Business Commons^™

Rationalism's Irrationality - An Example From Australian Mental Health Policy, Ciorstan J. Smark

Ciorstan Smark

This article reflects on the way in which accounting-related thinking influenced one particular historical event: the process of deinstitutionalisation from mental hospitals in New South Wales. The article suggests that accounting (via economic rationalism and other allied philosophical lenses ) led to the under funding of the deinstitutionalisation process to the detriment of society as a whole. Some of the societal difficulties inherent in using such rationalist calculus (biased towards quantified, monetary, accounting entity assumptions) as a means of evaluating social policies are then considered.

Macroeconomic Determinants Of Corporate Performance And Failure: Evidence From An Emerging Market The Case Of Jordan, Rami Zeitun, Gary Tian, Steve Keen

Gary Tian

This study investigates the impact of aggregate economic risk on a company’s performance and failure in a panel estimation using 167 Jordanian companies during 1989-2003. Our finding shows that unanticipated changes in interest rate negatively and significantly affect firms’ performance measured by ROA, which suggests that an interest rate rise increases the cost of borrowing and then further negatively affects a firm’s profit. We also found that both the production manufacturing index and Islamic credit facilities positively and significantly affect a firm’s performance. The positive and significant impact of Islamic credit facilities reflects the importance and the significance of the …

Disproportional Ownership Structure And Pay-Performance Relationship: Evidence From China's Listed Firms, Jerry Cao, Xiaofei Pan, Gary G. Tian

Xiaofei Pan

This paper examines the impact of disproportional ownership structure on the pay-performance relationship in China’s listed firms. We find that the cash flow rights of the ultimate controlling shareholder have a positive effect on this relationship while a divergence between the control rights and cash flow rights has a significantly negative effect. By dividing our sample into state owned enterprises (SOE), state assets management bureaus (SAMB), and privately controlled firms, we find that cash flow rights in SOE controlled firms have a significant impact on accounting based pay performance and cash flow rights in privately controlled firms also affect the …

Further Development Of Evidence-Based Coaching: Lessons From The Rise And Fall Of The Human Potential Movement, Gordon Spence

Gordon B Spence

Although several authors have argued for the development of an evidence-based approach to coaching practice, few attempts have been made to draw support for these arguments by examining events of the recent past. This paper seeks to learn some lessons from history by exploring events surrounding the rise and fall of the human potential movement (HPM), which occurred between the 1940s and 1970s. The demise of the HPM is of relevance to the coaching industry because it powerfully illustrates how the promise and potential of innovative practices can be easily lost when its practitioners become disconnected from theoretically sound rationales …

Capital Structure And Its Implications: Empirical Evidence From An Emerging Market In South Asia, Athula Manawaduge, Anura De Zoysa, Palli Mulla K A Chandrakumara

Anil Chandrakumara

Using panel data regression analysis for a sample of 171 companies, this paper examines the implications of capital structure of corporate entities in an emerging market, Sri Lanka. The results demonstrate that most of the Sri Lankan firms finance their operations with short-term debt capital as against the long-term debt capital. It provides strong evidence to indicate that debt capital has a negative impact on firm performance. The study also found a significant negative relationship between tangibility and performance indicating inefficient utilization of non-current assets. The negative performance implications associated with over-utilization of short-term debts and the under-utilization non-current assets …

An Empirical Analysis Of Sustainability Of Trade Deficit: Evidence From South Asian Countries, Reetu Verma, Nelson Perera

Nelson Perera

In this paper, the long-run relationship between Sri Lankan exports and imports during the period 1950 to 2006 is examined using unit root tests and cointegration techniques that allow for an endogenously determined structural break. The results failed to support the existence of a long-run equilibrium between exports and imports in Sri Lanka. This finding questions the effectiveness of Sri Lanka’s current long-term macroeconomic policies and suggests that Sri Lanka is in violation of its international budget constraint.

