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1 – 10 of 24Bob Doherty, Jonathan Ensor, Tony Heron and Patricia Prado
In this article, we offer a contribution to the ongoing study of food by advancing a conceptual framework and interdisciplinary research agenda – what we term “food system…
Abstract
In this article, we offer a contribution to the ongoing study of food by advancing a conceptual framework and interdisciplinary research agenda – what we term “food system resilience”. In recent years, the concept of resilience has been extensively used in a variety of fields, but not always consistently or holistically. Here we aim to theorise systematically resilience as an analytical concept as it applies to food systems research. To do this, we engage with and seek to extend current understandings of resilience across different disciplines. Accordingly, we begin by exploring the different ways in which the concept of resilience is understood and used in current academic and practitioner literatures – both as a general concept and as applied specifically to food systems research. We show that the social-ecological perspective, rooted in an appreciation of the complexity of systems, carries significant analytical potential. We first underline what we mean by the food system and relate our understanding of this term to those commonly found in the extant food studies literature. We then apply our conception to the specific case of the UK. Here we distinguish between four subsystems at which our “resilient food systems” can be applied. These are, namely, the agro-food system; the value chain; the retail-consumption nexus; and the governance and regulatory framework. On the basis of this conceptualisation we provide an interdisciplinary research agenda, using the case of the UK to illustrate the sorts of research questions and innovative methodologies that our food systems resilience approach is designed to promote.
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Rita J. Hartman, Mary B. Townsend and Marlo Jackson
The purpose of this paper is to supply an in-depth description of the educators’ values, beliefs and confidence changing from a traditional learning environment to a learning…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to supply an in-depth description of the educators’ values, beliefs and confidence changing from a traditional learning environment to a learning environment integrating technology.
Design/methodology/approach
The descriptive case study design was employed using descriptive statistical analysis and inductive analysis on the data collected.
Findings
Themes on a high level of confidence, the importance of professional development and training, self-motivation, and excitement about the way technology can enhance the learning, along with concerns over the lack of infrastructure and support for integrating technology, and about the ability of students to use the technology tools for higher ordered thinking surfaced.
Research limitations/implications
Additional research may include a more diverse population, including educators at the kindergarten to high school level. Another recommendation would be to repeat the study with a population not as vested in technology.
Practical implications
A pre-assessment of the existing values, beliefs and confidence of educators involved in the change process will provide invaluable information for stakeholders on techniques and strategies vital to a successful transition.
Social implications
To effectively meet the learning styles of Generation Z and those students following, educators need be able to adapt to quickly changing technology, be comfortable with students who multitask and be open to technology-rich teaching and learning environments.
Originality/value
This study filled a gap in the literature where little information on the humanistic challenges educators encounter when integrating technology into their learning environment providing insights into the values, beliefs and level of confidence of educators experiencing change.
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Mohammed Aboramadan and Khalid Abed Dahleez
This study aims to investigate the effects of transformational and transactional leaders’ behaviors on employees’ affective commitment and organizational citizenship behavior in…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to investigate the effects of transformational and transactional leaders’ behaviors on employees’ affective commitment and organizational citizenship behavior in the context of nonprofit organizations (NPOs). Additionally, this study attempts to examine the role of work engagement, as an intervening mechanism as work engagement in NPOs has been empirically neglected (Park et al., 2018).
Design/methodology/approach
Data were conducted from 400 employees working in Italian NPOs in the North of Italy. For verifying the hypotheses of this study, structural equation modeling techniques were implemented.
Findings
It was found that both transformational and transactional leaderships influenced positively affective commitment and organizational citizenship behavior, and work engagement was revealed to have significant positive mediating effects on the relationship between the variables examined in this study.
Practical implications
The results of this study may be beneficial to leaders and supervisors of NPOs, specifically regarding the influence of the leaders’ behaviors on the employees’ outcomes.
Originality/value
Due to the limited number of studies conducted on leadership in nonprofit organizations, this study theoretically and empirically contributes to the leadership literature as it is the first study to investigate the two styles of leadership on work-related outcomes via work engagement in the nonprofit sector.
