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1 – 10 of 58Amy Klemm Verbos and Maria T. Humphries
The purpose of this paper is to bring wider‐reaching feminism to confluence with relational indigenous values for transformative responses to systemic exclusion.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to bring wider‐reaching feminism to confluence with relational indigenous values for transformative responses to systemic exclusion.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors critique the prevailing (corporate) institutional logic in higher education through their stories and experiences, weaving in diverse feminist perspectives. Liberal feminist perspectives, the most visible gender critique, may merely increase numerical equality, diversifying the biographical characteristics of privilege. Exclusion for many is systemically retained. The authors argue that relational logics underpinning indigenous worldviews hold generative potential for institutional change toward deeper inclusiveness and justice.
Findings
Liberal feminists' two‐fold transformative aspirations for gender equality and deeper respect for currently marginalized “feminine” values leave room for deeper and wider reflection on how indigenous perspectives might contribute to institutional change.
Practical implications
This exploration may be applied to university recruiting, selection, evaluation, and promotion policies; articulating and assessing career competencies and trajectories; curriculum evaluation; organizational and management research; and pedagogical development and research.
Social implications
An indigenous critique of liberal feminism and indigenous perspectives on justice, relationality, and inclusivity may enhance social, university, corporate, community, and family life.
Originality/value
Interweaving feminist and indigenous insights into a critique of the prevailing corporate institutional logic informing organizational practice – in higher education and all sectors of society, it highlights the generative potential of indigenous contributions and encourages inclusion of diverse indigenous perspectives in organization theory and practice.
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Amy Klemm Verbos and Maria T. Humphries
The Principles of Responsible Management Education (PRME) are a United Nations led initiative that includes a mandate to engage with voices generally marginalized in business…
Abstract
Purpose
The Principles of Responsible Management Education (PRME) are a United Nations led initiative that includes a mandate to engage with voices generally marginalized in business classrooms. The voices of Indigenous peoples are among such marginalized voices. Inclusion of indigenous worldviews offer opportunities to enhance the capacity of the PRME to contribute to more just and sustainable management and development of humanity. The paper aims to discuss these issues.
Design/methodology/approach
PRME Principle One inspires opportunities to integrate the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (DRIP) and through this confluence, contribute to manifesting the espoused aspirations of the United Nations Global Compact (UNGC) – i.e. the transformation of poverty and environmental degradation toward universal human and environmental thriving.
Findings
Greater attention to relational ethics through critical pedagogy encourages reflection on the paradoxes of the market logic that permeates management education. The outcome in practice of this logic appears to result in ever increasing disparity. Its unfettered trajectory risks both people and planet. An indigenous call to respect all life, including that of the planet, brings the principles of universal inclusiveness to light in a compelling way.
Originality/value
This essay is unique in its call to construe together the PRME, UNGC, Business Reference Guide (BRG), and the DRIP to progress aspirations of inclusiveness and sustainability; and contribute indigenous worldviews for their intrinsic value in critical reflection on the damage caused by the market logic endemic to management education.
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Sheeba Asirvatham and Maria Humphries
This paper aims to invite reflection and action among scholars of gender in management to the shaping and meeting of commitments to universal justice.
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to invite reflection and action among scholars of gender in management to the shaping and meeting of commitments to universal justice.
Design/methodology/approach
In total, 12 women employed as senior scholars in public universities in Aotearoa New Zealand were invited to discuss their career experiences. An observed disjuncture between radical feminist analyses of their career experiences and their liberal feminist responses to issues arising for them prompted reflection on a wider disjuncture in the shaping of justice wherever neoliberal directives prevail, generating this paper’s activist call to integrity between analyses and practice among scholars as agents of change.
Findings
Implications drawn from the conversations with participants vindicated earlier critiques of diversity management under the conditions of neoliberalism when accommodating damaging social outcomes and systemic compliance is morally compromising.
Originality/value
Exploring accommodation of system preserving career strategies of scholars claiming commitment to justice is an evocative and original call to scholarly activism.
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Sheeba Asirvatham and Maria Humphries-Kil
The purpose of this paper is to reflect on career aspirations and experiences explored with senior women organizational scholars employed in neoliberally driven public…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to reflect on career aspirations and experiences explored with senior women organizational scholars employed in neoliberally driven public universities in Aotearoa (New Zealand) legally mandated to serve as a critic and conscience of society.
Design/methodology/approach
Over the 18 months period, three sequential research conversations were conducted with each of 12 participants known for their commitment to social justice and planetary well-being. The conversational approach allowed for spontaneous participant-lead development of ideas. Sequencing of conversations allowed for reflection on matters raised in previous conversations.
