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This paper aims to provide insights into the female transformational leadership behaviours within a socially dynamic environment. Research was conducted in the State of Qatar, a country that is going through a rapid social change.

The research framework was based on the transformational leadership framework (TLF) initially proposed by Burns (1978) and further developed by Bass (1985). A respondent set, consisting of 25 Qatari female managers, was taken from the largest public university in the State of Qatar. In-depth interviews were the main source of collected data. The data were analysed using NVivo 11.

Predominantly, Qatari female leadership behaviours were reflective of transformational leadership. In their dealings, Qatari female managers displayed motherly instincts, encouraged open communication, used relationship adaptations and used trust. From time to time, Qatari female managers displayed non-transformational leadership behaviours. This occasional leadership style switch was part of behavioural flexibility that was required in a mixed age, mixed gender, mixed experience and mixed nationalities work environment. The key reason for the change in transformational leadership approach came as a reaction to subordinates’ attitude. In particular, the male-dominated work environment required behavioural adjustments (such as being more assertive and autocratic) to deal with masculine subordinates.

A range of respondent perceptions were related to defining leadership. There was some overlapping between the tested determinants. For example, idealised influence and individualised consideration shared a degree of similarity in terms of how they were perceived.

Socially dynamic environment should be seen as an opportunity for female transformational leadership development. Social dynamism may result in an evolved TLF that could be more appropriate for Qatari organisations. Hence, experience and problem sharing between Qatari female managers may help in developing a socially and culturally fitting transformational leadership model.

The study presented a perspective of a socially dynamic environment where women were practicing transformational leadership primarily through behavioural flexibility and change management. The study suggests an extended version of TLF that would be more suitable for female leadership within a socially dynamic environment.

To argue that unique contemporary cultural shifts are leading to a new form of librarianship that can be characterised as “postmodern” in nature, and that this form of professional specialism will be increasingly influential in the decades to come.

A theoretical piece based on ideas from cultural history.

That postmodern library and information science (LIS) concepts will be a vital new strand to professional practice, but they will most likely subsist alongside more familiar concepts of practice which have proved readily applicable in the early years of “first wave” web technologies.

These are purely conceptual approaches to LIS and need to be investigated evidentially.

The change from “first wave” web technologies to Web 2.0 information technologies may have a greater impact on future techniques in digital librarianship than the change from print to the first electronic libraries in the 1990s.

This LIS paper is distinctive in that it borrows original ideas from the humanities to offer an understanding of LIS practice in the context of broad “cultural theory”, rather than in the narrower context of change in mechanical and technological processes.

Within international human resources management scholarship, the importance of trust for good employee relations is well-recognized. This paper aims to deepen understanding of extant intercultural communication (IC) studies on trust, with practical implications for globalizing organizations, by surfacing particularities of a developed Asia (Japanese) subsidiary in developing Asia (Thailand). It thereby contributes to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals on International Partnerships (UN SGD 17) and decent work (UN SDG 8).

The paper draws on first-hand interviews with Thai executives of varying responsibilities at a Japanese manufacturer to understand how IC can lead to trust failure in globalizing organizations. It follows a subjectivist, social constructivist epistemology to deepen understanding.

The findings break ground toward an innovative understanding of how Thai executives’ expectations might be betrayed, by surfacing a novel conceptualization of trust failure.

Research is limited to the case examined and the limitation is recognized within the paper. This paper offers an important theoretical refinement – a novel understanding and contribution to how trust might falter.

The findings have important practical implications for international organizations to be wary of power (and especially inequalities), insecurity and the resultant need for empathetic interpersonal relations in Thailand. Similar insights could be potentially relevant in other developed–developing Asia dyadic contexts as well because of the broad-based design of the current case study. Recommendations for staff selection are offered.

The study directly relates to global society’s sustainability objectives, especially decent work that targets a safe working environment for all.

The paper offers in-depth original insights into individual business executives’ values for trust creation in intercultural international organizations. It addresses the paucity of lived experience accounts of trust “failures” in Developed-Developing Asia contexts, valuable to realizing UN SDG 17 that pertains to international partnerships.

Sustainable solutions for meeting the physical, emotional and social health care needs of individuals may be realized by shifting the care landscape; for instance, through innovative models of service-integrated housing (SIH). By diversifying populations in these settings, care recipients can choose to engage their skills and abilities toward assisting co-residents, and vice versa as a form of symbiosis. The purpose of this paper is to define attributes of the concept and practice of symbiotic care.

The authors drew on firsthand field experience and secondary data from a literature review to conduct a conceptual derivation and analysis, using Walker and Avant’s methodology. The term symbiotic mutualism was derived from the field of biology as an analogy for care exchanged between non-peer co-residents. Attributes, antecedents and consequences of symbiotic care were identified and illustrated using model, borderline and contrary case descriptions.

