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1 – 10 of 43David Ong, David Reid and Natasha Simons
This article seeks to provide an update of two papers presented to the VDX Users Group of Australia and New Zealand during 2006. It aims to explore the issues associated with the…
Abstract
Purpose
This article seeks to provide an update of two papers presented to the VDX Users Group of Australia and New Zealand during 2006. It aims to explore the issues associated with the implementation of Trans Tasman Interlending and its subsequent success, and is written primarily from a technical perspective.
Design/methodology/approach
The first part describes the issues addressed, processes used and resolutions adopted in the period leading up to the go‐live of Trans Tasman Interlending. The second part provides a review of the first six months of operation.
Findings
Trans Tasman Interlending has produced interesting results and is clearly more significant for interlending in New Zealand than it is Australia. This article looks at a variety of result areas and delves into the issues the linked service has highlighted.
Research limitations/implications
While both countries have based their analysis on readily available report data, it is only in the Australian context that a formalised user survey was used. New Zealand reporting relies more on anecdotal evidence.
Practical implications
In highlighting the issues involved in linking two utilities this article potentially provides a checklist for others to follow and a yardstick against which to measure success.
Originality/value
Trans Tasman Interlending is a first for the linking of two national interlending utilities.
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Samantha Searle, Malcolm Wolski, Natasha Simons and Joanna Richardson
The purpose of this paper is to describe the evolution to date and future directions in research data policy, infrastructure, skills development and advisory services in an…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to describe the evolution to date and future directions in research data policy, infrastructure, skills development and advisory services in an Australian university, with a focus on the role of librarians.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors have been involved in the development of research data services at Griffith, and the case study presents observations and reflections arising from their first-hand experiences.
Findings
Griffith University’s organisational structure and “whole-of-enterprise” approach has facilitated service development to support research data. Fostering strong national partnerships has also accelerated development of institutional capability. Policies and strategies are supported by pragmatic best practice guidelines aimed directly at researchers. Iterative software development and a commitment to well-supported enterprise infrastructure enable the provision of a range of data management solutions. Training programs, repository support and data planning services are still relatively immature. Griffith recognises that information services staff (including librarians) will need more opportunities to develop knowledge and skills to support these services as they evolve.
Originality/value
This case study provides examples of library-led and library-supported activities that could be used for comparative purposes by other libraries. At the same time, it provides a critical perspective by contrasting areas of good practice within the University with those of less satisfactory progress. While other institutions may have different constraints or opportunities, some of the major concepts within this paper may prove useful to advance the development of research data capability and capacity across the library profession.
Justin Waring, Simon Bishop, Fiona Marshall, Natasha Tyler and Robert Vickers
The purpose of this paper is to investigate how three communication interventions commonly used during discharge planning and care transitions enable inter-professional knowledge…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate how three communication interventions commonly used during discharge planning and care transitions enable inter-professional knowledge sharing and learning as a foundation for more integrated working. These interventions include information communication systems, dedicated discharge planning roles and group-based planning activities.
Design/methodology/approach
A two-year ethnographic study was carried out across two regional health and care systems in the English National Health Service, focussing on the discharge of stroke and hip fracture patients. Data collection involved in-depth observations and 213 semi-structured interviews.
Findings
Information systems (e.g. e-records) represent a relatively stable conduit for routine and standardised forms of syntactic information exchange that can “bridge” time–space knowledge boundaries. Specialist discharge roles (e.g. discharge coordinators) support personalised and dynamic forms of “semantic” knowledge sharing that can “broker” epistemic and cultural boundaries. Group-based activities (e.g. team meetings) provide a basis for more direct “pragmatic” knowledge translation that can support inter-professional “bonding” at the cultural and organisational level, but where inclusion factors complicate exchange.
Research limitations/implications
The study offers analysis of how professional boundaries complicate discharge planning and care transition, and the potential for different communication interventions to support knowledge sharing and learning.
Originality/value
The paper builds upon existing research on inter-professional collaboration and patient safety by focussing on the problems of communication and coordination in the context of discharge planning and care transitions. It suggests that care systems should look to develop multiple complementary approaches to inter-professional communication that offer opportunities for dynamic knowledge sharing and learning.
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This study documents the role of relational trust in an afterschool organization and its influences on young people’s experiences.
Abstract
Purpose
This study documents the role of relational trust in an afterschool organization and its influences on young people’s experiences.
Design/methodology/approach
Through a 10-month ethnographic study of one afterschool program that teaches teens how to make documentaries, I demonstrate that the confluence of blurred organizational goals; weak relational trust among staff; and funding pressures may have the unintended consequence of exploiting students for their work products and life stories.
Findings
The study finds that, while not all organizations function with student work at its center, many afterschool organizations are under increasing pressures to document student gains through tangible measures.
Practical implications
Implications from these findings reveal the need for developing strong relationships among staff members as well as establishing transparency in funding afterschool programs from within the organization and from foundations in order to provide quality programming for young people.
Originality/value
This study informs organizational theory, specifically in terms of measures of variation in relational trust within an organization and its influence on young people. This chapter includes student accounts of experiences with staff to enhance the significance of relational trust.
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Leadership and music are two topics that are rarely mentioned together. However, their universal, intriguing, and complex nature allows a unique framework for helping individuals…
Abstract
Leadership and music are two topics that are rarely mentioned together. However, their universal, intriguing, and complex nature allows a unique framework for helping individuals learn leadership concepts. In this paper several songs have been selected from various music genres. Each demonstrates elements of leadership. Aspects of popular culture such as music can create opportunities to learn about leadership and contribute to the development of one’s leadership style. General leadership concepts, along with the transformational approach and emotional intelligence, will be explained as we study each song. Additionally, the paper will discuss effective teaching methods and applications for using music to teach leadership.
