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Open Access
Article
Publication date: 3 October 2023

Lisa Bohunovsky, Verena Radinger-Peer, Michaela Zint and Marianne Penker

Guided by paradox theory, the study aims to significantly advance Sustainability in Higher Education Institutions (SHEI) scholarship and inform change agents’ (CAs) practices by…

Abstract

Purpose

Guided by paradox theory, the study aims to significantly advance Sustainability in Higher Education Institutions (SHEI) scholarship and inform change agents’ (CAs) practices by uncovering the tensions underlying the challenges CAs face in embedding sustainability in their universities and learning about potential strategies to manage these tensions.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors conducted a multi-step, mix-methods study including interviews (n = 15), an online survey (n = 36) and focus groups (n = 29) with CAs from 17 of Austria’s 22 public universities. Participating CAs consisted of faculty, staff and administrators with leading roles in their Higher Education Institutions’ sustainability change processes.

Findings

Austrian SHEI CAs’ responses revealed 15 tensions at and between the individual, organizational and system level addressing academic, organizational and external stakeholder engagement aspects. Six tensions were selected for more in-depth exploration including elaboration of management strategies, building on CAs’ experiences. Results revealed examples of acceptance, separation and synthesis strategies.

Research limitations/implications

Based on the exploratory nature of our study, the authors do not claim to have identified a comprehensive list of tensions underlying the challenges faced by SHEI CAs, nor of all potential management strategies.

Practical implications

Although this study focused exclusively on Austrian SHEI CAs, the challenges they shared were consistent with those in the literature and, thus, insights should also support the CAs’ efforts in other countries.

Originality/value

This study offers novel perspectives on how to manage the challenges to SHEI. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, it is the first to describe paradox theory-informed management strategies recommended by a heterogenous group of SHEI CAs to address the barriers they face in transforming their universities toward sustainability.

Details

International Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education, vol. 24 no. 9
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1467-6370

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 17 February 2022

Daniela Argento, Laura Broccardo and Elisa Truant

This paper aims to examine why the sustainability paradox exists and how it unfolds by focusing on intraorganizational dynamics. It explores how organizational actors perceive and…

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Abstract

Purpose

This paper aims to examine why the sustainability paradox exists and how it unfolds by focusing on intraorganizational dynamics. It explores how organizational actors perceive and make sense of sustainability and thereby contribute to the sustainability paradox.

Design/methodology/approach

In a case study on IREN, an Italian listed multi-utility with considerable engagements with sustainability, data collection through interviews, e-mails and document analysis revealed contradictions raised by directors and middle managers. Findings were analyzed by iterating with the literature used to frame this study, which combines organizational sensemaking, paradoxes and management control.

Findings

The sustainability paradox comprises various facets. Directors and middle managers interpret sustainability differently depending on their role within the organization and their perceptions of the concept itself. Different interpretations thus occur within and across organizational levels and functions, impacting how sustainability is implemented and monitored. The use of parallel management control systems (MCSs) reflects multiple and fragmented sensemaking, which explains the facets of the sustainability paradox.

Research limitations/implications

Although this work illuminates the role played by individuals at top- and middle-management organizational levels and MCSs in relation to the sustainability paradox, more research is needed on how individuals make sense of sustainability at the lowest organizational levels.

Practical implications

Organizations claiming commitment to sustainability must establish communication forms on the practicalities of sustainability throughout the organization to stimulate shared sensemaking and the design and use of inclusive MCSs.

Originality/value

This paper explains why and how organizations unconsciously enact various facets of the sustainability paradox.

Details

Meditari Accountancy Research, vol. 30 no. 7
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2049-372X

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 28 May 2019

Firdaus Amyar, Nunung Nurul Hidayah, Alan Lowe and Margaret Woods

There has been very little qualitative “fieldwork” of audit practice. This is especially the case in relation to investigations into how audit engagements proceed. The purpose of…

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Abstract

Purpose

There has been very little qualitative “fieldwork” of audit practice. This is especially the case in relation to investigations into how audit engagements proceed. The purpose of this paper is to engage with audit practice in order to explore and explain the internal dynamics and paradoxical conditions within audit engagement teams.

