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A transition toward sustainable development requires engagement of university students in transformative learning. Therefore, quality frameworks and processes should support deep approaches to sustainable development in higher education. Research and initiatives that connect sustainable development, higher education and quality assurance (QA) are lacking. This study aims to explore to what extent quality assurance agencies in Europe support transformative learning for sustainable development in their frameworks.

The authors conducted a qualitative analysis of national QA frameworks in the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) to assess whether they support transformative learning for sustainable development. First, frequency analysis was undertaken; second, a blended coding approach was used to investigate whether and how transformative learning for sustainable development is addressed.

Overall, the authors found little support for transformative learning for sustainable development in most QA frameworks. One exception is the framework of the United Kingdom, which includes a specific guide on education for sustainable development wherein transformative learning is prominently mentioned. To a lesser extent, some support exists in the frameworks of Estonia, Holy See, Romania, Sweden, Switzerland and Ukraine. Although the transformative learning for sustainable development approach is not explicitly mentioned in most QA frameworks, many of them contain opportunities to highlight it. France and The Netherlands offer guidelines and criteria for acquiring a sustainable development label, while Andorra suggests including the sustainable development goals in institutional quality assessment.

The research provides the first map of how countries within the EHEA support transformative learning for sustainable development in national QA systems.

This paper aims to contribute to existing academic work and business practice by presenting original empirical findings and by providing insights into priority setting on Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in organizations. From an academic viewpoint, it not only adds to previous work on the topic of SDG materiality (e.g. Van Tulder and Lucht, 2019) but also aims to contribute new insights into the steps that are crucial and influence the adoption of the SDGs in materiality assessments. It may also add to the literature by providing new knowledge on the strategic considerations that organizations may make and institutional dynamics that encourage organizations to implement the SDG materiality method.

By executing a national survey research in Belgium through a collaboration between academics of Antwerp Management School, Louvain School of Management (UCLouvain) and the University of Antwerp, and supported by Belgium’s Federal Institute of Sustainable Development, the authors have obtained several insights into the SDG landscape in Belgium for various types of organizations, including companies, governmental and nongovernmental organizations and educational institutions. This research builds further on a first national survey (SDG Barometer Belgium, 2018) on the adoption and implementation of the SDGs. However, an important aim of this research is to shift the emphasis to more prominent new elements, such as whether or not organizations use the SDGs in materiality assessments. While the main part of the data for this research were collected through an online questionnaire, document analyses were conducted based on the sustainability reports of BEL 20 companies, the benchmark stock market index of Euronext Brussels consisting of 20 companies traded at the Brussels Stock Exchange, and seven interviews were held to obtain additional insights.

A total of 386 organizations across sectors responded to the question “Does your organization perform a materiality analysis”, of which 210 organizations completed the question “Does your organization align the materiality analysis with the SDGs,”after an “exit route” based on a positive answer to the first question. When diving into the survey results, the authors see that no more than 12% of the 210 organizations performing a materiality analysis align their materiality analysis with the SDGs, while 14% indicate that they do not account for the SDGs at all in their materiality analyses. The results show that 41% of the organizations take into account the SDGs to a certain degree when performing their materiality analysis. Speculating on an explanation for these results, it may be the case that organizations do not yet think about coupling the SDGs to their materiality assessment, experience difficulties in practice or generally lack the knowledge for relating the SDGs to the sustainability topics that are relevant to them. This seems in line with other research (e.g. Van Tulder and Lucht, 2019), as the results of this study indicate that it seems to be difficult for organizations to relate the SDGs to the existing sustainability priorities or materiality analyses of companies.

The real contribution of this paper essentially lies in the description of the Janssen Pharmaceuticals case. The company recognized that today’s internally focused approach to goal setting is not enough to address global challenges. Hence, looking at what is needed externally from a global perspective, taking into account sustainability thresholds and setting ambitions accordingly, is needed to bridge the gap between current performance and required performance. From the Janssen Pharmaceuticals case, the authors learned that external stakeholders are an extremely useful source of information to address the required performance by using the SDG framework. For sure, SDG materiality analyses are still in an early phase of development and knowledge on how to conduct such an analysis may be lacking. Future efforts – or the lack thereof – may indicate whether or not companies consider such analyses as sufficiently relevant. Although the uptake of the SDGs is in progress, it remains to be seen which, if any, materiality method will eventually turn out as a new dominant way of defining material issues. The findings presented in this study hopefully serve as a basis for further investigation of the topic.

