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This paper aims to examine the level of disclosure on content elements of integrated reporting (IR) in Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales higher education institutions (HEIs). The authors suggest that integrated thinking is an internal process that organizations can follow to increase the level of disclosure on IR that can be used as an effective mechanism to enhance accountability with stakeholders.

International Integrated Reporting Council (IIRC) guidelines and content analysis are used to analyze IR content elements in HEI reports from 2014-2016.

The results indicate a significant increase in the trend and extent of IR content elements. The HEI-specific characteristics examined, such as establishment of HEI; adoption of IR framework and governing board size are all statistically and positively associated with IR content elements disclosure. This paper introduces signalling theory to explore the idea that appropriate communication via integrated thinking can close the gap between the organization and its stakeholders via increased level of disclosure on IR content elements.

The results will assist policymakers and regulators to assess the benefits of voluntary implementation of IR at HEIs and evaluate possible mandatory implementation of IIRC guidelines. Second, the findings can assist managers of institutions interested in implementing IR.

This study recommends universities to explicitly address IR issues in reporting, as this will increase their impact as leaders of educational thought in addition to their roles as partners, advisors, counselors and assessors.

This study explores whether HEIs in Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales provide disclosure on IIRC content elements as a reflection of integrated thinking and whether the connectivity and interdependence between different departments will help to signal to stakeholders how HEIs create value for society.

This paper aims to investigate the supply and demand side of sustainability assurance in Bangladesh.

Drawing on signalling theory, a logistic regression model is used for a sample of 100 of the largest Bangladeshi companies to study the relationships between assurance, sustainability disclosure, industry membership and reporting format.

Authors’ results show that companies which produce more sustainability information are more likely to get their sustainability assured, to be from non-carbon intensive industries, and are more likely to integrate their sustainability information with the financial annual reports. Authors’ results support the argument that organisations based in weaker legal environments are more likely to secure assurance as this adds to the credibility and reliability of sustainability reports.

This paper has limitations which raise some issues for future research. First, the authors have covered only large companies; therefore, future research could examine the differences between small and large companies in relation to assurance. Secondly, the authors’ data consist of company sustainability disclosure information in the fiscal year 2015. Longitudinal studies are recommended to extend this research. Finally, future research could examine the moderating effects of geographical location on the relationship between assurance (and its providers) and other variables.

The findings of this paper will prove valuable to practitioners and researchers. Practitioners, including assurance providers and sustainability reporting managers will benefit from authors’ study as it covers both the demand and supply side characteristics of assurance. Researchers will benefit from the study as it investigates assurance practices in the developing country of Bangladesh.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to examine both the supply and demand sides of sustainability assurance in Bangladesh. Authors also introduce reporting format when measuring the relationship between assurance and its determinant factors at micro level. The study also links assurance to signalling theory.

This paper aims to examine trends in the content of reporting within 135 UK higher education institutions (HEIs). It explores the extent to which integrated reporting (IR) content elements, reflecting integrated thinking, are disclosed voluntarily and whether HEI-specific features influence the resulting disclosures.

Existing IR guidelines given by the International Integrated Reporting Council (IIRC) and the adoption of content analysis have provided the opportunity to examine the trend and extent of IR content elements associated in HEI corporate reports. The evidence was obtained from 405 UK HEI annual reports covering the period 2014-2016.

The results indicate a significant increase in the number of IR content elements embedded in HEI annual reports. The HEI-specific characteristics examined, such as the establishment of HEI (before or after 1992), adoption of IR framework and size of HEI, are all significantly and positively associated with IR content elements disclosure. This paper argues that institutional theory, isomorphism and isopraxism are relevant for explaining the changes in the contents of HEI annual reports. The findings also suggest that universities are beginning to adopt an integrated thinking approach to the reporting of their activities.

The study is based on IR content elements only and could be extended to include the fundamental concepts and basic principles of the IR framework. There are other factors that have a potentially crucial influence on HEI core activities (such as teaching and learning research and internationalisation) which have been omitted from this study.

The findings will allow policymakers to evaluate the extent to which integrated thinking is taking place and influencing the UK HEI sector in the selection and presentation of information. A further implication of the findings is that an appropriate a sector-wide enforcement and compliance body, for instance, the British Universities Finance Directors Group (BUFDG), may consider developing voluntary IR guidance in a clear, consistent, concise and comparable format. Also, it may pursue regulatory support for this guidance. In doing so, it may monitor the compliance and disclosure levels of appropriate IR requirements. Within such a framework, IR could be used to assist HEIs to make more sustainable choices and allow stakeholders to better understand aspects of HEI performance.

The research has implications for society within and beyond the unique UK HEI sector. Universities are places of advanced thinking and can lead the way for other sectors by demonstrating the potential of integrated thinking to create a cohesive wide-ranging discourse and create engagement among stakeholder groups. Specifically, IR builds on the strong points of accounting, for instance, robust quantitative evidence collecting, relevance, reliability, materiality, comparability and assurability, to explain the sustainability discourse into a “language” logical to HEIs organisational decision makers. Consequently, IR may generate better visibility and knowledge of the financial values of exploiting capitals (financial, intellectual, human, manufactured, social and natural) and offer a multifaceted approach to reassess HEIs organizational performance in various sectors that support the growth of integrated thinking.

This is the first known study to explore HEI characteristics and link them with the level of voluntary IR content elements disclosed in UK HEIs.