Design/methodology/approach

The research adopts a qualitative methodology, framed around an intensive case study that involves several methods of data collection and analysis including interviews, observation and document analysis. The authors observe audit team practices, work programmes and organisation including observations of individual and teams involved in audit engagements.

Findings

Using the lens of paradox theory, the authors explore the backstage of audit work, where audit teams are challenged with recurring contradictory requirements and opposing demands. The authors provide insight on the complexity associated with inadequate resourcing and planning that tend to stimulate the emergence of paradoxes in audit engagement work in a government audit context. As a result, the authors identify the occurrence of cascading reduced audit quality practices (RAQP) as the teams respond to the paradoxes they face.

Originality/value

The authors reveal the interlinked and cumulative coping strategies, namely, downplaying responsibility and downscaling audit processes. These strategies are performed concurrently by team leaders and audit members to manage paradoxical tensions. The authors also identified superficial audit supervision as another type of RAQP performed by team leaders.

Details

Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, vol. 32 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0951-3574

Keywords

Open Access
Book part
Publication date: 4 October 2019

Rene Wiedner and Shaz Ansari

Divestitures and other forms of organizational separation are not commonly associated with continuity and ongoing collaboration in inter-organizational relationships. Instead…

Abstract

Divestitures and other forms of organizational separation are not commonly associated with continuity and ongoing collaboration in inter-organizational relationships. Instead, separation is often equated with terminating relationships and gaining independence. Here, the authors argue that achieving separation does not require terminating relationships and that ongoing collaboration between separating entities may actually contribute to successful separation. The authors base this argument on the assertion that the objective of organizational separation is to achieve organizational autonomy for all entities involved and that separating entities can enable each other’s development of autonomy while remaining interdependent. The authors also discuss how collaborative separation may contribute to a range of benefits, as well as why it may nevertheless fail to emerge in practice. In this respect, the authors consider the relevance of ethical perspectives and emotional dynamics related to feelings of (dis)respect, (dis)trust, pride and shame. The authors conclude by discussing activities that may contribute to, and undermine, effective collaborative separation.

Details

Managing Inter-organizational Collaborations: Process Views
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78756-592-0

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 11 January 2021

William S. Harvey, Vince-Wayne Mitchell, Alessandra Almeida Jones and Eric Knight

A major part of knowledge management for knowledge-intensive firms such as professional service firms is the increasing focus on thought leadership. Despite being a well-known…

9564

Abstract

Purpose

A major part of knowledge management for knowledge-intensive firms such as professional service firms is the increasing focus on thought leadership. Despite being a well-known term, it is poorly defined and analysed in the academic and practitioner literature. The aim of this article is to answer three questions. First, what is thought leadership? Second, what tensions exist when seeking to create thought leadership in knowledge-based organisations? Third, what further research is needed about thought leadership? The authors call for cross-disciplinary and academic–practitioner approaches to understanding the field of thought leadership.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors review the academic and practitioner literature on thought leadership to provide a rich oversight of how it is defined and can be understood by separating inputs, creation processes and outcomes. The authors also draw on qualitative data from 12 in-depth interviews with senior leaders of professional service firms.

Findings

Through analysing and building on previous understandings of the concept, the authors redefine thought leadership as follows: “Knowledge from a trusted, eminent and authoritative source that is actionable and provides valuable solutions for stakeholders”. The authors find and explore nine tensions that developing thought leadership creates and propose a framework for understanding how to engage with thought leadership at the industry/macro, organisational/meso and individual/micro levels. The authors propose a research agenda based on testing propositions derived from new theories to explain thought leadership, including leadership, reducing risk, signalling quality and managing social networks, as well as examining the suggested ways to resolve different tensions.

