiality and autonomy. Such combined themes build reciprocal trust within peer conversations that can inspire engagement and effectively promote personal well-being. The contagious effect of such local interventions can help stimulate systemic cultural change and promote a positive psychosocial safety climate throughout an organisation and, in this case, across the aviation industry. This study provides a PC conceptual framework “Mutuality Equality Goals Autonomy Non-evaluative feedback, Skill Confidentiality Voluntary Supervisory (MEGANS CVS),” highlighting the salient features of PC in promoting MW.
Research limitations/implications
The study highlights the salient features of PC and its role in promoting peer conversations that enable personal transition, openness and acceptance. This study also highlights how PC and well-being can be used to encourage inclusivity and engagement, thereby strengthening institutional resilience.
Practical implications
This study highlights how PC that can assist HRM/HRD professionals to embed a more inclusive and salutogenic approach to MW that can reshape organisational cultures. This study highlights the significance and link of workplace stress to hazardous attitudes and dysfunctional behaviours. It further notes that whilst the MEGANS CVS peer coaching framework has been applied to pilots, it can also be applied across all sectors and levels.
Social implications
This study highlights the value of PC as an inexpensive means to engage at the grassroots level, which not only improves personal performance, safety and well-being but by building peer relationships can also act as a catalyst for positive and deep organisational cultural change.
Originality/value
This study offers the MEGANS CVS framework that exposes insights into PC practice that can assist HRM/HRD professionals embed a more inclusive and salutogenic approach to health and well-being that can reshape organisational cultures. This study highlights the significance and link of workplace stress to hazardous attitudes and dysfunctional behaviours, and whilst this framework has been applied to pilots, it can also have relevance across all sectors and levels. This study calls for a “salutogenic turn,” employing MW and PC to transform organisational capabilities to be more forward-thinking and solution-focused, promoting an inclusive “just culture” where leaders positively lead their people.
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Hazel Kershaw-Solomon, Nick Beech, Jeff Gold, Julia Claxton, Tricia Auty and Susan Beech
The purpose of this paper is to explore the impact competency frameworks as standardisation can have on the employee engagement of academic staff within higher education (HE…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to explore the impact competency frameworks as standardisation can have on the employee engagement of academic staff within higher education (HE) through their employment as managerial tools.
Design/methodology/approach
A literature review is conducted from which the conditions for effective competency frameworks are evaluated and the influence of changes in the HE environment in the form of political agendas and tight resources are explored.
Findings
This paper provides insights into the dynamics of public service modernisation and the tensions between the dominant discourse of managerialism and the degree of agency afforded to professional academics. It highlights the relevance of informal peer relationships in setting the climate to generate collegial bonding and professional engagement that underpin successful teacher fellowship accreditations. It further highlights the key role managers play in this process and provides a conceptual framework highlighting the dynamics and combined effect of employee engagement and competency frameworks set within complex HE environment.
Practical implications
This paper brings together the prerequisites for effective implementation of competency frameworks to implement successful employee engagement strategies set within the complexities of the HE context, which has not been studied to date. Armed with such insights, Human Resource Development (HRD) departments and universities can implement competency assessments that generate greater staff engagement.
Originality/value
The paper provides a critical approach in reviewing the impact of Continued Professional Development and its link to professional status and thus helps British Universities and others to understand how the mechanisms at work affect engagement levels of academic staff. Armed with this depth of understanding of how the change initiative works, with whom and under what circumstances, universities will be better able to meet target UK Professional Standards Framework membership levels required by the higher education academy (HEA) and, subsequently, the HEA to meet their targets for the government.
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Nick Beech, Jeff Gold and Susan Beech
The purpose of this paper is to first consider how veterans use talk to shape interpretations of personal and social identify. Second, this paper seeks to gain an understanding of…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to first consider how veterans use talk to shape interpretations of personal and social identify. Second, this paper seeks to gain an understanding of how veterans see themselves in a civilian world, their ability to re-conceptualise and realign their perspective on life to support their transition in to a civilian world.
Design/methodology/approach
Underpinned by Ricoeur’s theory of narrative identity, the work provides a qualitative analysis data from coaching interviews with five veterans.
Findings
The findings revealed the on-going legacy of military life and how its distinctiveness and belief centred on kinship shapes personal identity and the way they see their civilian world. The work sheds light on to the benefits of this Ricoeur’s self-reflexive approach and how it can be used to provide a deeper insight in to the nature of personal transitions and how narrative can be used to expose complexities of the narratives of personal history and meaning as the narrator becomes both the seeker and what is sought.
