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This paper examines the US opera sector as a means for interrogating how varying forms of non-standard work shape gender inequality in the creative industries.

The authors draw on 16 seasons of opera production data from Operabase.com to conduct a gender-based exploratory data analysis of the key creative roles of conductor, director and designers, as well as the hiring networks through which teams are formed, at the 11 largest opera companies in the United States.

The authors find that women, as a group, experienced gender-based disadvantage across the key creative roles of opera production, but particularly in the artistic leadership roles of conductor and director. The authors also find that women's exclusion in the field is being further perpetuated by the sector's non-standard and overlapping employment structures, which impacts women practitioners' professional visibility and career opportunities.

The study can help organizations implement strategic hiring practices that acknowledge the relationship between gender inequality and varying forms of non-standard work with the aim of increasing women's representation.

This study work establishes the scale of gender inequality operating within a sector that has received minimal scholarly attention as a site of employment. The study analysis also offers important insight for the wider creative industries and highlights opportunities to redress gender inequality in other sectors where project-based work is prevalent.

The COVID-19 crisis has affected almost all the global sectors. The hotel industry, however, was hit hardest challenging the leadership. This study, therefore, attempts to explore the challenges hospitality leadership in India face to navigate the crisis. The study additionally addresses how leaders manage the expectations of key stakeholders; communicate hard decisions with employees, pursue strategies for revival and explores the role of technology to survive the crisis.

The study adopts a qualitative approach involving structured interviews with 16 senior hospitality leaders consisting of CEO, vice president, general managers, directors, entrepreneur and general managers from various organisations like hotels, restaurant chains, food services and facilities management services. Data were content analysed involving coding techniques.

The leadership challenges included making customers and employees feel safe, optimising operations, agility and resilience of leaders, maintaining a balance between stakeholders, managing employee stress and ensuring cash reserves. The study found that leaders manage the expectation of various stakeholders by maintaining balance, demonstrating empathy and agility. The hard decisions are communicated with the employees through involvement, empathy and alleviating stress.

The study contributes by identifying twelve themes from the participants' responses under five major themes-labelled as leadership challenges, managing stakeholders, communicating with the employees, the role of technology and best practices of surviving the crisis. Future research can be conducted on such sub-themes in different countries.

As the tourism industry in India is recovering after the second wave, the governments along with all stakeholders, must launch special events for promoting the tourism sector. Safety measures like making vaccination certificates for all tourists and employees of the tourism sector should be made mandatory. Further, special certification following the COVID-19 protocol needs to be introduced for hotels and catering establishments. A fund generated from the sector's direct tax contribution needs to be established to support the employees.

The study has several social implications. The study results can unite all industry stakeholders to shape the post-pandemic era through collaboration. Empathetic leadership can take the industry out of chaos by balancing the interests of the various stakeholders of society. The pandemic has proven that we all are vulnerable to risks and challenges; leaders have a vital role in taking proactive steps to ensure that such uncertainties do not cause unprecedented damage.

This study expanded the research on the hospitality leadership challenges in managing crises in the backdrop of the crisis caused by COVID-19 pandemic. The conceptual model, variables, themes and sub-themes utilised are original contributions to the hospitality literature.

Ah la famille …! We tend to say that we do not choose it. But there are beautiful family stories, even in business, and particularly in France. Indeed, when it comes to business, the French take family as a serious matter – with about 80% of all companies in the country family controlled. Whether big or small, French family businesses are particularly noticeable in sectors such as food and beverages, as well as luxury.

The chapter gives a general overview of family firms in France, considering in particular their main legal structures, how diverse they are in reality, and finally their governance rules, and notably their family constitutions. It concludes that business and family stories often prove to be a good match, at least in France.

This study aims to present the results of a comparative study on the most key reasons for the failure of sustaining activities of operational improvement (OI) methodologies from the different types of manufacturing enterprises that located in Vietnam.

This study presents survey results from 30 local manufacturing enterprises and 21 foreign direct investment (FDI) enterprises located in Vietnam – a developing country. The authors utilize a combination method to collect data, including online and direct survey. The targeted interviewees selected to answer the questionnaire are manufacturing managers and top managers working in productivity, quality, engineering and other departments in respective firms. The developed questionnaire is verified by five experts to ensure the validity and soundness.

The study uncover that 21 local enterprises (70%) have not issued standard forms for OI deployment and supervision, while 17 foreign enterprises (81%) have adopted a systematic management and clearly indicators for evaluation of OI outputs. In addition, the top three reasons for OI failure are differences between local and foreign enterprises. In term of OI methodologies, most of participated enterprises implemented Lean tools and principles while only 7.8% of the participated enterprises applied Six Sigma. Three vital findings are uncovered, including, first, 30% of local enterprises standardize and supervise forms of OI.

There is a limitation in sample size, with the number of participants of 51 enterprises. Among the participants, 27% of local enterprises are small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) while 60% of FDI enterprises from large-sized group. This was limited to making a generated conclusion in the comparison of failure factors between two types of enterprises. This partly affects the radical comparison of failure factors between local and FDI enterprises.

