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Given the fact that the Islamic economic paradigm differs from the secular capitalist paradigm in terms of its emphasis on morality and spirituality, the author thinks that the current Human Development Index (HDI) does not capture human development from an Islamic perspective. The purpose of this paper is twofold: first, to provide a paradigmatic, theoretical, and conceptual model for the suggested Islamic HDI (iHDI) and second, to present several proxy variables for multi-dimensional iHDI and test the proposed index through empirical data for ten Muslim countries.

The author developed eight-dimensional composite iHDIs based on the understanding of human nature from the Tawhidi anthropology. These dimensions included physical, reasoning, spiritual, ethical, animal, social, deciding, and oppressive selves. The author measured them using nine different indices, three of which came from the conventional HDI (cHDI). The author then compared the rankings of those Muslim countries in iHDI to those in cHDI.

The iHDI rankings for all Muslim countries except two differed from those in cHDI. The difference was more substantial for countries with higher economic development. Thus, improved cHDI rankings for Muslim countries based on their economic development do not necessarily mean that they move toward ideal human development. This finding confirms the need for an alternative human development indexing approach from an Islamic perspective.

The paper is likely to initiate movement to develop an alternative HDI from Islamic perspective.

The paper findings have important policy implications for Muslim countries.

It is the first empirical paper showing how to develop an alternative HDI from an Islamic perspective.

We argue that in order to address the contemporary challenges that organizations and societies are facing, the field of organization development (OD) requires frameworks and skills to focus on the eco-system as the level of analysis. In a world that has become economically, socially, and technologically highly connected, approaches that foster the optimization of specific actors in the eco-system, such as individual corporations, result in sub-optimization of the sustainability of the natural and social system because there is insufficient offset to the ego-centric purposes of the focal organization. We discuss the need for OD to broaden focus to deal with technological advances that enable new ways of organizing at the eco-system level, and to deal with the challenges to sustainable development. Case examples from healthcare and the agri-foods industry illustrate the kinds of development approaches that are required for the development of healthy eco-systems. We do not suggest fundamental changes in the identity of the field of organizational development. In fact, we demonstrate the need to dig deeply into the open systems and socio-technical roots of the field, and to translate the traditional values and approaches of OD to continue to be relevant in today’s dynamic interdependent world.

This paper seeks to critically review developments in the literature spanning personnel management, HRM, learning organization and intellectual capital approaches to employee utilization and development. The purpose being to identify the benefits, limitations and lessons for the management of people in the co‐operative and mutual sectors.

The problem of inadequate Personnel or HRM systems in the majority of co‐operatives has been established by the author over a period of seven years, field work with co‐operative organizations including the international co‐operative alliance (ICA), asian confederation of credit unions (ACCU), and the British society for co‐operative studies. Direct interviews and a sample of HRM and Membership Relations audit forms developed as part of the ongoing field research and special project work have been applied to various co‐operative contexts in all the regions of the ICA.

The findings are that co‐operatives generally are lagging behind the private sector in their application of all four approaches. Mostly smaller co‐operatives lack effective basic personnel systems and few of the larger co‐operatives go beyond HRM. This failure to develop clear programs for the utilization and development of their people is a missed opportunity.

The membership base and its roots in a community of shared interests means that, whilst co‐operatives have lessons to learn from all four approaches, they can and must go beyond them if they are to optimize their people‐centered business advantage in the marketplace.

The paper suggests a new strategy for co‐operatives of Co‐operative Social Capital Management to help them compete, whilst retaining their co‐operative difference.

Drawing upon Alfred Sohn-Rethel's work, we argue that, just as capitalism produces abstract labor, it coproduces both abstract mind and abstract life. Abstract mind is the split between mind and nature and between subject/observer and observed object that characterizes scientific epistemology. Abstract mind reflects an abstracted objectified world of nature as a means to be exploited. Biological life is rendered as abstract life by capitalist exploitation and by the reification and technologization of organisms by contemporary technoscience. What Alberto Toscano has called “the culture of abstraction” imposes market rationality onto nature and the living world, disrupting biotic communities and transforming organisms into what Finn Bowring calls “functional bio-machines.”

The purpose of this research is to describe a model of nurses' work motivation relevant to the human caring stance of professional nursing work.

