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1 – 10 of 41Farveh Farivar, Jane Coffey and Roslyn Cameron
The purpose of this paper is to investigate which sociocultural and work conditions have the potential to change international graduates’ career mobility intentions and encourage…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate which sociocultural and work conditions have the potential to change international graduates’ career mobility intentions and encourage international graduates to stay in the host country when the initial intention was to leave the host country after graduating.
Design/methodology/approach
Data were collected via a web-based survey from international graduates and analyses suggest 129 (20 percent) of respondents changed their initial career mobility intentions. Data were analyzed using fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis.
Findings
Although previous studies report some pull–push factors such as attractive payment rates and work experience as being important in attracting potential workforce participants, these factors have no influence on changing the career mobility intentions of international graduates. In contrast, the work environment (WE) seems to be a strong condition for changing career mobility decisions. Results also reveal that the influence of sociocultural conditions on initial career mobility intention is more complicated than work conditions and varies from case to case.
Practical implications
The present study adopts the theoretical assumption that migration and mobility is a transition that forms over time and the findings suggest that international graduates’ global career mobility intentions depend on the WE. Therefore, government, higher education and industry development policy makers need to take this factor into account if they are interested in attracting and retaining global talent.
Originality/value
The majority of previous studies have focused on which push–pull factors encourage the recently graduated international student workforce to move or stay in a country while the current study argues which conditions have the potential to change initial career mobility intentions.
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Eileen Aitken-Fox, Jane Coffey, Kantha Dayaram, Scott Fitzgerald, Stephen McKenna and Amy Wei Tian
Eileen Aitken-Fox, Jane Coffey, Kantha Dayaram, Scott Fitzgerald, Stephen McKenna and Amy Wei Tian
The purpose of the paper is to investigate how human resource professionals (HRPs), in a variety of organizations, responded to the crisis brought about by the event of COVID-19…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of the paper is to investigate how human resource professionals (HRPs), in a variety of organizations, responded to the crisis brought about by the event of COVID-19. In particular, it aims to show how organizations, across all sectors, in Western Australia responded with urgency and flexibility to the crisis and showed “resilience in practice”.
Design/methodology/approach
The study is based on 136 questionnaire responses, 32 interviews and 25 managerial narratives. The mixed qualitative methodology was designed to enable an investigation of the impact of COVID-19 and the response of HRPs.
Findings
HRPs have responded with agility and flexibility to the impact of COVID-19. They have done so through extensive trial and error, sometimes succeeding, sometimes failing. They have not simply activated a preconceived continuity plan.
Research limitations/implications
The research indicates that resilience is an ongoing accomplishment of organizations and the people in them. The objective was description rather than prescription, and the research does not offer solutions to future pandemic-like situations.
Practical implications
The research suggests that, given the impact of COVID-19 on organizations, HR practices, processes and policies will need to be thoroughly reconsidered for relevance in the post-COVID world. Possible future directions are highlighted.
Originality/value
The research considers the actions of HRPs as they responded to a global crisis as the crisis unfolded.
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Lindsey Coombes, Jane Coffey and Helen Bartlett
The importance of mental health promotion is increasingly being recognised as a policy issue in the UK, although little is known yet about progress towards implementing mental…
Abstract
The importance of mental health promotion is increasingly being recognised as a policy issue in the UK, although little is known yet about progress towards implementing mental health promotion approaches within mental health services. This paper presents an overview of the topic, and reports on a survey of local authorities in England to identify examples of good practice in mental health promotion and the extent to which they are underpinned by evidence.
Fiona Jane Factor and Elizabeth Lillian Ackerley
The purpose of this paper is to describe a youth work model of participatory research practice which utilises a range of methods within non-traditional research settings…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to describe a youth work model of participatory research practice which utilises a range of methods within non-traditional research settings, highlighting the importance of trust, risk-taking and the creation of mutually respectful and non-hierarchical relationships. The paper suggests that such methods enable the development of new insights into previously intractable challenges when working with adolescents needing a safeguarding response from professionals.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper reflects on the challenges and successes of a project which brought police officers and young people together to develop solutions to improving safeguarding responses to young people affected by sexual violence and related forms of harm in adolescence. In particular, this paper focuses on a residential held in October 2016 in the Lake District involving 7 officers and 15 young people.
Findings
Despite a number of ethical challenges throughout the project, this paper makes the case that potentially high-risk participatory research projects can be supported and managed by university research centres. However, for these to be successful, staff need to work in trauma-informed ways, and possess high-level expertise in group work facilitation. Transparency, honesty, constancy and a range of different and creative activities, including mental and physical challenges, all contributed to the success of the project.
Originality/value
By detailing the empirical steps taken to develop, support and realise this project, this paper advances a youth work model of participatory research practice, filling an important gap within the methodological literature on participatory work with young people affected by sexual violence.
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Zachary A. Schaefer and Owen H. Lynch
The authors use concepts from the “communication constitutes organizations” (CCO) literature in combination with Cooren’s (2010, 2012) ventriloquism to demonstrate the symbolic…
Abstract
Purpose
The authors use concepts from the “communication constitutes organizations” (CCO) literature in combination with Cooren’s (2010, 2012) ventriloquism to demonstrate the symbolic uses of texts and shifting interpretations of authority during a negotiation regarding the future of a nonprofit educational institution. The two sides negotiating over how to resolve a fiscal crisis struggled to achieve legitimacy through competing institutional logics, and this paper captures this process through a detailed account. The paper aims to discuss these issues.
