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This study’s purpose is twofold: First, to investigate the relationship between managerial competences and Integrated Reporting (IR) practices; Second, to test whether all the managerial competences attributes are significantly related to IR practices.

This study adopts a correlational research design, and is also cross-sectional. Data were collected using a questionnaire survey of 188 manufacturing firms in Uganda. Data were analyzed with the help of the Statistical Package for Social Sciences.

The study finds that significant associations between managerial competences of knowledge and experience exist with IR practices except for skills. However, experience is the most significant predictor of IR practices. This experience is manifest, among others, in the managers’ ability to get the word out to the public including why the public should be proud of what the company does and about what the company offers and works to make it better.

This study did not control governance variables and yet governance and IR are inextricably associated. Future research should aim at testing the efficacy of investing in governance aspects potentially improving IR. This is because Environmental, Social and Governance investing is predicted to make capitalism work better and deal with the grave threat posed by climate change. The study also focuses on manufacturing firms, and these results may be only applicable to the manufacturing firms in Uganda. More research is therefore needed to further understand the effect of managerial competence attributes on IR in manufacturing firms in other contexts. Well, the results imply that more experienced managers are better placed to embrace IR practices than their less experienced counterparts.

The authors find that managerial experience explains IR practices more than competences and this makes intuitive sense since, for example, better experiential communication potentially minimizes the challenges such as lack of comparability, difficulty in communicating entity-specific information, information not available in a usable format and data errors normally encountered by IR (especially electronic) users. Hence, this study enhances our understanding of the role of managerial competences in the improvement of IR practices using perceptions of report preparers from a developing country where IR is voluntary and where the size of the stock market is small.

This paper specifies how to construct and validate an instrument based on multi‐item scales for the cataloguing and measurement of managerial and organizational capabilities on the basis of management perceptions. The construction and reduction of the scales have been reinforced by the Delphi and retesting techniques. The use of this methodology was illustrated in a sample of Spanish industrial firms. The paper enhances the value of the instruments for a resource‐based view with regard to the faithful and rigorous measurement of its key concept, distinctive competences. The scales created provide consistent empirical evidence to remove doubts surrounding managerial self‐evaluation, including those arising from problems of self‐esteem and reinforcement effects. In addition, the paper provides empirical evidence to support the predictive ability of distinctive competences on current and long‐term performance variability.

The purpose of this paper is to establish the relationship between managerial competence, managerial risk-taking behaviour and financial service outreach of microfinance institutions (MFIs).

In this cross-sectional and correlational study, the authors surveyed 52 branches of MFIs from a population of 60 branches of 20 MFIs in eastern Uganda. Two respondents, a branch manager and a senior loan officer, were the units of enquiry for each branch. The authors put forward and tested four hypotheses relating to the significance of the relationship between perceived managerial competence, risk-taking behaviour and financial service outreach using SPSS version 20. The authors established the hypothesized relationships using Pearson correlation coefficients and obtain a mediating effect of risk-taking behaviour using partial corrections and regression analysis.

The results suggest positive and significant relationships between perceived managerial competence, risk-taking behaviour and financial service outreach. However, while the direct relationship between managerial competence and financial service outreach without the mediation effect of risk-taking behaviour of managers was found to be significant, its magnitude reduces when mediation of risk-taking behaviour is allowed. Thus the entire effect does not only go through managerial competence but majorly also, through risk-taking behaviour of managers.

This study did not control for environmental factors such as laws and regulations. As such the model may have been under fitted. Nevertheless, the study has introduced a clearer understanding that outreach performance in MFIs rests with competent managers in strategic positions operating in synergy with their risk-taking behaviour. The study informs policy makers that outreach performance of the MFIs depends on the quality of the competence managers have in addition to their risk-taking propensities.

Efforts by the stakeholders to improve financial service outreach must be matched with appropriate competences and risk-taking behaviour of managers.

The results contribute to extant literature by investigating two explanatory variables for financial service outreach and provide initial evidence of the mediating effect of intrinsic high risk-taking behaviour of managers. Results add to the conceptual improvement in risk-taking behaviour and lend considerable support for the behavioural perspective in the study of financial service outreach of MFIs.

The competence framework continues to be plagued by unresolved conceptual ambiguity. This paper aims to consider other perspectives of managerial performance.

This is a conceptual article that examines and critiques current perspectives of competence based on an extensive literature review.

Sources of conceptual ambiguity are rooted in treating competence as both independent and dependent variables in relation to managerial performance. A managerial learning framework and a career perspective may offer less ambiguous, more promising conceptual frameworks for managerial performance.

The arguments presented for moving beyond the competence framework need to be developed into propositions that can be tested empirically.

Management development and education activities may not be achieving their intended outcomes due to the level of conceptual ambiguity found with the competence framework. It may be necessary to reconsider the efficacy of development programs and activities that rely on a competence approach.

