Search results

How far is training in your organisation concerned with developing individual skills or developing the overall performance of people to work together in the organisation more effectively? Traditionally, training has been concerned with developing individual skills. The emphasis has been upon apprentice training where people develop the technical expertise to do particular tasks. Alongside this ran the professional training required for accountants and others so that a company had individuals with specific knowledge to undertake functional roles.

The purpose of this paper is to draw on the literature debating research policy, research and the role of researchers, in discussing a single researcher's (Jan‐Erik Gröjer's) research during the 1980s and 1990s.

Jan‐Erik Gröjer's publications during the period are compared with different research modes 1 and 2, communalism, universalism, disinterestedness, originality and scepticism and PLACE within this polarized world, i.e. between demands from different research ideologies universities as well as individual researchers perform their research.

This paper can be read as both a contribution to the debate about the researcher's role and as a tribute to a friend who was able to investigate and practise different roles: normative and critical, theoretical and applied and provocative and humble, to name a few.

Further case studies of single researchers could serve as a valuable input to the discussion of different research ideologies.

The paper could be used in, e.g., doctoral student education when discussing the researcher's role but also when discussing the role of university research in general.

The used research modes have not before been analyzed using a single researcher as a case. It could be useful for individual researchers as well as in discussions about management of universities.

This paper aims to investigate whether the homes in the Norwegian capital, Oslo, are overpriced. While house prices in many countries dropped after the financial crisis, those in Norway have continued to increase. Over the past 20 years, real house prices in Oslo have increased by around 7 per cent yearly.

The authors use a vector error correction model to estimate the equilibrium between house prices, rents, construction costs and wages to examine whether house prices in Oslo are overpriced.

Long-term relationships between house prices, rents, construction costs and wages are found and used to estimate equilibrium house prices in Oslo. The overpricing in Oslo compared to estimated equilibrium prices is around 35 per cent.

Price–rent, price–construction cost and price–income ratios are often used, by practitioners to say something about over- or underpricing in the housing market. We test and find that house prices, rents and construction costs move toward constant ratios in the long run, while wages are found to be weakly exogenous in the system.

Our estimate of overpricing gives households, investors and policy-makers a better understanding of the risk associated with owning dwellings.

The purpose of this paper is to outline the background as well as methodological and epistemological aspects to, and the effects of, a follow‐up study 30 years later of the work‐sharing couples project, which is a Norwegian, experimental research project in the early 1970s. The aim of the project is to promote gender equality and a better work/life balance in families. In this paper the variation in work‐sharing and post work‐sharing trajectories over the life‐course is explored, mainly focusing on the impact of the work‐sharing arrangement on the couples' relations, their work/life balance and the well‐being of participants, the core objectives of the original project.

The original project has a small scale, interventionist design based on couples working part‐time and sharing childcare and housework; effects on family life and gender equality are documented by questionnaires and time diaries. In the follow‐up study, retrospective life‐course couple interviews with the original participants are used.

Revisiting the original project produced new insights into, the subversive and radical use of sex‐role theory in early Norwegian family sociology as an instrument of changing gender relations. In the follow‐up study, the high level of participation and the long duration of the arrangement would seem to qualify for a heightened level of expectation as to the effects of the experiment on the participants' lives. A high proportion of the couples are still married, and the work‐sharing arrangement has been regarded by the majority of participants to have had a positive impact on their marital relation, work/life balance and well‐being.

Insights gained from revisiting this project may prove fruitful when confronting contemporary dilemmas of work/life balance, as well as demographic and environmental challenges.

The original project is unique internationally owing to its theoretically subversive, interventionist design and reformatory ambition. The longitudinal follow‐up of the experiment is also unique in family research, and of great value for researchers into gender equality and the family.

Interest in developing institutional explanations of political and economic behavior has blossomed among social scientists since the early 1980s. Three intellectual perspectives are now prevalent: rational choice theory, historical institutionalism and a new school of organizational analysis. This paper summarizes, compares and contrasts these views and suggests ways in which cross‐fertilization may be achieved. Particular attention is paid to how the insights of organizational analysis and historical institutionalism can be blended to provide fruitful avenues of research and theorizing, especially with regard to the production, adoption, and mobilization of ideas by decision makers.

Two basic theses of G. H. Meads social psychology are: (1) Using gestures that influence sender and receiver in similar ways contains a reinforcing effect for both. (2) Under specific circumstances they also create new psychic domains, for example, consciousness of meaning, object, and the Self. The elementary levels of these processes are studied in social psychology, infant psychology, and lately in neuroscience.

One arena for studying these processes in adults is dancing, where spontaneity, emotionality, childish physical identification processes, and trajectories of the Self can coexist with cognitive planning and social regulation. I interpret this in a session of “Lunch Beat,” analyzing a layman interview on dancing during lunch break. The arena includes the differences between work obligations and the temporary freedom under lunch. One point is the creativity that may grow in the abrupt meeting of work demands and free physical sociality in dancing.

Interpretations conclude that participants’ experiences are: (1) energy production, (2) experiencing the world outside of “the box,” (3) expanding by denying “musts” for an hour, (4) meeting new people in both Others and Self, (5) creativity in changing arena from work to free time, and (6) meeting the not expected.

All interpretations are drawn back to basic theses in Mead.

City branding has gained popularity as governance strategy. However, the academic underpinning is still poor, and city branding needs a more critical conceptualization, as well as more complex management systems. This paper challenges the use of a “one size fits all” city brand, which is still common practice in many places. The paper proposes that city branding involves much more complexity than is commonly thought and outlines a strategy that enables urban policy-makers, marketing researchers and (place) marketers alike to better deal with city branding.

The authors integrate insights from literature on place branding, brand architecture and customer-focused marketing.

The article argues that place brands (in general and communicated place brands in particular) are by definition very complex, due to their different target groups, diverse place offerings and various associations place customers could have. Thus, an advanced brand management including target group-specific sub-brands is needed.

The model will be helpful for place brand managers dealing with a diverse target audience, and is likely to improve the target group-specific communication.

The paper provides an insight into the complexity of city brands and acknowledges that the perception of city brands can differ considerably among different target groups. Additionally, it offers a more comprehensive definition of place brands. This will be helpful for city brand managers and researchers alike in dealing with city brand complexity.

Attempts to consider how a founder has reduced equivocality in relation to support networks and reducing risks, especially in an international environment. Presents the case studies of five Danish and Australian born global companies. Considers different global models and their limitations. Presents the findings of recent surveys in this area. Concludes that internationalization has not been the primary objective in the founding process and gives direction for further research.