To the best of the authors' view, this is the first empirical study that compares the reasons for the failure for sustaining OI between local and foreign enterprises in a developing country. The result from this study will make contributions for further research in considering OI failure factors and then enhance effectiveness of OI methodologies in manufacturing companies.

This paper aims to propose a conceptual framework showing factors favoring the adoption of information systems (IS)-based service innovations in the public sector at the organizational level.

The research design is based on the development of a theoretical framework from the technology–organization–environment framework and from a case study of an outsourced IS-based electronic document management system from six different ministries in the same state in Mexico.

Strong contrasts in the degree of adoption of the service innovation appeared among various ministries involved in state government, revealing differences in the presence or absence of key variables, integrated into theoretical framework, including perception of external pressure; perception of benefits and risks and organizational readiness; and political, sociotechnical and economical inertia in given institutional conditions, leading to different public value outcomes associated with intraorganizational efficiencies and to the relationship between public administration and politicians.

Public managers must consider process mapping and sources of political, sociotechnical and economical inertia in given institutional conditions, to ensure a satisfactory adoption of service innovations in public administration and create public value. The promotion of a more structured and enduring professional career system in such context is another key to the adoption of innovations.

Based on theoretical and empirical grounds, the main contribution of this paper is to emphasize, through an integrated theoretical framework, the relatively unexplored roles of process mapping in organizational readiness and of political, sociotechnical and economic sources of inertia in relation to specific agents in the adoption of public sector service innovations at the organizational level in the context of the public administration in Mexico to produce public value.

This paper aims to discuss the interplay between strategic management accounting (SMA) and three organizational change configurations: strategy, structure and restructuring. This explication occurs within a context that is characterized by organization restructuring and corporate strategy changes within Jordan Customs Organization (JCO).

This paper uses a qualitative research approach and presents an interpretive case study of the JCO public sector organization. To collect data, it uses methodological triangulation, which includes interviews, historical and statistical analyses, documents and archival records. It is informed by the theoretical lens of configurational theory and strategic typologies to interpret the influences of organizational change configurations on SMA as it relates to the interplay of strategy, structure and restructuring.

The study findings agree with the related literature that SMA practices have developed management accounting from important operational transactions to gain a more strategic orientation through integrating customers, human resources, processes and financial departments. This paper concludes that specific SMA techniques have been used for strategizing by organizations in the public sector, providing a valuable counterpoint to the private sector adaptation that has dominated SMA research. This study finds that organizational restructuring has also contributed to decentralization and delegation, which has led to the distribution of tasks and specialization in accounting departments. It also concludes that SMA may facilitate or delay organizational change configurations in JCO. SMA can play a significant role in ensuring that the institution learns in response to organizational changes. On the contrary, this paper also concludes that organizational practices led to changes in SMA rules and routines.

A general criticism of case-study methods is that they lack rigor and provide little basis for generalization. First, case studies tend to be specific and individual, posing significant issues regarding generalization. Therefore, several comparative case studies involving various organizations should be conducted to ascertain if these practices have become more commonplace, especially in the public sector. Second, considering the nature of a government entity and the sensitivity of the information that required confidentiality, certain strategizing imperatives could not be directly examined, such as meetings between top management to make important decisions of strategic significance. This paper has important implications because it highlights the shortcomings of a supercilious singular relationship between strategic choices and the design of SMA practices.

This paper contributes to the growing literature by focusing on the relationship between SMA and three organizational change configurations: strategy, structure and restructuring. This paper is informed by the configuration theory perspective commonly used in accounting research. The empirical evidence in this study is provided in an SMA field, where empirical research is needed to be comparable with traditional accounting practices.

The study aims to explain the process of management accounting practices and organizational change aspects in the public sector’s response to environmental pressures. Specifically, it discusses the interaction process between management accounting practices from one side and culture, leadership and decentralization from the other side.

This study adopts qualitative research approach and an interpretive case study. The study uses the triangulation method of data collection, including interviews, annual reports, documents and archival records. A theoretical lens informs it of the contextual/processual approach for interpreting interaction processes between management accounting and organizational change aspects, including culture, leadership and decentralization.

The findings confirm that a change in organizational culture has an important impact on accounting change, which has played a central role in the desire to initiate and accept such changes by the organizational members. Similarly, the new leadership style created a unique culture that was considered a solid platform to introduce new accounting systems by enhancing the trust between IT staff and management accountants and their trust in themselves to accept the change. The paper concludes that the relationships between the change aspects at the organizational level, and accounting practices at the inherent organizational and accounting levels are both recursive and two way, with the two concepts inextricably interwoven.

The study has some limitations as the data is limited to only a single country – more explanation for Jordanian Customs Organization quantitative understandings of governance improvement. The study has important implications for practitioners and customs officials by showing that different government regulations and customs reforms have varied influences on the public sector. These reforms have included most modifications to the accounting and organizational configurations. This study contributes to institutional theory development and refinement by exploring the interface between external influences and internal origins in the accounting change process.

This study uses a categorical association between organizational changes and accounting in the public sector as most prior studies have been conducted on the private sector due to competitive and technical pressures. It also contributes to organizational change and accounting literature by discussing the relationship between accounting from one side and culture and leadership from another side.