Lessons From The National Mental Health Integration Program, Jane Pirkis, Kathy Eagar, Alan Owen, Natasha Posner, Philip Burgess, David Perkins

Alan G Owen

No abstract provided.

Electronic Documentation In Residential Aged Care Facilities - A Review Of The Literature On Organisational Issues And Early Findings On Initial Conditions From A Case Study, Kieren Diment, Ping Yu, Karin H. Garrety

Dr Ping Yu

This paper discusses the theoretical rationale for an empirical study of organisational change arising from introduction of electronic nursing documentation in residential aged care facilities. The study draws on a processual view of organisational change, which is related to the theory of complex adaptive systems. First we review existing literature on electronic nursing documentation with an organisational focus to provide a context to help outline the research aims of the present study. Then we describe a method to explore the hierarchical nature of the work environment based on the sociological theory of Institutional Ethnography. Finally we use this approach to …

Benefits Derived From Ict Adoption In Regional Medical Practices: Perceptual Differences Between Male And Female General Practitioners, Robert Macgregor, Peter Hyland, Charles Harvie, Boon-Chye Lee

Associate Professor Peter Hyland

Information and communications technologies (ICTs) are being used more and more by general practitioners (GPs) in their day-to-day activities. While a number of studies have shown that ICT adoption and use can provide real benefits to medical practices, there have been few studies to determine whether the perception of those benefits is uniform across the sector. This study examines whether differences in the perception of benefits exist between male and female GPs. The results suggest that the groupings and priorities of benefits arising from ICT use differ substantially between male and female GPs. Results also show, amongst other things, that …

Was The Copenhagen Summit Doomed From The Start? Some Insights From Green Is Research, Helen M. Hasan, C Dwyer

Helen Hasan

At the 2009 Copenhagen Summit on Climate Change, COP15, so many contradictory demands were apparent that it is doubtful whether it produced many useful outcomes. In this paper we question whether it, and summits like it, may be inherently doomed to fall short of expectations. With its experience of the intrinsic contradictions within socio-technical systems, the Information System’s profession may provide some insights into complex issues such as climate change. IS research has often demonstrated that imposed top-down solutions rarely provide the most promising way to approach highly complex problems. On the other hand, bottom-up emergent processes, though less politically …

Socio-Technical Systems: From Individual Transactions To Situated Community Activity, Helen M. Hasan

Helen Hasan

Although basic concepts of Activity Theory were articulated almost a century ago, they have stood the test of time and are proving to be appropriate for research into modem situation involving the use of socio-technical systems. Over the past decades the field of Information Systems has advanced from a focus on routine transaction processing systems to more sophisticated applications that support situated community activity. This chapter will describe how Activity Theory is becoming increasing relevant to these types of systems and can be complemented by other approaches such as Complexity Theory and a particular Knowledge Lens. Research is presented that …

Call Auction Transparency And Market Liquidity, Evidence From The Shanghai Stock Exchange, Gary G. Tian, Dionigi Gerace, Alex Frino

Dionigi Gerace

This paper examines the impact of pre-trade information transparency in pre-open call auction on market liquidity on the Shanghai Stock Exchange (SHSE). We examine the natural experiment affected by the Shanghai Stock Exchange in July 2006 when it changed its pre-open auction algorithm from an entirely black box into a limited transparent system with a closed order book. We find that the increase in pre-trade information transparency coincides with a statistically significant reduction in spread at the best quotes. The reduction in spread persists even after controlling for known determinants of depth. Furthermore, there is also evidence of a statistically …

Electronic Documentation In Residential Aged Care Facilities - A Review Of The Literature On Organisational Issues And Early Findings On Initial Conditions From A Case Study, Kieren Diment, Ping Yu, Karin H. Garrety