Findings
Vitality and creativity deemed essential to scholarly careers were reportedly under pressure. Career concepts in use indicate a protean commitment to self-direction but also recognized constraints of institutionally driven neoliberal output regimes. Detrimental impacts of neoliberal values permeating their employing institutions were offered spontaneously often in radical feminist terms but paradoxically given liberal feminist remedies.
Research limitations/implications
The 12 diverse transcripts of participant conversations generated remarkable similarities that indicate the influence of career articulations on the social construction of reality. The implications of this interpretation invite further reflection on the consequences of normalization of career metaphors and their implication in the intensification of institutional control, the weakening of professional autonomy and the system preserving restriction of career-related responsibilities.
Practical implications
Highlighting constraints to creativity and vitality necessary for scholarly work can inform further research into professional influences on justice and environmental matters in and beyond the Academy.
Social implications
In this paper a short review of Aotearoa (New Zealand) as in vanguard of neoliberal intensification globally, the implication of this doctrine in neoliberally driven universities and the impacts on career opportunities, degradations and responsibilities of scholars are explored.
Originality/value
The conversational research process contrasts with more tightly framed empirical research methods by generating spontaneous participant-led articulations of career-related dynamics explored and expanded over subsequent conversations.
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Linda J. Twiname, Maria Humphries and Kate Kearins
As part of an ongoing project on worker well‐being, this paper aims to examine the application of flexible work arrangements through the experiences of core workers in a small…
Abstract
Purpose
As part of an ongoing project on worker well‐being, this paper aims to examine the application of flexible work arrangements through the experiences of core workers in a small, European‐owned, New Zealand manufacturing firm.
Design/methodology/approach
A participatory action research approach is taken.
Findings
The research reveals that flexible employment arrangements utilised in this firm did not afford protection to core workers as theory suggests. Both core and peripheral workers were exposed to pressure primarily to extend their hours of work and to reduce their expectations regarding remuneration. Production level increases were not reflected in increases in numbers of core workers; in fact perceived job security was low. Core workers felt pressure to work extended hours out of their commitment to the firm, each other, and to maintain their own employment.
Practical implications
The use of more democratic processes inherent in action research oriented at workplace well‐being are shown to have had some value toward enhancing worker well‐being.
Originality/value
The paper demonstrates that the participative project placed pressure upon management and that it had the potential to redress a power imbalance within the employment relationship.
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Maria Humphries and Michelle St Jane
The purpose of this paper is to disenchant advocates of sustainability of the current form of capitalism and to argue that under current intensification of globalisation of…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to disenchant advocates of sustainability of the current form of capitalism and to argue that under current intensification of globalisation of economic and political efforts, “privilege” and “alienation” might be relocated/rearranged/redistributed but that the basic dynamic will remain constant. The very poor and vulnerable appear to be treated as collateral damage by capitalist practices reified as “The Market” and which we have personified as “The Master”.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors draw on the metaphor of subaltern studies to amplify their call for further discussion. Portraying the economic system as The (ruthless) Master invites further conversation about complicity or subjugation and invites reflection on alternatives to associated agency.
Findings
The Master's powers are amplifying globally. He continues to demand sacrifices. The most recent demand comes in the call for the protection of his economy at the expense of those to be most affected by climate change. These sacrifices are to be enacted by the willing high priests, the compliant, and the ignorant. Their sacrificial lambs are those who are forcibly harnessed to a system that exploits them, who become dependent on that system for survival, and who may be summarily dismissed when their “usefulness” is deemed diminished. The paper is here concerned with the people whose alternatives are reduced or destroyed and with the tolerance of this destruction of lives and livelihoods by an enabling population.
Research limitations/implications
This paper is an invitation to continued conversation, not a research paper in the positivist sense. The paper may be viewed as an experiment to see how far alternative perspectives can flourish in the academy and in our classrooms, boardrooms, and cafeterias. Conversations are posited as a means of change – of self and society.
Practical implications
This paper invites practitioners and academics to engage with critical self‐reflection as a necessary aspect for transformational learning and leadership. The extent to which positivists models of knowing prevail, papers more exploratory of diverse ontologies may be diminished or dismissed with significant implications for the enhancement or depletion of (intellectual and spiritual) diversity.
Social implications
The attractiveness of “sustainability” discourses are a mixed blessing. They may be generated to unsettle and used to transform ways of knowing and being that have led to the current crises facing humanity. The proffered remedies for these crises may also enable The Master to become better informed and more able to assimilate those who criticise. A subaltern position would make this less likely.
Originality/value
The value of an amplified subaltern voice lies in the honing of more critical insights and thus the discovery of not only more creative technical solutions to issues of sustainability and justice but the co‐creation of covenants that may generate a form of human and environmental flourishing beyond the Wealth of Corpor‐Nations.
