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The purpose of this paper is to explore: student perceptions of threshold concepts and capabilities in postgraduate business education, and the potential impacts of intensive modes of teaching on student understanding of threshold concepts and development of threshold capabilities.

The student experience of learning was studied in two business units: strategic management, and accounting. The method involved two phases. In the first, students and unit coordinators identified and justified potential threshold concepts and capabilities. In the second, themes were rationalized.

Significantly more so in intensive mode, the opportunity to ask questions was reported by student participants to support their development of the nominated threshold capabilities. This and other factors reported by students to support their learning in intensive mode are consistent with supporting students to traverse the liminal space within the limited time available in intensive mode.

Respondents from future cohorts will address the small participant numbers. Studies in only two units are reported. Studies in other disciplines are presented elsewhere.

The findings will be important to educators using intensive mode teaching in business, and researchers working within the framework.

This is the first study to explore the potential impacts of intensive modes of teaching on student understanding of threshold concepts and development of threshold capabilities.

Central to Martha Nussbaum's development of the capability approach into a theory of social and global justice is her addition of the notion of a capability threshold below which no dignified human life can be lived. This capability threshold identifies a standard for distributive justice that any decent political order must secure for all citizens. It is this threshold that is the intended focus of this paper.

Examining her most recent statement of the capability approach, Nussbaum's arguments that the threshold should be locally set by each nation in accordance with their history and traditions, and that all nations currently fail to satisfy the threshold condition, are assessed.

This paper shows that if Nussbaum's arguments are accepted, then the central function of a threshold as a tool of discrimination is undermined. If all nations fail to meet their locally set threshold, then there is no clear basis for the global redistribution that Nussbaum regards as necessary. Indeed, what basis there is could even justify counter‐intuitive redistribution from poorer to richer nations.

This paper concludes that if the capability approach is to be developed into a theory of social justice, then, rather than being set locally at different levels, the capability threshold may need to be a genuinely global one. Only then can the threshold discriminate between unjust political orders and those that are at least minimally just.

The purpose of this paper is to explore some of the implications for curriculum design by operationalizing threshold concepts and capabilities (TCC) in subject delivery. The motivation for undertaking this exploration is directly related to addressing public concerns for the business school curriculum.

A post facto analysis of a compulsory subject in finance that is part of an Australian business degree and the impact on a subsequent finance subject.

Customary approaches to granting part-marks in assessing students, (fractionalising) understanding of content can mean students pass subjects without grasping foundational concepts (threshold concepts) and are therefore not fully prepared for subsequent subjects.

Students passing subjects through fractionalization are poorly equipped to undertake deeper explorations in related subjects. If replicated across whole degree programs students may graduate not possessing the attributes claimed for them through their qualification. The implications for undermining public trust and confidence in qualifications are profound and disturbing.

The literature has exposed risks associated with operationalizing threshold through assessments. This highlights a risk to public trust in qualifications.

Operationalizing threshold concepts is an underexplored field in curriculum theory. The importance of operationalizing customary approaches to assessments through fractionalising marks goes to the legitimacy and integrity of qualifications granted by higher education. Operationalizing assessments for TCC presents profound, inescapable and essential challenges to the legitimacy of award granting institutions.

The purpose of this paper is to present a brief exposure to the development of the threshold concepts framework (TCF), the intention being to illuminate for interested readers a broader landscape of research activity than that perhaps conveyed by the individual contributions to this special edition.

There is first an account of how the notion of a “threshold concept” was presented by Meyer and Land in their seminal 2003 paper, and a clarification of some terminology used by them at that time to describe the (confusing for some) “characteristics” of such a concept. A discursive account, with examples, follows on how analyses for, and of, threshold concepts might proceed, and how findings might provoke a reappraisal of associated learning and teaching practices. Towards this end a contemporary pedagogical perspective is introduced based on the construct of integrated threshold concept knowledge (ITCK) as proposed by Meyer and Timmermans (2016). Reference to a detailed case study illustrates the practical dynamics of generating ITCK; specifically in the context of a third-year engineering course embedding the threshold of “critical flow”. Activities and processes, transferable to other discipline contexts, are described that yield particular elements of ITCK (different constituent “types of knowledge”) in relation, in this case, to “critical flow”. A final consideration is the “representation” of “critical flow” for pedagogical purposes in the form of a metacognitive activity for learning and formative assessment purposes that is, again, adaptable to other discipline contexts.

There are no specific findings in this paper as its purpose is to provide a condensed review of the development of the TCF.

This value of this paper is that it provides a contemporary expert exposure to the development of the TCF by the originator of the notion of a threshold concept.