Christos Begkos and Katerina Antonopoulou
In the current digital era where online content is riddled with fabricated metrics and rankings, this research aims to investigate the underpinning mechanisms of the calculative…
Abstract
Purpose
In the current digital era where online content is riddled with fabricated metrics and rankings, this research aims to investigate the underpinning mechanisms of the calculative practices which actors engage with to evaluate digital platform content in the absence of well-defined performance measures.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper focuses on the online, photo-sharing platform Instagram which is devoid of common performance measures such as rankings, ratings and reviews. The authors applied netnographic methods to capture users' actions and interactions at the Greek Instagram community. The authors adopt a practice lens as informed by Schatzki's ‘site ontology’ to capture actors' calculative practices as organised by rules, teleoaffective structures and general and practical understandings.
Findings
Platform actors engage in aesthetic and palpable evaluations of other user profiles and their posted content. They employ permissible (e.g., using third-party apps) and illicit (e.g., lobbying and procuring engagement) tactics to measure and manage digital platform performance, fabricate metrics and blur others' evaluations, in pursuit of prestige and material teleologies. Their calculative practices are conditioned by an implicit social etiquette, which permeates the platform both horizontally and vertically.
Originality/value
First, the paper captures and theorises the mechanisms which underpin actors' calculative practices for performance measurement in the absence of robust judgement devices. Second, it demonstrates how ambiguous assemblages of material and prestige teleologies, aesthetic and palpable evaluative regimes and implicit rules and practical expertise collectively invoke platform actors' calculative practices and the construction of performance measures. In doing so, it contributes to performance measurement literature via demonstrating how management accounting is implicated in the evaluation of digital platform outputs.
Practical implications
The paper provides insight on how platform actors fabricate performance metrics, what they perceive as ‘good’ online content and what constitutes an ‘impactful’ user account or a ‘successful’ social media campaign. Such findings are valuable to management accountants, entrepreneurs and practitioners who seek to evaluate digital platform performance.
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Habsah Muda, Zaharah Salwati Baba, Zainudin Awang, Natasha Shazleen Badrul, Nanthakumar Loganathan and Mass Hareeza Ali
The rationale for the postgraduate supervision measures for higher education by the call for universities to adopt a systematic practice in postgraduate supervision through new…
Abstract
Purpose
The rationale for the postgraduate supervision measures for higher education by the call for universities to adopt a systematic practice in postgraduate supervision through new supervisors' exposure to creative ways of monitoring. This paper aims at understanding, improving and validating the content of behavioral supervision measures using the expert review and pretesting analysis.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors developed, modified and operationalized the items based on the developmental supervision theoretical concept by Glickman (1980) to measure the behavioral supervision of postgraduate in higher education. The authors obtain comments and verification from experts for content validity and criterion validity. Later, the authors do pretesting of face validity.
Findings
The result of the expert review and pretesting, analysis, provides measures (items) for the following seven stages (components) of postgraduate behavioral supervision: listening/clarifying; encouraging; presenting/demonstrating; negotiating/problem-solving; directing; standardizing and reinforcing.
Practical implications
The findings contribute to the rational development of supervision measures and functional transformation in the postgraduate supervision process in higher education at national and international contexts.
Social implications
These supervision measures, if practiced by the supervisors and postgraduates' students, will accelerate and achieve the aspiration initiative of the Ministry of Higher Education. In general, based on the needs identified, the positive impact of this study can improve national and international postgraduate program educational outcomes.
Originality/value
There is limited number of empirical research which resulted in postgraduate behavioral supervision measures in the context of higher education.
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Natasha Zafar, Muhammad Ali Asadullah, Muhammad Zia Ul Haq, Ahmad Nabeel Siddiquei and Sajjad Nazir
The firms use training evaluation practices (TEPs) to determine the return of billions of dollars spent on employee training and development activities. The firms need to…
Abstract
Purpose
The firms use training evaluation practices (TEPs) to determine the return of billions of dollars spent on employee training and development activities. The firms need to modernize the set of TEPs for evidence-based workforce management decisions. This study aims to examine a mediation mechanism to explain how human resource (HR) professionals’ design thinking (DT) mindset strengthens the set of TEPs using predictive workforce analytics (PWAs).
Design/methodology/approach
The authors used SPSS computational named MLMED to test the proposed relationships by collecting data from 180 management professionals serving in subsidiaries of multinational corporations in Pakistan.
Findings
The statistical results demonstrated that DT is not directly related to firms’ TEPs. However, the statistical results supported the mediating role of firms’ use of PWAs between DT and TEPs.
Originality/value
The findings offer a new perspective for firms to use HR professionals’ DT mindset for modernizing the set of existing HR practices.
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Craig S. Fleisher and Natasha M. Blair
This paper examines the evolution of two separate fields, which are essentially concerned with the same issues but are framed by different academic and professional disciplines…
Abstract
This paper examines the evolution of two separate fields, which are essentially concerned with the same issues but are framed by different academic and professional disciplines and practice. It appears that public affairs management researchers often fail to take into account parallel literature from the discipline of public relations — even when purporting to offer an interdisciplinary approach. Equally, the public relations literature frequently fails to speak the language of business management and narrowly defines such key business activities as marketing, policy and strategy. In this paper, the authors present evidence prescribing the differing evolution of public affairs and public relations. They compare and contrast public affairs and public relations in terms of their definitions, scholarship, survey evidence, leading writers, academic and professional associations and educational programme content. They conclude by offering several suggestions for closing the gap between the two areas.
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