Karin Garrety

This paper discusses the theoretical rationale for an empirical study of organisational change arising from introduction of electronic nursing documentation in residential aged care facilities. The study draws on a processual view of organisational change, which is related to the theory of complex adaptive systems. First we review existing literature on electronic nursing documentation with an organisational focus to provide a context to help outline the research aims of the present study. Then we describe a method to explore the hierarchical nature of the work environment based on the sociological theory of Institutional Ethnography. Finally we use this approach to …

Deficit Financing In Lcds: Evidence From South Asia, Muhammad K. Chowdhury

Khorshed Chowdhury

Fiscal policy triggers three distinct effects on the economy such as (1) interest rate effect (2) price effect and (3) exchange rate effect. A VAR system was developed to capture these effects in jive South Asian countries. Empirical results suggest that budgetary action does not have any perceptible influence ·on the interest rate of the sampled countries. In terms of the price effect, fiscal action has opposite effects in Bangladesh and India. Fiscal action tends to increase aggregate price level in India but reduces the price level in Bangladesh, although the magnitude is very small. For Pakistan the price effect …

Australia: The Challenge Of Father-Daughter Succession In Family Business: A Case Study From The Land Down Under, Mary Barrett, Ken Moores

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

This chapter examines the case of an Australian woman, Roz, who succeeded her father as the CEO of a large fourth-generation family business, Hawkins Family Group, in the traditionally male-dominated transport industry. The case is described in three phases. First, we outline Australian culture how it influences business life, including the position of women in the Australian workforce especially as managers and entrepreneurs. We then describe the history of the Hawkins Family Group and how Roz eventually came to lead it. Finally, we return to aspects of Australian values and culture and other literature to draw conclusions about the case. …

Identifying And Measuring Factors Of Technical Inefficiency: Evidence From Unbalanced Panel Data Of Thai Listed Manufacturing Enterprises, Yot Amornkitvikai, Charles Harvie

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

This study employs stochastic frontier analysis (SFA) and two-stage DEA approaches to predict firm technical efficiency and analyse an inefficiency effects model. Aggregate translog stochastic frontier production functions are estimated under the SFA approach using an unbalanced panel data of 178 Thai manufacturing enterprises listed in the Stock Exchange of Thailand (SET), covering the period 2000 to 2008. The maximum-likelihood Tobit model is used to conduct the second-stage of the two-stage DEA model to investigate the relationship between technical inefficiency and environmental variables. Both parametric and non-parametric approaches are found to produce consistent results. The empirical evidence from both approaches …

Capital Structure And Its Implications: Empirical Evidence From An Emerging Market In South Asia, Athula S. Manawaduge, Anura De Zoysa, Palli Mulla K A Chandrakumara

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Using panel data regression analysis for a sample of 171 companies, this paper examines the implications of capital structure of corporate entities in an emerging market, Sri Lanka. The results demonstrate that most of the Sri Lankan firms finance their operations with short-term debt capital as against the long-term debt capital. It provides strong evidence to indicate that debt capital has a negative impact on firm performance. The study also found a significant negative relationship between tangibility and performance indicating inefficient utilization of non-current assets. The negative performance implications associated with over-utilization of short-term debts and the under-utilization non-current assets …

Education Into Employment? Indonesian Women And Moving From Business Education Into Professional Participation, Ang Lindawati, Ciorstan J. Smark

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

The purpose of this paper is to explore the issue of possible cultural and historical explanations of why Indonesian women’s higher participation in tertiary accounting studies has failed to lead to a commensurately higher participation in the upper echelons of public accounting careers. This paper has adopted the ideographic subjectivist approach which suggests that research should be culturally and historically informed. Women interviewed for this study repeatedly mentioned two cultural and historical barriers to their fuller participation in the public accounting profession. Firstly, it was noted that Javanese expectations of “proper” behavior in women did not lend itself to some …

Was The Copenhagen Summit Doomed From The Start? Some Insights From Green Is Research, Helen M. Hasan, C Dwyer