The purpose of this paper is to help better understand the translation process of the management control system (MCS) of privatised solid waste management (SWM) towards creating a stable network.

Drawing on the actor network theory (ANT), the case of a privatised SWM was studied. Data were collected from all entities involved in the privatisation process of SWM, which include Department A, Corporation X and the private sector concessionaire. Six documents were reviewed, 20 interviews were conducted and two observations were carried out.

The findings reveal that the control mechanism of SWM is complex, involving the interaction between human and non-human actors. Non-human actors include the key performance indicators (KPIs) and the concessionaire agreement (CA), which are the main control mechanisms towards creating a stable SWM network. Essentially, stability is achieved when the KPIs and CA can influence the activities of both intra- and inter-organisational relationships.

This paper provides a better understanding of the translation process of the MCS that adds to the stability of the network of a privatised SWM from the lens of the ANT.

Healthcare tribalism refers to the phenomenon through which different groups in a healthcare setting strictly adhere to their profession-based silo, within which they exhibit stereotypical behaviours. In turn, this can lead to deleterious downstream effects upon productivity and care delivered to patients. This study highlights a clinician-led governance model, implemented at a National Health Service (NHS) trust, to investigate whether it successfully overcame tribalism and helped drive innovation.

This was a convergent mixed-methods study including qualitative and quantitative data collected in parallel. Qualitative data included 27 semi-structured interviews with representatives from four professional groups. Quantitative data were collected through a verbally administered survey and scored on a 10-point scale.

The trust arranged its services under five autonomous business units, with a clinician and a manager sharing the leadership role at each unit. According to interviewees replies, this equivalent authority was cascaded down and enabled breaking down professional siloes, which in turn aided in the adoption of an innovative clinical model restructure.

This study contributes to the literature by characterizing a real-world example in which healthcare tribalism was mitigated while reflecting on the advantages yielded as a result.

Previous studies from all over the world identified major differences in the perspectives of different healthcare professional groups. In the United Kingdom, clinicians largely felt cut off from decision-making and dissatisfied with their managerial role. The study findings explain a governance model that allowed harmony and inclusion of different professions. Given the long-standing strains on healthcare systems worldwide, stakeholders can leverage the study findings for guidance in developing and implementing innovative managerial approaches.

Existing conceptual, empirical and case studies evidence suggests that manufacturing industries find the joint implementation of Kaizen philosophy initiatives. However, the existing practices rarely demonstrated in a single framework and implementation procedure in a structure nature. This paper, therefore, aims to develop, validate and practically test a framework and implementation procedure for the implementation of integrated Kaizen in manufacturing industries to attain long-term improvement of operational, innovation, business (financial and marketing) processes, performance and competitiveness.

The study primarily described the problem, extensively reviewed the current state-of-the-art literature and then identified a gap. Based on it, generic and comprehensive integrated framework and implementation procedure is developed. Besides, the study used managers, consultants and academics from various fields to validate a framework and implementation procedure for addressing business concerns. In this case, the primary data was collected through self-administered questionnaire, and 244 valid questionnaires were received and were analyzed. Furthermore, the research verified the practicability of the framework by empirically exploring the current scenario of selected manufacturing companies.

The research discovered innovative framework and six-phase implementation procedure to fill the existing conceptual gap. Furthermore, the survey-based and exploratory empirical analysis of the research demonstrated that the practice of the proposed framework based on structured procedure is valued and companies attain the middling improvements of productivity, delivery time, quality, 5S practice, waste and accident rate by 61.03, 44, 52.53, 95.19, 80.12, and 70.55% respectively. Additionally, the companies saved a total of 14933446 ETH Birr and 5,658 M² free spaces. Even though, the practices and improvements vary from company to company, and even companies unable to practice some of the unique techniques of the identified CI initiatives considered in the proposed framework.

All data collected in the survey came from professionals working for Ethiopian manufacturing companies, universities and government. It is important to highlight that n = 244 is high sample size, which is adequate for a preliminary survey but reinforcing still needs further survey in terms of generalization of the results since there are hundreds of manufacturing companies, consultants and academicians implementing and consulting Kaizen. Therefore, a further study on a wider Ethiopian manufacturing companies, consultants and academic scale would be informative.

This work is very important for Kaizen professionals in the manufacturing industry, academic and government but in particular for senior management and leadership teams. Aside from the main findings on framework development, there is some strong evidence that practice of Kaizen resulted in achieving quantitative (monetary and non-monetary) and qualitative results. Thus, senior management teams should use this research out to practice and analyze the effect of Kaizen on their own organizations. Within the academic community, this study is one of the first focusing on development, validating and practically testing and should aid further study, research and understanding of Kaizen in manufacturing industries.

So far, it is rare to find preceding studies proposed, validated and practically test an integrated Kaizen framework with the context of manufacturing industries. Thus, authors understand that this is the very first research focused on the development of the framework for manufacturing industries continuously to be competitive and could help managers, institutions, practitioners and academicians in Kaizen practice.