Business Commons^™

Factors Influencing Job Attainment In Recent Bachelor Graduates: Evidence From Australia, Denise Jackson

Research outputs 2013

Favourable graduate employment outcomes are critical for future enrolments in higher education. Enrolments fund higher education providers and ensure a continuous supply of graduates to enhance organisational effectiveness, national productivity and global competitiveness. Recent evidence suggests the global financial crisis has softened graduate labour markets. Stakeholder concerns for graduate career prospects and the adequacy of return on investment from studying at university prompt exploration of those factors which influence graduate employment outcomes. This study tests, using logistic regression, a model of job attainment in recent Bachelor graduates of Australian higher education providers using national data gathered in 2011 (n …

'It's Not About Believing': Exploring The Transformative Potential Of Cultural Acknowledgement In An Indigenous Tourism Context, Pascal Scherrer, Kim Doohan

Research outputs 2013

This paper directly challenges the persisting argument that in the host-(uninvited) guest relationship of Kimberley coastal tourism in Australia's far northwest, Traditional Owners (the hosts) have a pedagogic responsibility to first educate the tourism industry (the guests) of their impacts on them in order to facilitate culturally appropriate and sustainable tourism experiences. We contend that such an argument reflects a deeply entrenched context of erasure and power imbalance between Australian Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people. We highlight, using three decades of public records, the fact that government and industry have ignored and continue to ignore knowledge and learning shared by Kimberley …

How Do Excellent Companies Stay Excellent?, Alan R. Brown

Research outputs 2013

Organisations throughout the world adopt business excellence frameworks to guide their business strategy and continuous improvement. Some seek and receive awards which recognise high levels of achievement against the criteria of these frameworks. Even at these levels of performance, organisations face challenges to maintaining high levels of achievement and these are the subject of this paper. Using a sample of Australian Business Excellence Award winners, interviews with key managers provide insights into the challenges which these organisations face in their ongoing quest for excellence. Six key themes emerged: embedding excellence, ensuring it is not onerous, engaging people, providing meaning, driving …

Do Political Instability, Terrorism, And Corruption Have Deterring Effects On Tourism Development Even In The Presence Of Unesco Heritage? A Cross-Country Panel Estimate, Ghialy Choy Lee Yap, Shrabani Saha

Research outputs 2013

This article evaluates the effects of political instability, terrorism, and corruption on tourism development, particularly UNESCO-listed heritage destinations. Using a fixed-effects panel data analysis for 139 countries over the period 1999-2009, the result reveals that a one-unit increase in political instability decreases tourist arrivals and tourism revenue between 24% and 31% and 30% and 36%, respectively. Furthermore, in the presence of heritage, terrorism has negative effects on tourism demand even though its effect is lower than that of political instability. However, the study shows that an increase in corruption index would not have an adverse influence on tourist arrival numbers, …

Using Research Informed Approaches To Strategic Hrm Teaching, Alan J. Coetzer, Helen B. Sitlington

Research outputs 2013

This paper outlines research that was guided by the broad question: What teaching and learning (T&L) strategies should be employed in SHRM? This question was answered using data gathered in three focus groups involving T&L specialists, business strategy and HRM academics, and HRM practitioners. Through a process of successive focusing, potential T&L strategies were initially identified and then tested and refined in the focus groups. Drawing on literature and input from the participants, we contend that SHRM can be effectively taught through a combination of primarily problem-based and case-based approaches. We also argue that process worksheets are an effective method …

Telework: The Role Of Social Support, Heather Dawson-Howard, Peter P. Standen, Maryam Omari

Research outputs 2013

Telework is a rapidly growing work practice but its effects on employees’ psychological wellbeing have been little studied. A particular problem for remote workers is the potential loss of social support. Much research shows support from supervisors and co-workers increases employee wellbeing and reduces the negative effects of job demands. How telemediated social support functions in telework, and how much home-based support can replace it, have not so far been studied. A framework for research on social support in telework is presented in this paper. Social support can be provided electronically but how affects workers’ wellbeing and performance is an …

Could On-The-Job Embeddedness Help Bind Fifo Workers To Their Jobs?, Glenda B. Scott, Helen B. Sitlington, Pattanee Susomrith, Alan R. Brown