Originality/value

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, they are the first to separate out thought leadership from its inputs, creation processes and outcomes. The authors show new organisational paradoxes within thought leadership and show how they can play out at different levels of analysis when implementing a thought leadership strategy. This work on thought leadership is set in a relatively under-explored context for knowledge management researchers, namely, knowledge-intensive professional service firms.

Details

Journal of Knowledge Management, vol. 25 no. 11
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1367-3270

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 20 January 2021

Paolo Ferri, Shannon I.L. Sidaway and Garry D. Carnegie

The monetary valuation of cultural heritage of a selection of 16 major public, not-for-profit Australian cultural institutions is examined over a period of almost three decades…

4639

Abstract

Purpose

The monetary valuation of cultural heritage of a selection of 16 major public, not-for-profit Australian cultural institutions is examined over a period of almost three decades (1992–2019) to understand how they have responded to the paradoxical tensions of heritage valuation for financial reporting purposes.

Design/methodology/approach

Accounting for cultural heritage is an intrinsically paradoxical practice; it involves a conflict of two opposite ways of attributing value: the traditional accounting and the heritage professionals (or curatorial) approaches. In analysing the annual reports and other documentary sources through qualitative content analysis, the study explores how different actors responded to the conceptual and technical contradictions posed by the monetary valuation of “heritage assets”, the accounting phraseology of accounting standards.

Findings

Four phases emerge from the analysis undertaken of the empirical material, each characterised by a distinctive nature of the paradox, the institutional responses discerned and the outcomes. Although a persisting heterogeneity in the practice of accounting for cultural heritage is evident, responses by cultural institutions are shown to have minimised, so far, the negative impacts of monetary valuation in terms of commercialisation of deaccessioning decisions and distorted accountability.

Originality/value

In applying the theoretical lens of paradox theory in the context of the financial reporting of heritage, as assets, the study enhances an understanding of the challenges and responses by major public cultural institutions in a country that has led this development globally, providing insights to accounting standard setters arising from the accounting practices observed.

Details

Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, vol. 34 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0951-3574

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 5 May 2021

Linda Höglund, Maria Mårtensson and Kerstin Thomson

The purpose of this paper is to enhance understanding of the conceptualisation and operationalisation of public value in practice by applying Moore's (1995) strategic triangle as…

9303

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to enhance understanding of the conceptualisation and operationalisation of public value in practice by applying Moore's (1995) strategic triangle as an analytical framework to study strategic management and management control practices in relation to public value.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper uses an interpretative longitudinal case study approach including qualitative methods of document studies and interviews between 2017 and 2019.

Findings

In the strategic triangle, the three nodes of authorising environment, public value creation and operational capacity are interdependent, and alignment is a necessity for a strategy to be successful. But this alignment is vulnerable. The findings suggest three propositions: (1) strategic alignment is vulnerable to management control practices having a strong focus on performance measurements, (2) strategic alignment is vulnerable to standardised management control practices and (3) strategic alignment is vulnerable to politically driven management control practices.

Originality/value

With the strategic triangle as a base, this paper tries to understand what kind of management control practices enable and/or constrain public value, as there has been a call for this kind of research. In this way it adds to earlier research on public value, to the growing interest in the strategic triangle as an analytical framework in analysing empirical material and to the request for more empirical studies on the subject. The strategic triangle also embraces political factors, government agendas and political leadership for which there has also been a call for more research.

Details

Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, vol. 34 no. 7
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0951-3574

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 17 May 2022

Hao Li, Jialin Sun and Guotang Zhao

With the help of multi-body dynamics software UM, the paper uses Kik–Piotrowski model to simulate wheel-rail contact and Archard wear model for rail wear.

Abstract

Purpose

With the help of multi-body dynamics software UM, the paper uses Kik–Piotrowski model to simulate wheel-rail contact and Archard wear model for rail wear.