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

At the 2009 Copenhagen Summit on Climate Change, COP15, so many contradictory demands were apparent that it is doubtful whether it produced many useful outcomes. In this paper we question whether it, and summits like it, may be inherently doomed to fall short of expectations. With its experience of the intrinsic contradictions within socio-technical systems, the Information System’s profession may provide some insights into complex issues such as climate change. IS research has often demonstrated that imposed top-down solutions rarely provide the most promising way to approach highly complex problems. On the other hand, bottom-up emergent processes, though less politically …

Managing The Transition From The Classroom To The Workplace: Beyond The Duty Of Care, Bonnie Amelia Dean, Michael D. Clements

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Industry is increasingly demanding graduates that are work ready. Preparing students that are not only technically competent but that also display the necessary soft skills for industry, presents a challenge for higher education. Experiential learning programs can offer students the opportunity to develop these skills and practice discipline knowledge, however for program sustainability higher education must meet the needs of its key stakeholders. This paper presents an intensive internship program that aims to supportively transition students into industry, while focusing on key stakeholder engagement. A beyond duty of care approach is presented through the design, structure and application of the …

Disproportional Ownership Structure And Pay-Performance Relationship: Evidence From China's Listed Firms, Jerry Cao, Xiaofei Pan, Gary G. Tian

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

This paper examines the impact of disproportional ownership structure on the pay-performance relationship in China’s listed firms. We find that the cash flow rights of the ultimate controlling shareholder have a positive effect on this relationship while a divergence between the control rights and cash flow rights has a significantly negative effect. By dividing our sample into state owned enterprises (SOE), state assets management bureaus (SAMB), and privately controlled firms, we find that cash flow rights in SOE controlled firms have a significant impact on accounting based pay performance and cash flow rights in privately controlled firms also affect the …

Electronic Documentation In Residential Aged Care Facilities - A Review Of The Literature On Organisational Issues And Early Findings On Initial Conditions From A Case Study, Kieren Diment, Ping Yu, Karin H. Garrety

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

This paper discusses the theoretical rationale for an empirical study of organisational change arising from introduction of electronic nursing documentation in residential aged care facilities. The study draws on a processual view of organisational change, which is related to the theory of complex adaptive systems. First we review existing literature on electronic nursing documentation with an organisational focus to provide a context to help outline the research aims of the present study. Then we describe a method to explore the hierarchical nature of the work environment based on the sociological theory of Institutional Ethnography. Finally we use this approach to …

Performance Implication Of Ownership Structure And Ownership Concentration: Evidence From Sri Lankan Firms, Athula S. Manawaduge, Anura De Zoysa, Kathleen M. Rudkin

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Purpose - This paper seeks to examine the impact of ownership concentration and ownership structure on firms’ performance of a sample of public listed companies in Sri Lanka in the premise of an agency theory framework.

Design/methodology/approach - The paper first investigates the nature of ownership structure and concentration and then examines whether there is strong evidence to support the observation that the variations of ownership structure across firms result in systematic variations in firm performance. This hypothesis is tested by assessing the impact of ownership structure and concentration on firm performance measured in terms of accounting profitability and market …

New Oracles From Delphi - A 'Crucial Experiment' For Positivism In Archival History, Aida Sy, Tony Tinker, George M. Mickhail, Fahrettin Okcabol

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Empiricism has reigned supreme as an episteme for mainstream accounting research for some 25 years. In accounting, the Empiricist doctrine has assumed various guises. Positive Accounting is one of Empiricism's generic forms. It exists both in its own right, and in various incarnations such as Market Studies, Agency Theory and Historical Archivalism (in accounting history). In the U.S, these manifestations of Empiricism emerged in the mainstream literature in response to attacks on the then Big 8 accounting firms and their corporate clients. In the 1970's, Abraham Briloff's assaults in Barrons were costing the firms and their clients millions of dollars …