The model was derived from selected theories of behavioral motivation and work motivation. Evidence‐based theory addressing nurses' work motivation and nurses' motivational states and traits in relation to characteristics of organizational culture and patient health outcomes is suggested in an effort to make a distinct contribution to health services research. An integrated review of selected theories of motivation is presented, including conceptual analyses, theory‐building techniques, and the evidence supporting the theoretical propositions and linkages among variables intrinsic to nurses' work motivation.

The model of the Motivation to Care for Professional Nursing Work is a framework intended for empirical testing and theory building. The model proposes specific leadership and management strategies to support a culture of motivational caring and competence in health care organizations.

Attention to motivation theory and research provides insights and suggests relationships among nurses' motivation to care, motivational states and traits, individual differences that influence nurses' work motivation, and the special effects of nurses' work motivation on patient care outcomes. Suggestions for nursing administrative direction and research are proposed.

This exploratory study aims at identifying the main characteristics of strategic performance measurement systems (SPMS) that influence SPMS outcomes, which, in turn, impact firm performance. Using data from 1,990 companies in a wide range of industries, we employed path analysis and stepwise regression to test the model. We found empirical support for the model, in that SPMS have a significant effect on human resource practices and business results. The degree of BSC adoption, the impact of SPMS on human resources, the purposes for which the SPMS were designed, and the use of nonfinancial performance measures were found to have the most effect on the impact of the SPMS on business results.

Human capital has been traditionally viewed in terms of how an individual’s investment in knowledge, skills and abilities can lead to higher pay or promotions. More recently, human capital has been regarded as a unit-level resource using the term “human capital resources” to consider the aggregate effects of human capital. The purpose of this paper is to examine the collective human capital present in a firm’s board of directors as a valuable resource leading to superior firm outcomes.

The study examined the effects on firm innovation of the scientific expertise of corporate directors, average board tenure and the presence of a firm’s founder on the board. Data from a sample of pharmaceutical firms were analyzed with the dependent variable, innovation, measured as patent applications and both individual and unit-level human capital measures of the predictor variables.

The results show that the presence of a founder-director is positively related to innovation and more pronounced when combined with the board’s scientific expertise. Board tenure shows a relationship to innovation and is more evident in combination with the board’s aggregate level of scientific expertise. The effect of directors’ scientific expertise is also greater when measured at the board level of scientific expertise.

Future studies should examine these relationships within a broader context extending the research to other industries thereby incorporating wider variation in both the antecedents and measures of innovation. In addition, future studies might investigate a likely non-monotonic relationship of board tenure with strategic outcomes, recognizing the non-linear nature of effects of board tenure.

In addition to the theoretical and empirical implications, this research may also inform practicing managers charged with constituting their boards of directors and provide some guidance for the recruitment and retention of board members. The research may also assist top managers and investors in knowing when the presence of a founder on the board is useful and supportive of the firm’s strategic direction.

The study extends scholarly understanding of human capital theory beyond the top management team to boards of directors demonstrating the importance not only of directors’ individual capital but also how it combines with that of other directors. Moreover, it enhances understanding of board characteristics beyond the bounds of demographic characteristics to show that additional qualities affect firm strategy. This research also informs managers, boards and investors how boards might be more effectively constituted to impact firm strategy.

This article discusses the foresight of philosopher/mathematician Norbert Wiener who, in the 1940s, founded Information Ethics as a research discipline. Wiener envisioned the coming of an “automatic age” in which information technology would have profound social and ethical impacts upon the world. He predicted, for example, machines that will learn, reason and play games; “automatic factories” that will replace assembly‐line workers and middle managers with computerized devices; workers who will perform their jobs over great distances with the aid of new communication technologies; and people who will gain remarkable powers by adding computerized “prostheses” to their bodies. To analyze the ethical implications of such developments, Wiener presented some principles of justice and employed a powerful practical method of ethical analysis.

Here Marx's philosophy is dissected from the angle of bourgeois capitalism which he, Marx, sought to overcome. His social, political and economic ideas are criticised. Although it is noted that Marx wanted to ameliorate human suffering, the result turned out to be Utopian, contrary to his own intentions. Contrary to Marx, it is individualism that makes the best sense and capitalism that holds out the best hope for coping with most of the problems he sought to solve. Marx's philosophy is alluring but flawed at a very basic level, namely, where it denies the individuality of each person and treats humanity as “an organic body”. Capitalism, while by no means out to guarantee a perfect society, is the best setting for the realisation of the diverse but often equally noble human goals of its membership.