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This chapter explains the research design. An interpretive methodology was considered most suitable for the study. Informed by an institutional framework, the interpretive methodology was selected for this monograph for its strengths of focusing on the research context, interactive processes, and meanings that are not measurable by quantitative approach. The interpretive methodology is also consistent with the ontological and epistemological positions of the researchers. Data were collected from interviewing four groups of key persons and a document survey. The data triangulation and multiple perspectives helped increase the reliability and validity of the study. Also, conducting data collection in a natural setting produced a rich data source. This enabled the provision of an enhanced understanding of the operation and effectiveness of corporate governance and financial reporting practice in a real setting. In addition, the systematic set of data analysis procedures helped improve research rigor and develop conceptual and theoretical understanding of issues of interest.

The author argues that the familiar distinction between interpretive and non-interpretive theories of constitutional interpretation obscures another important distinction: that between hermeneutically open and hermeneutically closed theories. Closed theories seek resolution to constitutional conflict by employing methods of interpretation that are intuitively persuasive. Open theories deny that such methods are always available, and seek resolution of conflict through a combination of legal, political, and social means. The author argues that closed theories have failed to live up to their implicit promise of self-justification, and examines the practice of constitutional interpretation in Canada and Australia to support this view.

This chapter derives from the movieDr. Strangelovecues for exploring questions about the quest for methodological insularity and purity in socio-legal research. Steven Lukes’ classic three-dimensional model of power provides an intellectual focus for the core exploration of relations between epistemology and data generation, the two key elements that we usually identify with methodology. The discussion culminates in an affirmative argument for the value of approaching methodology as jazz, the creative popular music that grounds reliable, humane sense in Kubrick's movie and provides an apt analogy for much of the leading scholarship in the LSA tradition.

This paper seeks to develop a mid-range theory of how change recipient sensemaking processes affect the realization of strategic flexibility during simultaneous change in professional service firms.

The research presented is based on an exploratory embedded case study adopting a qualitative interpretive methodology, conducted at a professional service organization. A sensemaking lens was adopted in order to study organizational change processes. Data was collected through semi-structured open-ended in-depth interviews, and analyzed using first and second order analysis, inspired by the methodology used by Corley and Gioia (2004).

We identified four determinants of change recipient sensemaking: professional identification, dominant organizational discourse, equivocality of expectations, and cross-understanding between thought worlds. Case findings indicate that cognitive and affective dimensions of change recipient sensemaking are strongly interwoven in their effect on realizing strategic flexibility.

We contribute to the competence-based strategic management literature by introducing the concept of change recipient sensemaking in understanding the realization of strategic flexibility; by identifying four major determinants in a context of simultaneous change in a professional service organization; and by highlighting the interwoven and mutually reinforcing cognitive and affective dimensions of professional’s process of constructing meaning.

Purpose: Nowadays, many terms like computer vision, deep learning, and machine learning have all been made possible by recent artificial intelligence (AI) advances. As new types of employment have risen significantly, there has been significant growth in adopting AI technology in enterprises. Despite the anticipated benefits of AI adoption, many businesses are still struggling to make progress. This research article focuses on the influence of elements affecting the acceptance procedure of AI in organisations.

Design/Methodology/Approach: To achieve this objective, propose a hierarchical paradigm for the same by developing an Interpretive Structural Modelling (ISM). This paper reveals the barriers obstructing AI adoption in organisations and reflects the contextual association and interaction amongst those barriers by emerging a categorised model using the ISM approach. In the next step, cross-impact matrix multiplication is applied for classification analysis to find dependent, independent and linkages.

Findings: As India is now focusing on the implementation of AI adoption, therefore, it is essential to identify these barriers to AI to conceptualise it systematically. These findings can play a significant role in identifying essential points that affect AI adoption in organisations. Results show that low regulations are the most critical factor and functional as the root cause and further lack of IT infrastructure is the barrier. These two factors require the most attention by the government of India to improve AI adoption.

Implications: This study may be utilised by organisations, academic institutions, Universities, and research scholars to fill the academic gap and faster implementation of AI.

Information and communications technology (ICT) offers enormous opportunities for individuals, businesses and society. The application of ICT is equally important to economic and non-economic activities. Researchers have increasingly focused on the adoption and use of ICT by small and medium enterprises (SMEs) as the economic development of a country is largely dependent on them. Following the success of ICT utilisation in SMEs in developed countries, many developing countries are looking to utilise the potential of the technology to develop SMEs. Past studies have shown that the contribution of ICT to the performance of SMEs is not clear and certain. Thus, it is crucial to determine the effectiveness of ICT in generating firm performance since this has implications for SMEs’ expenditure on the technology. This research examines the diffusion of ICT among SMEs with respect to the typical stages from innovation adoption to post-adoption, by analysing the actual usage of ICT and value creation. The mediating effects of integration and utilisation on SME performance are also studied. Grounded in the innovation diffusion literature, institutional theory and resource-based theory, this study has developed a comprehensive integrated research model focused on the research objectives. Following a positivist research paradigm, this study employs a mixed-method research approach. A preliminary conceptual framework is developed through an extensive literature review and is refined by results from an in-depth field study. During the field study, a total of 11 SME owners or decision-makers were interviewed. The recorded interviews were transcribed and analysed using NVivo 10 to refine the model to develop the research hypotheses. The final research model is composed of 30 first-order and five higher-order constructs which involve both reflective and formative measures. Partial least squares-based structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) is employed to test the theoretical model with a cross-sectional data set of 282 SMEs in Bangladesh. Survey data were collected using a structured questionnaire issued to SMEs selected by applying a stratified random sampling technique. The structural equation modelling utilises a two-step procedure of data analysis. Prior to estimating the structural model, the measurement model is examined for construct validity of the study variables (i.e. convergent and discriminant validity).