The objective of this chapter is to help unpack the performance-enhancing role of certain capabilities that influence the decision of female immigrant entrepreneurs to rapidly internationalise. It employs a capabilities perspective of the broader resource-based theory and contributes to existing research involving capabilities that facilitate or inhibit rapid internationalisation. One strand of earlier literature highlights a potential ‘double disadvantage’ among particular female immigrant entrepreneurs associated with gender and ethnicity. An alternative strand of prior research identifies certain gender and ethnic resources/capabilities like cultural knowledge that can provide potential advantages. Findings from interviews with 11 female immigrant entrepreneurs that migrated to the UK, and selected secondary data, form an instrumental case study. New insights emerge regarding the potential role of appropriate stakeholders in transforming operational capabilities to those of a threshold or potentially dynamic nature. The findings suggest that generalisation should not occur regarding earlier literature investigating practices in other sectors.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate and identify threshold concepts that are the essential conceptual content of finance programmes.

Conducted in three stages with finance academics and students, the study uses threshold concepts as both a theoretical framework and a research methodology.

The study identifies ten threshold concepts in finance that are clearly endorsed by finance academics. However, the extent to which students are explicitly aware of the threshold concepts in finance is limited.

As well as informing further research into the design and delivery of finance programmes, the findings of the study inform the use of threshold concepts as a theoretical framework and a research methodology. The study does not explore the bounded, discursive, reconstitutive and liminal aspects of threshold concepts. Implications include the lack of recognition of more modern concepts in finance, and the need for input from industry and related disciplines.

The threshold concepts in finance provide the starting point for finance educators in the design and delivery of finance programmes. In particular, the threshold concepts in finance need to be made more explicit to students.

Using the threshold concepts in finance as well as the other findings of this study to inform to finance curriculum design and delivery is likely to achieve better quality educational outcomes for finance students as well as better prepare them for professional finance roles.

The finance curriculum is under researched and for the first time this study identifies the threshold concepts in finance to inform the design of finance programmes.

This article aims to provide a response to the papers in this issue.

The methodology employed is philosophical.

In her response, Nussbaum thanks the authors for their contributions and addresses their most salient arguments.

Nussbaum in this article responds to the papers in this issue of IJSE and addresses the authors' most salient arguments.

This chapter examines the case of threshold concepts, as an example of a theory being developed and applied within higher education research. It traces the origins and meaning of the term, reviews its application by higher education researchers and discusses the issues it raises and the critiques it has attracted. This case is of particular interest, as the idea of threshold concepts is little more than a decade old, yet in that time it has attracted considerable attention.

The purpose of the paper is to design and explain a moral compass framework that informs decision-making by those engaged in shaping the doctoral education and supervision environment.

The research involved analysis of transcripts of 50 interviews with a range of doctoral students and supervisors. The framework was derived from the integration of the transcript analysis with a range of theoretical constructs: Rittel and Webber’s (1973) “wicked” problems; Bowden’s (2004) capability for the unknown future; Baillie et al.’s (2013) threshold capability development; liminality (Meyer and Land 2006); mindfulness (Langer and Moldoveanu, 2000; Green and Bowden, 2012); as well as our interpretation of moral compass and collective morality.

Although applicable to a wide range of contexts, with broader, potentially universal implications for professional life, the framework is explained using the doctoral education system as example, and supervisor and candidate experiences as illustration. It relates individual decision-making to notions of collective morality and moral development within a multi-level system, through moral advocacy and moral mediation, activities identified as necessary at all levels of the doctoral system.

Our framework demonstrates the need for developing awareness of the multi-factorial nature of the wicked problems that arise in doctoral education and the requirement to address such problems across all levels – individual, organisational and national. We identified the central importance of a new construct – collective morality and the way that moral advocacy and moral mediation can contribute to resolution of such wicked problems in doctoral education and supervision.

Drawing on the resource-based view of the firm, this study aims to analyze solution providers’ strategic capabilities that facilitate above-average returns.

The study applies a qualitative comparative case method. In addition to an extensive set of secondary data, the results are based on interviews with 35 executives from nine leading industrial solution providers, their strategic customers and suppliers. The analyzed solution providers were identified based on quantitative survey data.

By observing six distinctive resources and three strategic business processes, the present study identifies seven strategic capabilities that occur in different phases of solution development and deployment: fleet management capability, technology-development capability, mergers and acquisitions capability, value quantifying capability, project management capability, supplier network management capability and value co-creation capability.

The study develops a generic model for the strategic capabilities of servitization. Application of the developed model to different contexts would further validate and enhance it.

Managers can use the developed model to benchmark, identify, build and manage solution providers’ strategic capabilities and associated practices.

The study develops a valuable conceptual model based on the comparative case data. Case firms were selected for the study based on a representative quantitative data set. The results were verified and triangulated with external data.