We issue a double Souvenir number of The Library World in connection with the Library Association Conference at Birmingham, in which we have pleasure in including a special article, “Libraries in Birmingham,” by Mr. Walter Powell, Chief Librarian of Birmingham Public Libraries. He has endeavoured to combine in it the subject of Special Library collections, and libraries other than the Municipal Libraries in the City. Another article entitled “Some Memories of Birmingham” is by Mr. Richard W. Mould, Chief Librarian and Curator of Southwark Public Libraries and Cuming Museum. We understand that a very full programme has been arranged for the Conference, and we have already published such details as are now available in our July number.

The CATRIONA (Cataloguing and Retrieval of Information over Networks Applications) Feasibility Study, funded by the British Library Research and Development Department and run at Strathclyde University, was a six‐month study which ended in January 1995. The feasibility study had two main aims: to investigate the technical, organisational and financial requirements for the development of applications programs and procedures to enable the cataloguing, classification, and retrieval of documents and other resources over networks; and to explore the feasibility of a library system supplier led collaborative project to develop such applications and procedures and integrate them with one or more existing library housekeeping systems and associated OPAC interfaces. The original proposal can be found at:<URL:http://www.bubl.bath.ac.uk/BUBL/catriona.html> This article outlines the context in which the feasibility study arose, the specific aims of the study, the main results of the study and possible future developments.

THIS number will appear at the beginning of the Leeds Conference. Although there is no evidence that the attendance will surpass the record attendance registered at the Birmingham Conference, there is every reason to believe that the attendance at Leeds will be very large. The year is one of importance in the history of the city, for it has marked the 300th anniversary of its charter. We hope that some of the festival spirit will survive into the week of the Conference. As a contributor has suggested on another page, we hope that all librarians who attend will do so with the determination to make the Conference one of the friendliest possible character. It has occasionally been pointed out that as the Association grows older it is liable to become more stilted and formal; that institutions and people become standardized and less dynamic. This, if it were true, would be a great pity.

This paper seeks to use two empirical episodes to investigate gendered critiques of leadership.

The paper uses an action inquiry approach by reflecting on two pieces of work, one collaborative and one individual, to reflect on ideas about women's ways of leading, and women's leadership of groups. The work includes the making of artefacts which it uses as a stimulus for reflection and as a reflective practice in itself. The artefacts which it uses are quilts, and the feminised nature of quiltmaking is also considered.

The paper begins by reflecting on the ability of a leaderless group of women to achieve a task in a highly successful and timely manner. It uses this experience to explore theories of distributed leadership in work groups, and suggests an alternative proxy for leadership. It then uses the creation of a piece of art about Elvis Presley and the Madonna to consider gendered constructions of leadership, including heroic and post‐heroic leadership. Drawing on the work of Fletcher, it considers why feminised post‐heroic leadership is so often vaunted and so seldom seen. It posits the tension between self‐abnegation and self‐promotion and service and individual achievement as an explanation of the slow adoption of this more feminised form of leadership. The paper traces the emergent process of the work itself, and hints at the difficulty of getting the “right answers” from research participants, and reflects on the role of nostalgia as a limiting factor in organisational research.

The collaborative method of the piece synchronises with the ideas under investigation, and builds on the critique of post‐heroic leadership as an observable phenomenon in organisations.

The purpose of this paper is to explore factors contributing to non-participation in a workplace physical activity (PA) intervention in a large UK call centre.

In total, 16 inactive individuals (nine male/seven female), aged 27±9 years, who had not taken part in the intervention were interviewed to explore their perceptions of PA, the intervention and factors which contributed to their non-participation. Transcripts were analysed using thematic analysis.

Six superordinate themes were identified: self-efficacy for exercise; attitudes towards PA; lack of time and energy; facilities and the physical environment; response to the PA programme and PA culture. Barriers occurred at multiple levels of influence, and support the use of ecological or multilevel models to help guide future programme design/delivery.

The 16 participants were not selected to be representative of the workplace gender or structure. Future intentions relating to PA participation were not considered and participants may have withheld negative opinions about the workplace or intervention despite use of an external researcher.

In this group of employees education about the importance of PA for young adults and providing opportunities to gain social benefits from PA would increase perceived benefits and reduce perceived costs of PA. Workplace cultural norms with respect to PA must also be addressed to create a shift in PA participation.

Employees’ reasons for non-participation in workplace interventions remain poorly understood and infrequently studied. The study considers a relatively under-studied population of employed young adults, providing practical recommendations for future interventions.

Westbrook Farm Home for Boys in Queensland, Australia, existed in various forms for over 100 years. As such, it offers a valuable window into Australian approaches to managing and reforming boys through the twentieth century. The purpose of this paper is to examine its approach to reforming teenage boys during a period marked by a mass escape in 1961. It argues that the reformatory education initially intended was no longer tenable during this moment in history, and that this period represents a breakdown of that approach.

This paper draws on material including newspaper reports, memoirs, and the report of an inquiry into an escape by inmates in 1961. These are analysed in order to construct a picture of the type of reformatory education during this period and the public and official responses to this.

Westbrook Farm Home for Boys was, during this period, an institution attempting to provide a reformatory education at a historical moment when such an education was no longer viewed as appropriate means of addressing the criminal behaviour of youths. This, combined with the leadership of a domineering figure in Superintendent Roy Golledge, led to a culture of abuse, rather than education. The uncovering of this culture was a pivotal moment in the transition of Westbrook into an institution explicitly dealing with criminal youths.

No academic work relating to this moment in Westbrook’s history has been previously published.

There has been a growing policy emphasis on prevention and the promotion of independence for older people. Are we clear, however, what we mean by prevention and how far authorities have been able to balance the needs of service users with promoting the well‐being of older people in general?