This paper aims to understand how managers in an Australian financial institution coordinated different organisational actions for the management of the work health of employees, by adopting “work‐life balance” initiatives.
The paper uses a narrative approach to analyse various internal and external documents and has also collected “self‐accounts” of employees.
It was found that management used “work‐life balance” initiatives to manage both the physical and emotional health of employees. Management's main focus was on community volunteering, which was satisfying for employees, but also of significant benefit to the organisation in terms of marketing and branding. Thus, management was able to use these initiatives to motivate employees to work towards organisational goals.
The paper contributes to the developing literature on human competence accounting by using employee “self‐accounts” to compare with organisational statements in relation to worker health.
]]>This paper aims to outline the financial and human cost of bullying in the workplace. The authors investigate how bullying is perpetrated so that management controls to prevent bullying can be put in place, reducing financial and human costs, and the risks posed to organisations by bullying.
The authors' study uses an exploratory on‐line survey, designed from a practice perspective. The instigator is an Australian management consultancy working on managing organisational risk. The study is based on sense‐making research using open‐ended questions, delving into life experiences to recall potential bullying incidences in their work life. The authors then develop hypotheses from their review of the literature and compare these to the results of their survey.
Most of the authors' findings contradict both academic and practitioner notions of bullying. They find that bullying happens mostly between peers rather than being perpetrated by people in positions of power over weaker colleagues, extends into all levels of the organisation, is perpetrated as part of the normal day‐to‐day interactions between people, rather than in special circumstances, and is often perpetrated between peers in the presence of other peers. To explain this behaviour the authors introduce the concept of “tournaments” from agency theory and the personal characteristics of perpetrators and victims.
From a management control and accounting perspective, managers controlling and accounting for bullying can also be the perpetrators and their participation in organisational politics and competitive tournaments may well be preventing the recognition and control of bullying, counter to what is good for the organisation.
This paper's risk management approach to understanding bullying in the workplace is novel; it outlines implications from a management control and accounting perspective. It also uses the concept of “tournaments” to propose why Australian managers tend to want to “sweep the issue under the carpet” and how the authors' research methodology offers a way forward to raise awareness so bullying can become an important part of management control in organisations.
]]>Health is a main resource for human functioning. Embedding generative health management within organisations, therefore, is useful for health and productivity reasons. Generative health management requires a change in the thinking and actions of all stakeholders, and should be regarded as a system transition that may be supported by a value case. In this study, a value case methodology is described and piloted. The aim was to investigate the efficacy of the value case methodology for generative health management within organisations.
This paper takes the form of a case study, in which the interactive value case methodology is piloted within a research foundation in The Netherlands.
The different perspectives from the internal stakeholders on generative health management were made explicit, and revealed a strong relation between organisational development and health. The interactive value‐case methodology has initiated a process in which stakeholders jointly defined the full value of generative health management. During that process, some stakeholders developed an active personal commitment towards the transition.
The research was only carried out in one case. The value case methodology is potentially also useful for other transitions (long‐term complex developments or system innovations). The case study provided a broad view on the relevance of health for all stakeholders within this single case, and contributed to ownership of the transition.
A value case presents stakeholders' multi‐perspective visions and preferences with regard to health and organisational development. The participative approach opens up ways to an active commitment of relevant stakeholders who are willing to support transitions.
The methodology to assess the full value of complex transitions is still of an explorative nature. The value case methodology may offer innovative ways to support transitions in individuals, organisations and society as a whole.
]]>The purpose of this study is to explore explanation factors regarding labor communication practices by many of the world's large companies.
The data collection focuses on the 2009 fiscal year sourced from 460 highly visible public companies in 57 separate countries. A total of 14 Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) items are used as the benchmark of labor disclosure checklist.
The authors' results provide evidence that the overall level of labor‐style communication is 66.4 percent. Companies in emerging market jurisdictions have the highest labor disclosure communication. Employment information is the most frequently disclosed set of items. Lesser communication is noted for training and education, and diversity and equal opportunity issues. Statistical analysis indicates that political visibility, jurisdictional, creditor pressure, and corporate governance variables are directly related to labor communication.
This study assumes that the 14 items used as the checklist benchmark from GRI (2006) are voluntary in each country. Results suggest that combination of legitimacy theory and stakeholder theory are relevant in explaining global context of labor communication.
A broader international survey of labor practices using the specific guidelines of the globally respected Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) has not yet been conducted. This study contributes insights for a better understanding of labor communication practices among three jurisdictional business systems.
]]>The purpose of this paper is to develop a conventional analysis of the content of researches published in high quality academic journals, specifically in the accounting area, with particular emphasis on intellectual and human capital, in order to provide guidance for authors on research paper characteristics that influence the journal's acceptance decisions.
The paper provides a quantitative analysis of the additional characteristics (the main characteristic considered by default is the quality of the journal's contents) that could increase the chances for publishing a research paper in a high quality journal.
The findings indicate several additional characteristics which may influence the journal's acceptance decision during the publication process. These characteristics relate to the journal's origin, type of research, presentation of literature within the research paper and the type of research approaches, characteristics that should be considered by any researcher from the beginning of the process of writing the research paper.
The present paper contributes to the existing literature by analyzing the research characteristics deemed important for the publication of a research paper related to intellectual capital in a high quality journal. The study identifies a pattern for the researches published in this field, in order to provide benchmark for further researches, thus being the first study conducted in this area of interest.
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