Design/methodology/approach

The CRH5 vehicle-track coupling dynamics model is constructed for the wear study of rails of small radius curves, namely 200 and 350 m in Guangzhou East EMU Depot and those 250 and 300 m radius in Taiyuan South EMU Depot.

Findings

Results show that the rail wear at the straight-circle point, the curve center point and the circle-straight point follows the order of center point > the circle-straight point > the straight-circle point. The wear on rail of small radius curves intensifies with the rise of running speed, and the wearing trend tends to fasten as the curve radius declines. The maximum rail wear of the inner rail can reach 2.29 mm, while that of the outer rail, 10.11 mm.

Originality/value

With the increase of the train passing number, the wear range tends to expand. The rail wear decreases with the increase of the curve radius. The dynamic response of vehicle increases with the increase of rail wear, among which the derailment coefficient is affected the most. When the number of passing vehicles reaches 1 million, the derailment coefficient exceeds the limit value, which poses a risk of derailment.

Details

Railway Sciences, vol. 1 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2755-0907

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 31 August 2021

Carin Lindskog and Johan Netz

This study aims to create a better understanding of how practitioners implement and work Agile while balancing the tensions arising between stability and change.

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Abstract

Purpose

This study aims to create a better understanding of how practitioners implement and work Agile while balancing the tensions arising between stability and change.

Design/methodology/approach

A grounded theory approach was used to explore what happens in practice when software development teams implement and work Agile. The empirical data consists of twenty semi-structured interviews with practitioners working in fourteen different organizations and in six different Agile roles.

Findings

As a result, a substantive theory was presented of continuously balancing between stability and change in Agile teams. In addition, the study also proposes three guidelines that can help organizations about to change their way of working to Agile.

Research limitations/implications

The inherent limitation of a grounded theory study is that a substantial theory can only explain the specific contexts explored in that study. Thus, this study's contribution is a substantial theory that needs to be further developed and improved.

Practical implications

The proposed guidelines can help organizations about to change their way of working to Agile. They can also assist organizations in switching from “doing Agile” to “being Agile”, thus becoming more successful.

Originality/value

The new perspective that this study contributes is the fact that our discovered categories show that several inherent processes are ongoing at the same time in order to balance the need to have both stability and change.

Details

International Journal of Managing Projects in Business, vol. 14 no. 7
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1753-8378

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 20 September 2022

Marcel F. van Assen and Marjolein C.J. Caniëls

In this study the authors investigate the relationship of both social (SLMX) and economic (ELMX) leader–member exchange with innovative work behaviour (IWB) and the potential…

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Abstract

Purpose

In this study the authors investigate the relationship of both social (SLMX) and economic (ELMX) leader–member exchange with innovative work behaviour (IWB) and the potential moderating effect of having a paradox mindset. A paradox mindset facilitates the recognition of tensions and the integration of competing demands and goals, which may fuel IWB.

Design/methodology/approach

At two points in time the authors gathered survey data from employees working in the mid and back office of a Dutch bank.

Findings

SLMX associates with innovative behaviour, whilst ELMX does not. However, when paradox mindset is included as a moderator, the authors find negative interaction effects of paradox mindset with both ELMX and SLMX.

Practical implications

The findings indicate that management should be aware of the impact that having a paradox mindset has on the innovative work behaviour of employees. Managers are well advised to assess the extent to which an employee entertains a paradox mindset and adjust the type of leadership appropriate to the situation, and in particular adjust the intensity of their exchange relationship with these employees.

Originality/value

Paradox mindset acts as a substitute for an employee's social relationship with the leader, as paradox mindset captures most of the variation in IWB, thereby drawing influence away from SLMX. This finding complements studies showing that a person's mindset can greatly influence innovative work behaviour.

Details

European Journal of Innovation Management, vol. 25 no. 6
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1460-1060

Keywords

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