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Maddy Power, Bob Doherty, Katie J. Pybus and Kate E. Pickett
This article draws upon our perspective as academic-practitioners working in the fields of food insecurity, food systems, and inequality to comment, in the early stages of the…
Abstract
This article draws upon our perspective as academic-practitioners working in the fields of food insecurity, food systems, and inequality to comment, in the early stages of the pandemic and associated lockdown, on the empirical and ethical implications of COVID-19 for socio-economic inequalities in access to food in the UK. The COVID-19 pandemic has sharpened the profound insecurity of large segments of the UK population, an insecurity itself the product of a decade of “austerity” policies. Increased unemployment, reduced hours, and enforced self-isolation for multiple vulnerable groups is likely to lead to an increase in UK food insecurity, exacerbating diet-related health inequalities. The social and economic crisis associated with the pandemic has exposed the fragility of the system of food charity which, at present, is a key response to growing poverty. A vulnerable food system, with just-in-time supply chains, has been challenged by stockpiling. Resultant food supply issues at food banks, alongside rapidly increasing demand and reduced volunteer numbers, has undermined many food charities, especially independent food banks. In the light of this analysis, we make a series of recommendations. We call for an immediate end to the five week wait for Universal Credit and cash grants for low income households. We ask central and local government to recognise that many food aid providers are already at capacity and unable to adopt additional responsibilities. The government's – significant – response to the economic crisis associated with COVID-19 has underscored a key principle: it is the government's responsibility to protect population health, to guarantee household incomes, and to safeguard the economy. Millions of households were in poverty before the pandemic, and millions more will be so unless the government continues to protect household incomes through policy change.
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Terhi Nissinen, Katja Upadyaya, Kirsti Lonka, Hiroyuki Toyama and Katariina Salmela-Aro
The purpose of this study was to explore school principals’ job crafting profiles during the prolonged COVID-19 crisis in 2021, and investigate profile differences regarding…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study was to explore school principals’ job crafting profiles during the prolonged COVID-19 crisis in 2021, and investigate profile differences regarding principals’ own perceived servant leadership, stress and work meaningfulness.
Design/methodology/approach
Using latent profile analysis (LPA), two job crafting profiles were identified: (1) active crafters (55%) and (2) average crafters (45%). By auxiliary measurement-error-weighted-method (BCH), we examined whether and how job crafting profiles differed in terms of servant leadership, stress and work meaningfulness.
Findings
Active crafters reported higher than the overall mean level of approach-oriented job crafting (increasing job resources and demands), whereas average crafters reported an overall mean level of approach-oriented job crafting. Avoidance-oriented job crafting by decreasing hindering job demands did not differentiate the two profiles. Active crafters reported significantly higher servant leadership behavior, stress and work meaningfulness than average crafters.
Originality/value
Study findings provide new knowledge and reflect the implications that the unprecedented pandemic had for education. This study contributes to the existing literature within the scholarship of job crafting through empirical research during the prolonged COVID-19 pandemic. For practitioners, these study findings reflect contextual constraints, organizational processes and culture, and leadership in workplaces.
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Alessandro Lo Presti, Amelia Manuti, Assunta De Rosa and Angelo Elia
The current study makes two main contributions: one theoretical and one methodological. First, it investigated the theoretical prepositions of career sustainability perspective…
Abstract
Purpose
The current study makes two main contributions: one theoretical and one methodological. First, it investigated the theoretical prepositions of career sustainability perspective, which appears particularly suitable for examining project managers' careers' dynamics and patterns, featured by explicit and recursive interactions between individual, temporal and contextual factors. Second, the study aimed to adopt a qualitative approach to this topic as to allow a deeper understanding of individual narratives about careers, highlighting underexplored issues and peculiarities that future research could further examine through quantitative methodologies.
Design/methodology/approach
Project managers' careers are still an under-researched topic, especially through qualitative methods. The study applied career sustainability theory to the realm of project management, moreover, adopting a socio-constructivist perspective. Participants were 50 Italian project managers who were involved through a narrative in-depth interview that focused on career and career success. Their answers were analyzed through thematic analysis of contents and diatextual analysis.