Design/methodology/approach
This study emerged from a multi-year full immersion ethnography undertaken by the second author, who spent over 5,000 hours as a participant observer at the organization. The quotes and observations come form field notes taken during this time.
Findings
Communication constitutes the nonprofit institution through two communication flows – self-structuring processes and institutional positioning – and these flows symbolically and materially unified the opposing negotiation parties during the negotiation process as each side struggled to gain legitimacy through competing institutional logics. The process of ventriloquism was the mechanism through which different actors and texts negotiated their levels of authority.
Practical implications
This case demonstrates how oppositional groups used and viewed texts throughout a negotiation process, revealing the agency, authority, legitimacy, and symbolic power of texts. This case also highlights the political struggle between institutional logics backed by financial models and professional logics backed by traditional organizational values.
Originality/value
At a material level, this case is a detailed examination of organizational members navigating the negotiation process during a fiscal crisis, but on a symbolic level this case demonstrates the communicative means through which oppositional groups negotiate core organizational values, and whether past values can lead organizations to a sustainable future. The observational depth of this case study was only possible through long term, full immersion ethnography, and this depth provides clarity to abstract concepts from CCO, ventriloquism, and institutional theory.
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Cathriona Nash and Serge Basini
This study sets out to capture the consumer perspective regarding the purchase request relationship between parent and child.
Abstract
Purpose
This study sets out to capture the consumer perspective regarding the purchase request relationship between parent and child.
Design/methodology/approach
This interpretive study enhances an understanding of these purchase request experiences as they are lived by respondents. The story of both parents, along with children, is thus considered paramount. Using a series of depth‐interviews and focus groups with parents and children, a key theme emerged through the interpretive process. “The game” permeates their experiences of this request relationship and is virtually unreported until now.
Findings
Contrary to extant research, this study positions the contemporary parent‐child purchase relationship as a positive experience where an understanding of “the game” permeates this natural familial interaction. Furthermore, a tacit understanding and awareness of the intricacies associated with “the game”, including each other's roles, tactics, outcomes, feelings and perspectives regarding “the game”, are considered playful and entertaining by all respondents.
Originality/value
First, adopting a consumer‐centric approach as the focus of this research instead of the much reported “vested interest” perspective added a new breadth and dimension to an understanding of the parent‐child purchase request relationship not previously captured. Second, the departure from extant positivistic research, to an interpretive approach proved very beneficial in uncovering “the game”: a novel departure from previous pester power research.
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The purpose of this paper is to investigate the ways in which organisational context and individual agency interact (co-participate) to shape the workplace learning of graduate…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the ways in which organisational context and individual agency interact (co-participate) to shape the workplace learning of graduate trainee accountants, and to examine the role of firm size in conditioning this interaction.
Design/methodology/approach
A qualitative, comparative approach was used, involving interviews with 20 respondents across two large and three small accountancy firms in England.
Findings
Differences in individual learner biographies and trajectories generate divergent dispositions with regard to workplace learning. In turn, these dispositions influence the extent to which the generally less formal learning environment of the small firm is interpreted either positively or negatively.
Research limitations/implications
Further research is needed on processes of agency/context interaction across a wider range of organisational and professional environments.
Practical implications
Individual dispositions play an important role in determining the optimal approach towards professional development in practice.
Originality/value
The paper offers a novel insight into how variations in both context and agency – and the relationship between them – can generate significant divergences in the professional learning process.
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Yara Levtova, Irma Melunovic, Caroline Louise Mead and Jane L. Ireland
This preliminary investigation aims to examine the psychological impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on patients and staff within a high secure service.
Abstract
Purpose
This preliminary investigation aims to examine the psychological impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on patients and staff within a high secure service.
Design/methodology/approach
To discern the connection between COVID-19-related distress and multiple factors, the study involved 31 patients and 34 staff who completed assessments evaluating coping strategies, resilience, emotional reactivity, ward atmosphere and work-related aspects.
Findings
Results demonstrated that around a third of staff (31.2%) experienced COVID-19-related distress levels that met the clinical cut-off for possible post-traumatic stress disorder. Emotional reactivity, staff shortages, secondary traumatic stress and coping strategies were all positively correlated with COVID-19-related-distress. Resilience was negatively associated with distress, thus acting as a potential mitigating factor. In comparison, the prevalence of distress among patients was low (3.2%).
Practical implications
The authors postulate that increased staff burdens during the pandemic may have led to long-term distress, while their efforts to maintain minimal service disruption potentially shielded patients from psychological impacts, possibly lead to staff “problem-focused coping burnout”. This highlights the need for in-depth research on the enduring impacts of pandemics, focusing on mechanisms that intensify or alleviate distress. Future studies should focus on identifying effective coping strategies for crisis situations, such as staff shortages, and strategies for post-crisis staff support.
Originality/value
The authors postulate that the added burdens on staff during the pandemic might have contributed to their distress. Nonetheless, staff might have inadvertently safeguarded patients from the pandemic’s psychological ramifications by providing a “service of little disruption”, potentially leading to “problem-focused coping burnout”. These findings underscore the imperative for further research capturing the enduring impacts of pandemics, particularly scrutinising factors that illuminate the mechanisms through which distress is either intensified or alleviated across different groups. An avenue worth exploring is identifying effective coping styles for pandemics.
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