Search results

The 1988 Education Reform Act marked a fundamental shift in direction for the education service and represented a radical shift from the past. One of the major areas of change has been on existing relationships and the subsequent challenge to traditional structures and practices. Responsibilities and accountability have been decentralised to the individual institution. Subsequently this has led to pressure from sources, such as the Government and teaching profession, for a more articulate approach to leadership and management development. In 1990 Handy warned that not all staff are equally experienced or capable of leadership roles. Williams suggested that the position of principal/headteacher is not necessarily the most appropriate for some members of the teaching profession. This paper looks at a proposed initiative for the development of a qualification for headship in general and the implications for implementation in Northern Ireland in particular, and considers it against existing management literature and practice.

In reviewing the management literature, especially marketing management, it is evident that little attention has been paid to qualitative research in the discipline. This is perhaps due to the propensity to apply quantitative approaches in an attempt to establish the credibility of a relatively young subject. However, to neglect qualitative research methods in marketing can stifle innovation, creativity and new ways of thinking that are the very essence of successful marketing. In order to appreciate fully the value of qualitative research it is necessary to consider its historical development.

The purpose of this paper is to understand the influence of information and knowledge exchange and sharing between managers and non-executive directors is important in assessing the dynamic processes of accountability in boardrooms. By analysing information/knowledge at multiple levels, invoking the literature on implicit/tacit and explicit information/knowledge, the authors show that information asymmetry is a necessary condition for effective boards. The authors introduce a conceptual model of manager-non-executive director information asymmetry as an outcome of the interpretation of information/knowledge-sharing processes amongst board members. The model provides a more nuanced agenda of the management-board information asymmetry problem to enable a better understanding of the role of different types of information in practice.

The analysis of information/knowledge exchange, sharing and creation and the resultant conceptual model are based on the following elements: manager-non-executive director information/knowledge, management-board information/knowledge and board dynamics and reciprocal processes converting implicit/tacit into explicit information/knowledge.

The paper provides new insights into the dynamics of information/knowledge exchange, sharing and creation between managers and non-executive directors (individual level)/between management and boards (group level). The authors characterise this as a two-way process, back-and-forth between managers/executive directors and non-executive directors. The importance of relative/experienced “ignorance” of non-executive directors is revealed, which the authors term the “information asymmetry paradox”.

The authors set out key opportunities for developing a research agenda from the model based on prior research of knowledge conversion processes and how these may be applied in a boardroom setting.

The model may assist directors in better understanding their roles and the division of labour between managers and non-executive directors from an information/knowledge perspective.

The authors apply Ikujiro Nonaka’s knowledge conversion framework to consider the transitioning from individual implicit personal to explicit shared information/knowledge, to understand the subtle processes at play in boardrooms influencing information/knowledge exchange, sharing and creation between managers and non-executive directors.

This paper shows that uncertainty is a multidimensional theoretical concept, which has empirical implications for the relationship with vertical integration. In a survey of empirical work that tests the relation between uncertainty and vertical integration, this paper demonstrates that performance ambiguity and general measures of uncertainty are positively related with vertical integration, technological uncertainty is negatively related, while market uncertainty and complexity are not systematically related to vertical integration.

Like it or not, change is inevitable if you are to survive. Far better to instigate change than allow other people to inflict it on you. To anticipate the future has to be good to allow time to implement change rather than having to react to it. This appears quite simple, but is it? This special themed issue of Management Decision contains a number of examples of how organizations have managed change. Lessons can be learned from other industries than your own with regard to best practice and basic principles which can then be applied to your own organization..

Many managers and scholars agree that diversity is a positive factor that leads to competitive economic advantage for organisations. However, this assertion remains largely untested. To examine the implied relationship between firm performance and diversity, performance at minority‐friendly organisations was compared to that at other organisations within the same industry. Results indicated that minority friendly firms significantly outperformed the market, indicating that diversity in organisations may be related to economic success. This finding has significant strategic implications.

The purpose of the study is to empirically extend and validate a measure of absorptive capacity (ACAP) and examine its role in leveraging the benefits of diversity on innovation within global virtual teams (GVTs). This study validates a multidimensional measure of ACAP for use within the GVT. GVTs are increasingly utilized in industry given their ability to bring together diverse knowledge and experience from geographically dispersed individuals.