Practical implications
The work reinforces the value of Ricoeur’s self-reflexive approach identifying narrative mediating between two “poles” of identity and the act of mimesis; prefiguration, configuration and refiguration as veterans project stories of their world and their place within it.
Originality/value
The paper provides new insights in to the importance of narrative identify broadening its potential application with engagement across diverse communities, thereby providing depth and rigour of its conceptual understanding of personal identify. The work further provides insights in to the challenges facing veterans to integrate within a civilian society.
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Nick Beech, David Devins, Jeff Gold and Susan Beech
This paper aims to explore the concept of resilience set within a family business context and considers how familiness and the nature of noneconomic factors, such as relationship…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to explore the concept of resilience set within a family business context and considers how familiness and the nature of noneconomic factors, such as relationship dynamics influence performance. This paper provides new insights into the nature and impact of familiness as a mediating device, uncovering the potential for reframing resilience theory and practice.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper draws on a review of the extant literature in the areas of resilience and familiness as a means of developing a deeper understanding of the social-ecological system of the family firm.
Findings
The study reveals family business as a complex interrelationship between complimentary social-ecological systems. It highlights the complexity of family business and the challenges of the relational nature of familiness and how this presents additional layers of complexity in the decision making process and implementation.
Research limitations/implications
The paper draws on literature that is dominated by western culture and may partially or not at all reflect the issues associated with organisational resilience in family firms with such backgrounds and their culturally bound social-ecological systems.
Originality/value
The paper seeks to fill a knowledge gap by exploring the key elements of organisational resilience in the context of familiness. The work calls for further research into the nature of familiness connections mediating the nature of family relational dynamics. It further provides a framework indicating how these elements can shape and subvert day-to-day management events, raising implications for theory and practice and calls for deeper empirical research to be undertaken.
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Nick Beech, Jeff Gold, Susan Beech and Tricia Auty
This paper aims to explore the impact discourse has on decision making practices within the boardroom and considers how personal proficiency in micro-language use can enhance an…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to explore the impact discourse has on decision making practices within the boardroom and considers how personal proficiency in micro-language use can enhance an individual’s personal efficacy in influencing boardroom decisions. The work uses Habermas’ theory of communicative action to critique board talk, highlighting the need for greater understanding of the power of everyday taken for granted talk in strategy shaping. It illuminates the contribution that human resource development (HRD) professionals can make to the management of such behaviour and minimising dysfunctional behaviour and enabling effective boardroom practices.
Design/methodology/approach
Traditional governance theory from a business and organisational perspectives are provided before considering the boardroom environment and HRD’s role. The authors undertake ethnographic research supported by conversation analysis to explore how directors use talk-based interpersonal routines to influence boardroom processes and enact collective decision making. The authors provide one extract of directors’ talk to illustrate the process and demonstrate what the data “looks like” and the insights it holds.
Findings
The analysis suggests that the established underlying assumptions and rationale ideologies of corporate governance are misplaced and to understand the workings of corporate governance HRD academics and professionals need to gain deeper insight into the employment of talk within boards. Armed with such insights HRD professionals can become more effective in developing strategies to address dysfunctional leadership and promote good governance practice throughout their organisation.
Social implications
The work raises a call for HRD to embrace a societal mediation role to help boards to become a catalyst for setting good practice which is strategically aligned throughout the organisation. Such roles require a more dialogical, strategic and critical approach to HRD, and professionals and academics take a more holistic approach to leadership development.
Originality/value
The paper considers the role of the development of HRD interventions that both help individuals to work more effectively within a boardroom environment and support development to shape a boardroom culture that promotes effective governance practice by influencing boardroom practice thereby promoting strong governance and broad social compliance throughout the organisation.
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Dagmar Daubner-Siva, Sierk Ybema, Claartje J. Vinkenburg and Nic Beech
The purpose of this paper is to provide an inside-out perspective on the practices and effects of talent management (TM) in a multinational organization.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to provide an inside-out perspective on the practices and effects of talent management (TM) in a multinational organization.
Design/methodology/approach
The study adopts an autoethnographic approach focusing on the experiences of the first author during her employment in a multinational organization. This approach contributes to the literature by providing an insider talent perspective that thus far has not been presented in TM research.
Findings
Applying autoethnography as a means to address the inside-out perspective in TM reveals a tension. The authors label this phenomenon the “talent paradox,” defined as the mix of simultaneously occurring opportunities and risks for individuals identified and celebrated as a talent.