Findings
Results showed that project managers' career could be a prototypical example of sustainable career, basically described in terms of four basic constitutive dimensions as follows: time frame, social space, agency and meaning. Implications for both future theoretical expansion of career sustainability theory and project managers' career management interventions were also discussed.
Originality/value
The originality of the paper could be found in the effort to adopt a socio-constructivist perspective to investigate the topic of career sustainability taking the exemplary case of project managers' career.
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Josine van den Elsen and Brenda Vermeeren
Research findings are ambiguous regarding the effects of age on sustainable labour participation (SLP), defined as the extent to which people are able and willing to conduct their…
Abstract
Purpose
Research findings are ambiguous regarding the effects of age on sustainable labour participation (SLP), defined as the extent to which people are able and willing to conduct their current and future work. The purpose of this paper is to contribute by examining age effects on SLP by focusing on the moderating role of workload.
Design/methodology/approach
A mixed-method study was conducted in 2018. First, a survey was distributed among a sample of 2,149 employees of the Dutch central government. Second, 12 interviews with public sector employees took place to gain greater insight into the quantitative data collected.
Findings
Three components that reflect an employee’s SLP were studied: vitality, work ability and employability. The quantitative results, in general, showed that SLP decreased with ageing. However, in contrast to the hypothesis, the results showed a significant positive relationship between age and energy. Moreover, relationships between an employee’s age and certain aspects of their SLP were moderated by workload. The interviews helped to interpret these results.
Practical implications
The findings demonstrate that some of the older worker stereotypes are unfounded, and the important practical implications of these are discussed.
Originality/value
Earlier research has produced conflicting findings regarding the relationship between age and (aspects of) SLP. By investigating several aspects of SLP in separate regressions within this research, the specific influences of age have become clearer. Furthermore, the research provides fresh insights into the relationship between age and SLP by including moderating effects of workload.
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T. Scott Graham, Michael Z. Sincoff, Bud Baker and J. Cooper Ackermann
Movies have mesmerized audiences for years, crossing boundaries of race, gender, age, culture, and nationality. They have also been used to teach people how to lead. One text that…
Abstract
Movies have mesmerized audiences for years, crossing boundaries of race, gender, age, culture, and nationality. They have also been used to teach people how to lead. One text that zeroes in on the essence of leadership is The Leadership Challenge, by Kouzes and Posner (2002). Through their research, they have highlighted five practices of effective leaders. It is our intent to share how we apply movies to teach the tenets of the groundbreaking leadership research of Kouzes and Posner, with proven ideas that work with students of leadership in any setting.
Using movies to teach leadership is a winning strategy; however, diligent planning is required to incorporate them successfully into leadership education. Movies are entertaining, informative, energizing, and educational, if used skillfully. The more facilitators use film, the more skilled they will become and the more the participants will benefit.
Asif Hussain Samo, Moomal Baig Bughio, Quratulain Nazeer Ahmed, Muzafar Ali Shah and Shafique Ahmed
The literature on leadership is quite extensive; however, this study explains the impact of leadership styles on career success, career competence and career adaptability in the…
Abstract
Purpose
The literature on leadership is quite extensive; however, this study explains the impact of leadership styles on career success, career competence and career adaptability in the health sector. It explains the impact of servant leadership on career competence and career adaptability with a serial mediating impact of psychological safety and proactive behavior as well as self-efficacy and proactive behavior.
Design/methodology/approach
It is a quantitative study, and it tested the suggested model in hospitals in Pakistan. The data were collected from 310 health practitioners from the hospitals, and it was analyzed with partial least square structural equation modeling.
Findings
The findings suggest that psychological safety and proactive behavior serially mediate the impact of servant leaders on career competence and career adaptability; hence, servant leadership tends to increase career competence and career adaptability of individuals. One more serial mediation has been tested with positive results between servant leadership and career competence and career adaptability.
Originality/value
The study takes a very well theoretically linked model which tests the serial mediating path of servant leadership to career competencies and career adaptability.
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