Four defining attributes of symbiotic care were identified: first, cohabitation: care recipients live closely together in SIH settings. Second, non-peer: co-residents have distinct, complementary needs and abilities. Third, mutualism: co-residents experience mutually significant benefits as a result of the activities of their co-residents. Fourth, agency-sponsored: the professional SIH agency or organization attends to unmet resident needs.

Symbiotic care is a relatively rare phenomenon for which little research exists. This analysis provides a starting point for empirical research, policy and program development and critical evaluation.

This paper fills a wide gap in the research literature and offers important terminology. It is the first to define the attributes of symbiotic care.

Gender bias and stereotypes are universal issues in today’s society. This study presents a comprehensive review of women’s leadership based on bibliometric analysis. The feminist approach to leadership is helpful in many ways, and it could be the type of leadership needed in the challenging world of academia. Women present unique characteristics and traits, particularly their motherly approach to leadership.

A review of the literature based on bibliometric analysis by mapping the knowledge structure of the subject is conferred by uncovering the past, present and future trends based on three bibliometric analyses.

The finding suggests that gender equality, stereotypes and barriers in women’s leadership are at the forefront of the subject in HEIs. The overall system, mindset and willingness for institutional transformation are needed to change the mindset of accepting women as leaders of HEIs.

This study brought the significant idea of increasing women’s empowerment in HEIs, eventually strengthening institutional leadership’s capability towards advanced education.

This study would present a crucial foundation in women’s empowerment, particularly from the HEIs perspective and from the generic women’s leadership literature.

Many people feel a connection to their work that could best be described as a dependency, due to its intensity and importance to their overall self-concept. It is likely that psychological and social needs play a profound role in the connection people feel to their work; however, the explanatory power of these factors has been neglected in the literature, particularly with regard to cultural perspectives. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

To address this deficiency, the authors propose a profile multidimensional construct referred to as psycho-social work dependency, drawing on the Mandala model of self (Hwang, 2011b) and the Chinese composite self (Lu, 2003). The authors also developed a psychometrically sound 16-item questionnaire, the psycho-social work dependency scale, to measure this construct. A total of 1,314 valid questionnaires were obtained from employees in Taiwan to verify the reliability and validity of the instrument. Cross-validation was conducted using an independent sample of 278 valid questionnaires.

The results indicate good reliability and validity. What follows is a discussion of four types of psycho-social work dependency: strong, loose, direct, and indirect. Implications and suggestions for future research are also presented.

A cultural-inclusive construct-psycho-social work dependency was developed to best delineate the connections between Chinese employees and their work. This study expounded the definition, structure, measurement scale, and profile of psycho-social work dependency. These results could help OB researchers and practitioners to know more about the connections between employees and their work, especially for Chinese workers. This new construct may also stir up more studies to investigate the role of psycho-social work dependency in the workplace.

The purpose of this paper is to contribute to a better understanding of how socially‐embedded information systems (IS), knowledge, and firm capabilities can impact the post‐merger integration efforts of a firm. In particular, this research seeks to identify, describe, and analyze how socially‐embedded resources hindered the integration of the procurement function following the merger of two telecommunications firms.

This research was designed as a longitudinal exploratory study of a single case. The design involved multiple interviews, participant observation, and an evaluation of multiple data sources. Data were collected to develop a comprehensive and reliable understanding of events and outcomes related to the systems integration effort. Process models are used to show the development of phenomena over time.

The findings of the research are twofold. First, in line with previous findings on socially‐embedded resources, the research shows that socially‐embedded resources hindered the ability of a merged firm to integrate some resources. Previous research argued that social constraints can prevent a firm from changing the way it uses resources to establish a competitive advantage, and this research confirms those findings. Second, this research is an important contribution because it identifies two social constraints in particular – cognitive sunk costs and the reluctance to defy social traditions – that contributed to the inability of the merged firm to successfully integrate the procurement function following a merger.

The findings of this study provide empirical evidence to support the theoretical argument that the socially embedded resources involved in the IS, knowledge, and firm capabilities of each of the firms prior to the merger enabled them to establish a competitive advantage in their respective market environments. Further, the data provide validation for the idea that the social context in which firms compete does, in fact, contribute to the development of competitive advantages. The RBV is also extended by showing that the same social contexts can also prevent firms from integrating important resources following a corporate merger.

One of the main objectives of executive management following a corporate merger is to lead the organization in skillfully integrating key resources of the merged organization. However, most firms cannot successfully engage in post‐merger integration efforts unless they fully understand how resources such as IS, knowledge, and firm capabilities can help or hinder their integration efforts. By highlighting one firm's efforts to integrate resources following a merger, the paper provides concrete examples of potential problems that can arise. Potential problems and hindrances are presented in a strategic checklist for managerial consideration.