Originality/value
The paper may be of value to TM scholars and practitioners, as well as to employees who have been identified as high potentials or talents in their organizations. In contrast with the TM literature’s optimism, the findings illuminate that being identified as a talent may paradoxically produce both empowerment and powerlessness. Attending to personal aspects of TM processes is relevant for organizations as well as for individuals as it enables reflection and sensemaking.
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In this paper, I explore what shapes the identities of digital nomads (DNs), a class of remote workers who travel and work concurrently. Through extensive fieldwork and interviews…
Abstract
In this paper, I explore what shapes the identities of digital nomads (DNs), a class of remote workers who travel and work concurrently. Through extensive fieldwork and interviews with 50 digital nomads conducted in seven coworking hostels in Mexico in 2022, I construct a theory of DN identity. I base this upon the frequent transformations they undergo in their Circumstances, which regularly change their worker identity.
DNs relinquish traditional social determinants of identity, such as nationality and religion. They define their personal identities by their passions and interests, which are influenced by the people they meet. DNs exist in inherently transitive social spaces and, without rigid social roles to fulfil, they represent themselves authentically. They form close relationships with other long-term travellers to combat loneliness and homesickness. Digital nomads define their worker identities around their location independence. This study shows that DNs value their nomadic lifestyle above promotions and financial gain. They define themselves by productivity and professionalism to ensure the sustainability of their lifestyle. Furthermore, digital nomad coworking hubs serve focused, individual work, leaving workplace politics and strict ‘office image’ norms behind. Without fixed social and professional roles to play, digital nomads define themselves personally according to their ever-evolving passions and the sustainability of their nomadic life. Based on these findings, I present a cyclical framework for DN identity evolution which demonstrates how relational, logistical, and socio-personal flux evolves DN’s worker identities.
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Anthony Beech, Nick Freemantle, Caroline Power and Dawn Fisher
– The purpose of this paper is to examine the potential biases in research designs used to assess the efficacy of sex offender treatment.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine the potential biases in research designs used to assess the efficacy of sex offender treatment.
Design/methodology/approach
In all, 50 treatment studies (n=13,886) were examined using a random effects meta-analysis model.
Findings
Results indicated a positive effect of treatment for both sexual (OR=0.58, 95%, CI 0.45-0.74, p < 0.0001), and general recidivism (OR=0.54, 95%, CI 0.42-0.69, p < 0.0001), indicating that the likelihood of being reconvicted after treatment was around half compared to no treatment. RCTs showed no significant effect for sexual or general, recidivism. Significant effects were found for non-RCT designs (i.e. incidental cohort, completers vs non-completers designs). Assignment based on need (i.e. giving treatment to those who were high-risk) indicated a negative effect of treatment.
Practical implications
The results highlight the importance of considering study design when considering treatment efficacy.
Originality/value
The current research reports studies identified up until 2009, and examined both published, and unpublished, research originating from a variety of samples employing a random effects model. Consequently, it can be argued that the results are both original and are reflective not only of identified studies, but are also representative of a random set of observations drawn from the common population distribution (Fleiss, 1993). The results of the study suggest that what is required in future research is methodological rigour, and consistency, in the way in which researchers measure the effectiveness of sexual offender treatment.
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Paul Hibbert, Peter McInnes, Chris Huxham and Nic Beech
The purpose of this paper is to explore the ways in which narratives of collaborations tagged as successful may be constructed around common characterizations of participants, in…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to explore the ways in which narratives of collaborations tagged as successful may be constructed around common characterizations of participants, in order to provide insights to the ways in which stories may be constructed as vehicles for the adoption or adaptation of good or promising practices.
Design/methodology/approach
Qualitative interview data from three collaborative situations are analysed through a narrative‐centred procedure with a particular focus on micro‐stories.
Findings
The paper provides a set of recurring characterizations observed within narratives of successful collaboration and their employment within the stories offered by collaborating partners. It also suggests the relationship that these characterizations might have to the stimulation or retardation of good collaborative practices.
Research limitations/implications
The paper is derived from interviews in the UK context and extrapolation to other contexts seems plausible but should be conducted cautiously and with reflection.
Originality/value
The particular style of narrative analysis conducted in this work has not been employed to the consideration of collaborative accounts and the characterizations derived may have utility as anchoring elements in stories of collaboration, helpful in both the elicitation and interpretation of such accounts.