The estimates show cognitive evaluation as an important antecedent for expectation which is shaped primarily by the entrepreneurs’ beliefs (perception) and also influenced by the owners’ innovativeness and culture. Culture further influences expectation. The study finds that facilitating condition, environmental pressure and country readiness are important antecedents of expectation and ICT use. The results also reveal that integration and the degree of ICT utilisation significantly affect SMEs’ performance. Surprisingly, the findings do not reveal any significant impact of ICT usage on performance which apparently suggests the possibility of the ICT productivity paradox. However, the analysis finally proves the non-existence of the paradox by demonstrating the mediating role of ICT integration and degree of utilisation explain the influence of information technology (IT) usage on firm performance which is consistent with the resource-based theory. The results suggest that the use of ICT can enhance SMEs’ performance if the technology is integrated and properly utilised. SME owners or managers, interested stakeholders and policy makers may follow the study’s outcomes and focus on ICT integration and degree of utilisation with a view to attaining superior organisational performance.

This study urges concerned business enterprises and government to look at the environmental and cultural factors with a view to achieving ICT usage success in terms of enhanced firm performance. In particular, improving organisational practices and procedures by eliminating the traditional power distance inside organisations and implementing necessary rules and regulations are important actions for managing environmental and cultural uncertainties. The application of a Bengali user interface may help to ensure the productivity of ICT use by SMEs in Bangladesh. Establishing a favourable national technology infrastructure and legal environment may contribute positively to improving the overall situation. This study also suggests some changes and modifications in the country’s existing policies and strategies. The government and policy makers should undertake mass promotional programs to disseminate information about the various uses of computers and their contribution in developing better organisational performance. Organising specialised training programs for SME capacity building may succeed in attaining the motivation for SMEs to use ICT. Ensuring easy access to the technology by providing loans, grants and subsidies is important. Various stakeholders, partners and related organisations should come forward to support government policies and priorities in order to ensure the productive use of ICT among SMEs which finally will help to foster Bangladesh’s economic development.

This chapter explores how Cypriot lecturers perceive and experience fear while being at work. Drawing on the lens of interpretive inquiry, data were collected through interviews with 19 lecturers. Analysis focused on experiences of workplace fear offering rich insights into characteristics of fear, eliciting events, and coping ways. Findings help to unveil the specific events that lead to fear in the Cypriot universities, and the ways lecturers manage their fearful experiences. The study contributes to the study of discrete emotions, by empirically examining fear’s own storyline through the workers’ own perspectives, within a specific context.

The purpose of this paper is to advance knowledge and obtain an understanding of the phenomenon of public sector external auditing (PSEA) in Tanzania.

The paper used a grounded theory method informed by a critical approach. It used data from multiple sources including interviews, observations and documents, to provide a theoretical and practical understanding of PSEA in Tanzania. The theoretical aspects were developed ‘in vivo’ and were also informed by the Habermasian concept of colonisation.

The principal research findings from the data concern the central phenomenon of managing colonising tendencies in PSEA which appeared to be the core strategy for both the government and external auditors. While the government appeared to manage the National Audit Office of Tanzania (NAOT) appearance and exploited the legitimising features of PSEA, external auditors manoeuvred within colonising tendencies and attempted to maintain the ‘audit supremacy’ image. PSEA in Tanzania encountered colonising tendencies because of weak working relationship between the NAOT and other accountability agencies, inconsistencies in governance and politics, the culture of corruption and secrecy, dependence on foreign financing and mimicking of foreign models. To coexist within this colonising environment, external auditors managed their relationship with auditees and the complexities of PSEA roles. Managing colonising tendencies resulted into obscured subordination of PSEA, contributing to cosmetic accountability and growing public interest in PSEA.

It is hoped that future research in other countries, in and beyond Africa, will be undertaken to broaden and deepen our understanding of the external auditing of public sector entities.

The paper combines grounded theory with a critical approach to understand PSEA in a developing country.

The purpose of this paper is to forward an extension of reception analysis as a way to incorporate and give insight to social media mediations and big data in a qualitative marketing perspective. We propose a research method that focuses on discursive developments in consumer debates for example on YouTube – a large-scale open-access social media platform – as opposed to the closed and tightknit communities investigated by netnography.

Online reception analysis

Using a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods, we find that big data can enrich online reception analyses by showing new aspects of weak tie online networks and consumers meaning making.

The potential of online reception analysis is to encompass a discursive perspective on consumer interactions on large-scale open-access social media and to be able to analyze socialities that do not represent shared cultures but are more representative of transitory everyday interactions.

Our method contributes to the current focus to define levels of analysis beyond research centered on individuals and individual interactions within groups to investigate other larger socialities. Further, our method also contributes by incorporating and investigating the mediatization of interaction that social media contributes with and therefore our methods actively work with the possibilities of social media. Hence, by extending the advances made by netnography into online spaces, online reception analysis can potentially inform the current status of big data research with a sociocultural methodological perspective.

The contributions of qualitative research to the study of behavioral–emotional disabilities, mild intellectual disabilities, and learning disabilities (the three types of high-incidence disabilities) are relatively recent and far from abundant. This chapter discusses qualitative, or “naturalistic” research by briefly examining the methodology used in such inquiry, reviewing many of the available studies concerning those with high-incidence disabilities, and providing implications from the existing empirical literature. It is not recommended that qualitative research takes the place of quantitative research in special education, but well-designed and executed naturalistic studies can contribute additional knowledge that is worthwhile to the field.