The hypotheses of this research were tested using a field survey to collect real world knowledge about GVTs. The survey method is a research technique in which data is collected from a sample of individuals using a questionnaire.

Using a sample of GVT members, the authors find that ACAP significantly mediates the relationships between diversity (deep-level diversity, functional-level) and innovation.

The implications for the study of GVTs is discussed and recommendations are offered. GVTs, as investigated in this study, include members that use electronic media for some or all of their interactions and collaboration with other team members.

This study validates and operationalizes the multi-dimensional ACAP construct at the GVT level: its relationship with diversity and its influence on GVT innovation.

The purpose of this paper is to present an exploratory study of employee voice and silence in international auditing firms. The authors examine two key questions: what is the propensity of employees in training to speak up on workplace problems and how would management react to employees in training speaking up on workplace problems?

The authors compare and contrast the views of employees on training contracts with management including partners. Semi-structured interviews were carried out with eight managers/partners and 20 employees working in six large auditing firms in Ireland.

The authors find that employees on training contracts have a high propensity to remain silent on workplace problems. Quiescent and acquiescent forms of silence were evident. Management expressed willingness to act on employee voice on workplace problems concerning business improvements and employee performance but were very resistant to voice in regard to a change in working conditions or a managers’ performance. Employees and management couched employee voice in terms of technical knowledge exchange rather than being associated with employee dissatisfaction or having a say in decision making.

The authors highlight how new professional employees are socialised into understanding that employee voice is not a democratic right and the paper provides insight on the important role of partners as owner/managers in perpetuating employee silence. Previous research on owner/managers has tended to focus on small businesses while the auditing firms in this study have large numbers of employees.

Workplace silence impedes productivity, job satisfaction and retention, key issues for the hospital workforce worldwide. It can have a negative effect on patient outcomes and safety and human resources in healthcare organisations. This study aims to examine factors that influence workplace silence among hospital doctors in Ireland.

A national, cross-sectional, online survey of hospital doctors in Ireland was conducted in October–November 2019; 1,070 hospital doctors responded. This paper focuses on responses to the question “If you had concerns about your working conditions, would you raise them?”. In total, 227 hospital doctor respondents (25%) stated that they would not raise concerns about their working conditions. Qualitative thematic analysis was carried out on free-text responses to explore why these doctors choose to opt for silence regarding their working conditions.

Reputational risk, lack of energy and time, a perceived inability to effect change and cultural norms all discourage doctors from raising concerns about working conditions. Apathy arose as change to working conditions was perceived as highly unlikely. In turn, this had scope to lead to neglect and exit. Voice was seen as risky for some respondents, who feared that complaining could damage their career prospects and workplace relationships.

This study highlights the systemic, cultural and practical issues that pressure hospital doctors in Ireland to opt for silence around working conditions. It adds to the literature on workplace silence and voice within the medical profession and provides a framework for comparative analysis of doctors' silence and voice in other settings.

This paper aims to explore and gain a better understanding of the relationship between power circumstances and the environmental uncertainty perceived by managers.

This paper conducted a survey of 1,000 manufacturing firms selected randomly from the Top 5000 largest firms in Taiwan. The responding firms were clustered by K‐means into four groups of power circumstances. The paper then applied MANOVA and ANOVA to test the differences among the three types of supply chain uncertainty across the four groups.

The results show that power circumstances are associated with managers' perceptions of environmental uncertainty in terms of demand, technology, and supply. This paper finds that managers of buying firms in dominant positions perceive a lower demand uncertainty while managers facing higher supplier power perceive greater uncertainty in technology. For buying firms under ambiguous power circumstances, their managers tend to perceive higher supply uncertainty. The paper then put forth six power‐based propositions on the basis of their results.

Given that the data are from large‐sized firms, the generalizability of their findings to smaller firms may be limited.

When developing strategies to tackle environmental uncertainties, managers should consider their firm's power circumstances because these tend to influence the managers' interpretation and decisions and thereby their subsequent strategies.

Although environmental uncertainty has been addressed extensively in various management fields, how the environmental uncertainty perceived by a firm's managers is related to the power the firm holds has never been empirically examined. This study clarifies this issue.