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Maria Humphries and Shayne Grice
Persistent patterns of employment segregation have long beenchallenged through what is here called “the discourse ofequity”. Associated equity legislation and equal…
Abstract
Persistent patterns of employment segregation have long been challenged through what is here called “the discourse of equity”. Associated equity legislation and equal employment policies have not succeeded in changing these patterns. “The management of diversity”, a newly‐developing discourse, is claimed by its proponents to encapsulate traditional equity issues in a more managerially compelling format. Additionally, through this new discourse, progressively addresses issues associated with managing diverse people in a global context. Argues that, in the context of globalizing capitalism, a new homogeneity with different patterns of exclusion is being achieved. The pragmatic focus on “the management of diversity” may diffuse the emancipatory imperative implicit in “the discourse of equity”. Urges an examination of the extent to which traditional equity concerns have been co‐opted to divert attention from new forms of systemic employment segregation.
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Margaret Moussa, Mathew Bright and Maria Estela Varua
The purpose of this paper is to examine the suitability of job and work design theory for investigating knowledge workers’ productivity. The review is a response to recommendation…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine the suitability of job and work design theory for investigating knowledge workers’ productivity. The review is a response to recommendation and adoption of the motivational human resource management approach by a number of knowledge management researchers. The authors show that the existing literature on this topic overlooks key criticisms of HRM job and work design theory itself. The authors suggest modifications.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper proceeds by outlining knowledge management researchers’ arguments rejecting the application of traditional measurement approaches to investigating knowledge workers’ productivity. The review develops to examine the various arguments for adopting work design theory and considers the key contributions and critiques in this field. Drawing on the insights of key HRM work design critics, the paper concludes by offering suggestions for a model suitable for examining the drivers of knowledge work productivity in process.
Findings
The principle finding is that Morgeson and Humphrey’s (2006) Work Design Questionnaire (WDQ) stand as the most conceptually consistent and methodologically considered human resource management work design theory. However, this model must itself be modified to include a category of organizational contextual work characteristics. For application to the filed of knowledge management, WDQ must also be expanded to include knowledge sharing, role breadth self-efficacy and employee well-being as key work design mediators and outcomes.
Research limitations/implications
Greater consideration needs to be given to the distinction between knowledge sharing as a work design mediator and as a work design outcome. Morgeson and Humphrey themselves note that the “common method variance” problems arising in psychometric research have been reduced but not completely eliminated from their model.
Practical implications
Survey instruments based on the recommended model potentially provide a valuable means for understanding and enhancing productivity in a variety of knowledge intensive service industries. The pronounced benefit of this model is that it is applicable in cross-industry and cross-occupational contexts, unlike many existing knowledge worker productivity models. This is an advantage, given the centrality of the inter-connectivity of different types of activities and industries in knowledge work.
Social implications
Work design prioritizes employee motivation and support and links this to the quality of work and the well-being of clients. The benefits of well-designed knowledge work extend well beyond the generation of specific innovations and macroeconomic productivity improvements.
Originality/value
Job design and work design theory have been applied in the field of knowledge management. However, the applications have largely overlooked key critiques of the established models in the human resource management literature. The paper fills this gap. Its original suggestions for modifying Moregeson and Humphry’s (2006) WDQ reflect the authors’ in-depth analysis of the literature.
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This article is a shortened version of a Master’s dissertation for the Liverpool University Centre for Archive Studies. It deals with issues of appraisal. Such issues involve…
Abstract
This article is a shortened version of a Master’s dissertation for the Liverpool University Centre for Archive Studies. It deals with issues of appraisal. Such issues involve fundamental concepts on what records are, why they are kept, and their life cycle. The answers to these questions were sought and found in the history of archives, and in the specialist literature. The theory and the methodology adopted were then applied to a case study of a recently established organisation in Lisbon, which has, at the core of its business, information in electronic format.
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This paper aims to review the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoint practical implications from cutting-edge research and case studies.
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to review the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoint practical implications from cutting-edge research and case studies.
Design/methodology/approach
This briefing is prepared by an independent writer who adds their own impartial comments and places the articles in context.
Findings
Adherence to neoliberal processes and practices is impeding progress towards greater gender equality within organizations in New Zealand. A system premised on delivering equity and fairness has instead exacerbated injustices both in the workplace and wider society. Academics advocate a strong feminist-driven critique to highlights these contradictions and inspire change.
Originality/value
The briefing saves busy executives and researchers hours of reading time by selecting only the very best, most pertinent information and presenting it in a condensed and easy-to-digest format.
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