Financial Crises And Stock Market Volatility Transmission: Evidence From Australia, Singapore, The Uk, And The Us, Indika Karunanayake, Abbas Valadkhani, Martin J. O'Brien

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

With the globalization of international trade and finance, the interaction between international financial markets has increased markedly. Therefore, this paper examines the nature of interaction between stock market returns and their volatility, with a particular focus on the global financial crises in 1998 and 2008 for Australia, Singapore, the UK, and the US. This study applies multivariate generalised autoregressive conditional heteroskedasticity (MGARCH) model with dummy variables for weekly data spanning from January 1992 to June 2009. Based on the results obtained from the mean return equations, we could not find any significant impact on returns arising from 1998 and 2008 …

The Potential Pitfalls Of Transferring Constructs Across Cultural Settings: Experience From Npd Research In Australia, Janette K. Rowland, Elias Kyriazis

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the research design and methodology choices in the field of Marketing Management in order to choose the best “fit” for the authors’ research on developing a climate of trust within the new product development process. Many researchers often use constructs developed and empirically tested in other cultural contexts. This often allows for interesting cross-cultural comparisons. While useful, this paper cautions on the blind application of constructs and survey instruments. Reporting on experience from exploratory research carried out in the context of the NPD process in Australian manufacturing firms, we show the potential …

Segmenting The Senior Travel Market By Means Of Travel Motivation - Insights From A Mature Market (Switzerland), Philipp E. Boksberger, Christian Laesser

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

The paper reports on the segmentation of Swiss senior travellers on the basis of their travel motivation. Switzerland is considered a mature market which is why this country serves as a role model for future travel behaviour. In contrast to previous studies, which identified up to six clusters, the results reveal that in the case analysed there are three clusters. Two of them partially represent a life cycle concept: TIME HONOURED BON VIVANTS (phase 1; towards the end of a professional life), and GRIZZLED EXPLORERS (phase 2; from the start of a retired life). These two segments are complemented by …

Developing And Refining Outcome Measurement Suites: An Example From The National Continence Management Strategy, Janet E. Sansoni, Nicholas Marosszeky, Emily Sansoni

Sydney Business School - Papers

This paper provides a brief overview of the Australian National Continence Management Strategy with respect to its activities related to the assessment of incontinence, the use of measures to evaluate the outcomes of incontinence treatment interventions, and the production of Australian prevalence and burden of disease estimates.

It highlights the Continence Outcomes Measurement Suite (COMS) project, in particular, which has moved through a number of developmental stages. Stage 1 involved the scholarly review of commonly used self-report and clinical assessment measures for both urinary and faecal incontinence against the current definitions provided by the International Continence Society (Thomas, et al., …

From Hatred To Genuine Peace: A Dynamic Formulation Of Conflict Resolution, Amnon Levy

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

This paper highlights the role of hatred and its evolution in determining the nature of peace between groups, or nations, after reaching, and while implementing, truce. It proposes that weak inertia, diminishing memory of hatred and low propensity to reciprocate hatred are essential for reaching a genuine and stable peace. In the case of mutual abstinence from violence, genuine peace process prevails if both groups have sufficiently weak inertia and strongly diminishing memories of hatred and low proponsities to reciprocate hatred. When these conditions are not satisfied, genuine peace may still be reached if one of the groups has weak …

Call Auction Transparency And Market Liquidity, Evidence From The Shanghai Stock Exchange, Gary G. Tian, Dionigi Gerace, Alex Frino

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

This paper examines the impact of pre-trade information transparency in pre-open call auction on market liquidity on the Shanghai Stock Exchange (SHSE). We examine the natural experiment affected by the Shanghai Stock Exchange in July 2006 when it changed its pre-open auction algorithm from an entirely black box into a limited transparent system with a closed order book. We find that the increase in pre-trade information transparency coincides with a statistically significant reduction in spread at the best quotes. The reduction in spread persists even after controlling for known determinants of depth. Furthermore, there is also evidence of a statistically …