Conceptual ambiguity regarding competence has been previously noted. This paper presents an analysis of the possible sources of ambiguity, and the dilemmas faced when trying to reduce the level of ambiguity. By clarifying these issues, the paper may be of value to researchers in the management development field and to practitioners involved with employee and managerial development.

Work on managerial competence has largely been characterized by being narrowly focused, fragmented and confusing in its terminology. Further, it has often failed to deal with issues of organizational specificity and the widely different contexts for managerial performance. Additionally, the work has mainly been located in and applied to lower level managers in the larger, often multinational organizations. Finally, the focus of much competence work has been on individual managers and has often taken little account of teamworking. Describes a contextually embedded framework of managerial competence which is targeted on top teams in small to medium‐sized enterprises. The framework identifies and distinguishes the key foci for clearly defining managerial competence, and beyond that, serves to locate existing competency frames in a single and coherent whole. The framework also explicitly recognizes organizational context as an important influence on ‐ indeed determinant of ‐ managerial competence in situ. Uses the concept of a lens of organizational competence to bridge environmental and organizational cultural variables with top team concerns and capabilities.

By integrating the resource management perspective and the optimal distinctiveness perspective, the purpose of this paper is to explain how firms configure their managerial ties and competences to identify entrepreneurial opportunities.

Using survey data collected from 238 firms in a transition economy, this paper tests a model of firms’ exploration and exploitation competences under which managerial ties promote or constrain opportunity discovery.

The paper finds that managerial ties are positively related to opportunity discovery. More importantly, competence exploration strengthens the impact of business ties on opportunity discovery, whereas it weakens the impact of political ties. On the contrary, competence exploitation strengthens the effect of political ties on opportunity discovery, whereas it weakens the impact of business ties.

First, the findings enrich the social network perspective of opportunity recognition by linking managerial social ties to opportunity discovery in the context of a transition economy. Second, this paper adds to current understanding of the resource management perspective and the optimal distinctiveness perspective by exploring the fit between different managerial ties (business ties vs political ties) and different competences (exploration vs exploitation) in contributing to opportunity discovery.

Seeks to explore the boundaries of managerial competence and takes as its point of departure the distinction between competence and meta‐competence. The Management Charter Initiative (MCI) defines competence as the ability to perform effectively and suggests that competence is the outcome of using knowledge and skills appropriately. The concept of management is problematic and the process of management is difficult to separate from its context. Burgoyne has used the term meta‐competence to distinguish the higher‐order abilities which have to do with being able to learn, adapt, anticipate and create. The concept of competence as used in the MCI is illustrated in the equation: knowledge + skills = competence. Suggests that a distinction could usefully be drawn between managerial processes which are competence based and those which are based on meta‐competences. Presents a number of typologies of knowledge and relates these to the concept of meta‐competence. Examines knowledge in relation to judgment, intuition and acumen.

Research on managerial competence has been narrowly focused and confusing in its terminology. In particular, a disparity has emerged between the definitions and assessments of competence developed in the USA and the approaches adopted in the UK. In this paper it is argued that each perspective is incomplete and therefore lacking as a comprehensive frame for understanding both managerial competence and the management of performance. Furthermore, they have failed to deal with issues of the dynamic environment and the widely different contexts for managerial performance, particularly with regard to identifiable cultural differences. This paper aims to paint a more complete picture of “competence” by subjecting it to conceptual analysis. An examination of its contemporary use identifies both conceptual and practical flaws. Accordingly, an alternative approach is posited which places emphasis on those issues critical to achieving desired enhancements in management performance.

A critical response to the present stage in the development of management education is presented. The concept of competence is evaluated and its utility assessed. In particular, the use of the term by the Management Charter Initiative (MCI) is thrown into critical focus and found to be pragmatically and conceptually flawed. Emphasizes the importance of addressing the approach actually adopted by the MCI and other agencies in the “reform” of vocational qualifications and argues that the MCI has been incorrectly criticized for attempting to impose a simplistic model of management. Considers the implications and argues that management educators and developers are faced with a dominant concept of “competence” which they find difficult to realize in their educational practice. Subjects the concept of competence to conceptual analysis in order to bring into focus the key analytical elements implicit in the term, assesses the MCI approach and offers alternative approaches which place the emphasis on those issues which are critical for achieving consensually desired enhancements in management education and development.

This paper presents the findings from a study into managerial competence in the Scottish visitor attraction sector. It provides an insight into the range, diversity and perceived importance of current and future competences highlighting differences based on gender, age, size, level of training and location. Although the main findings reveal a focus on operation and self‐management competences, with less emphasis given to strategic competences, significant differences were exposed between those managers who operated in medium‐ and larger‐sized establishments than those in smaller sites, those who had received training for their current position as well as those who had no training and those under the age of 50. The paper concludes by discussing implications of the findings for strategic human‐resource‐development providers in Scottish tourism.