The purpose of this paper is twofold. First, it aims to contribute to the theoretical discussion on shared service centres (SSCs) for public sector accounting by putting forth a novel typology of different SSCs and their creation modes, and outlining the challenges these specific models are likely to face. Second, it uses the Estonian case study to test the theoretical conjectures.

Since in the Estonian central government different reform models for creating SSCs for public sector accounting have been tried out, the Estonian case offers an opportunity for exploring what the motives behind the creation of different forms of SSCs can be and what kind of challenges reform actors can face when opting for different reform models. The sources of data for the qualitative case study included official documents, media articles and interviews.

The Estonian case study demonstrates that the distinct reform models for creating SSCs in public sector accounting can indeed have different motives and also face various challenges to different degrees. Some challenges, however, are present in all reform models (e.g. difficulties in achieving customer orientation and reduced input to managerial decision making).

This paper puts forth a novel typology of public sector SSC reform models and analyses the challenges these different reform models are likely to face. The theoretical contribution and the Estonian case study are valuable for both academics and practitioners analysing or considering the creation of SSCs.

In a competitive environment, eHealth small and medium-sized enterprises’ (SMEs’) barriers to survival differ from those of large enterprises. Empirical research on barriers to eHealth SMEs in less prosperous areas has been largely neglected. This study fills this gap by employing an integrated approach to analyze barriers to the development of eHealth SMEs. The purpose of this paper is to address this issue.

The authors collected data through semi-structured interviews and conducted thematic analysis to identify 16 barriers, which were used as inputs into total interpretive structural modeling (TISM) to build interrelationships among them and identify key barriers. Cross-impact matrix multiplication applied to classification (MICMAC) was then applied validate the TISM model and classify the 16 barriers into four categories.

This study makes significant contributions to theory by identifying new barriers and their interrelationships, distinguishing key barriers and classifying the barriers into four categories. The authors identify that transcultural problems are the key barrier and deserve particular attention. eHealth SMEs originating from regions with cultural value orientations, such as hierarchy and embeddedness, that differ from the UK’s affective autonomy orientation should strengthen their transcultural awareness when seeking to expand into UK markets.

By employing an integrated approach to analyze barriers that impede the development of eHealth SMEs in a less prosperous area of the UK, this study raises entrepreneurs’ awareness of running businesses in places with different cultural value orientations.

The purpose of this paper is to show the link between the comparative effectiveness research (CER) and the interest in developing drugs for rare disease by the pharmaceutical industry. Total healthcare spending is on the rise without having a corresponding better health outcome. As such, with the growing role of government in healthcare, measuring and demonstrating value is beginning to expand beyond the private sector to metrics applied in the public sector. A modern approach to comparative effective research began its rapid rise in the USA when the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 allocated $1.1 billion for CER. This paper analyzes the implication and impact on the pharmaceutical industry.

The paper reviews the basic definitions of CER and its areas of strength and weakness. It used real examples of drugs to show the impact of the Reinvestment Act of 2009 on the rise of orphan drugs.

The study shows that the act encouraged the development of orphan drugs, mainly because of the low budget impact due to a smaller patient base. Provisions of the Affordable Care Act provide incentives for such rare disease indications, as no one can be denied coverage with pre-existing conditions.

The study is limited by the number of available rare drugs and the ongoing process of implementation of the Affordable Care Act.

The study shows the cost-effective method of treating medical conditions.

Development of orphan drugs opens up access to care for many patients at a cost-effective price.

This paper shows the link between the CER and the interest in developing drugs for rare disease by the pharmaceutical industry. It also brings out the possible implication of the Affordable Care Act on the pharmaceutical industry with respect to its strategies for drug development and drug portfolio.

The purpose of this article is to reassert the status of language as a topic of major interest to researchers in the light of the rise of the transnational corporation.

This article reviews recent literature and case study evidence in order to track an important shift taking place in the status of language management.

The emergence of the transnational corporation transforms the nature and significance of language from a minor issue into one that impacts on a company's core competencies.

The literature remains sparse and case studies limited in number. In depth investigation into the language management practices of transnational corporations is called for in order to test the hypotheses of this paper.

Language will generate greater interest as a research topic as the transnational model is implemented, and more sophisticated language management practices will emerge as a result, with the promise of delivering a competitive advantage.

The inter‐relationship between language management and the transnational model of global corporations has not been asserted in the literature up to this point.