Research outputs 2013

Fly-In Fly-Out (FIFO) employees in the mining industry in Western Australia have had high levels of turnover, resulting in high costs in recruitment, training and lost production. This research is seeking to understand the reasons for high turnover in this somewhat unusual group of employees. Whilst the research has utilised the more traditional approach to understanding labour turnover, that is that dissatisfaction with job or company and the availability of viable alternatives lead to intention to quit, preliminary results indicate that job embeddedness theory, may provide a better understanding of why FIFO workers choose to stay in their jobs. This …

Sustaining Online Communities In The Charitable Health Sector: How To Keep A Good Thing Going, Leesa N. Costello, Julie S. Dare, Lelia R. Green

Research outputs 2013

What happens when an online community part-funded by a competitive grant process in partnership with a relevant charitable organisation reaches its use-by date? What reasons might an organisation have for continuing (or not) to support the community and its future development? How is ‘ownership’ transferred from the research institution to the not-forprofit organisation, along with any possible risks? These are all good questions: not least because it seems that most communities in this position are not ‘adopted’ by their not-forprofit sponsors, but languish on the sidelines waiting for a benefactor to pick up the potential costs and risks. This paper …

Contextual Support For Innovation In An Australian Financial Services Firm, Agung N. Fahrudi, Denise E. Gengatharen, Yuliani Suseno, Craig Standing

Research outputs 2013

Organizational learning can facilitate innovation and it is affected by internal and external contexts. Leaders can provide internal contextual support for learning to occur in the organization in order to respond to changes in external contexts. However, there are limited studies about how leaders affect innovation in financial services firms. This paper applies Crossan et al.’s (1999) 4I framework to examine the impact of internal and external factors on an organization’s learning process and the extent of its innovation. An on-going case study of a large Australian financial services firm is used to gain insights about contextual support for innovation. …

Forecasting Singapore Economic Growth With Mixed-Frequency Data, A. Tsui, C.Y. Xu, Zhaoyong Zhang

Research outputs 2013

In this paper we intend to forecast the economic growth of Singapore by employing mixed frequency data. This study is motivated by the following observations: macroeconomic variables are the important indicators of the economic performance, but they are normally available at low frequencies, e.g. quarterly for GDP and monthly for inflation. In contrast, the financial variables such as stock returns are available at high frequency, and often the asset prices are forward-looking and believed to contain useful information about future economic developments (Stock and Watson 2003). It is therefore an interesting question to raise whether or not one can use …

Primary Sector Volatility And Default Risk In Indonesia, David E. Allen, Ray R. Boffey, Akhmad R. Kramadibrata, Robert Powell, Abhay Singh

Research outputs 2013

The Indonesian market is a critical market to the South East Asian region, being that region’s largest economy. The primary sectors of the Indonesian economy, incorporating Agriculture and Mining, are of critical importance to the country, representing approximately one quarter of GDP and providing nearly 40% of the nation’s employment. Mining and Agriculture stock returns significantly outperformed the Indonesian Stock Exchange (IDX) composite index in the five years leading up to Global Financial Crisis (GFC), and experienced savage falls during the GFC. Against this background, we examine the market and credit risk of these sectors during the pre-GFC, GFC and …

A Dynamic Credit Ratings Model, David E. Allen, Robert Powell, Abhay Singh

Research outputs 2013

The Global Financial Crisis (GFC) provided overwhelming evidence of the problems caused by inadequate credit ratings. Losses and problem loans experienced by banks over this period were staggering. Yet many of the securitized sub-prime parcels which were widely seen as an underlying cause of the GFC, as well as corporate obligors who experienced severe difficulties during the GFC, retained extremely strong external credit ratings. They may have had low perceived risk at the time of rating, but as circumstances changed, the ratings stayed static and became far removed from the underlying risk. A key problem is that the external credit …

Towards A Folk Taxonomy Of Popular New Media Marketing Terms, Nathalie S. Collins, Jamie Murphy

Research outputs 2013

Word of Mouth and Brand Community Marketing terms have emerged to describe particular people and their effectiveness in promoting messages, particularly with the emergence of social media. The development of the terms and their use are concurrent in academic literature, industry literature and popular culture. Furthermore, it is common for these terms to converge, borrowing meanings, connotations and subtexts. This paper explores five key community marketing terms−Geek, Maven, Alpha User, Evangelist and Fanboy−and develops term classifications and relationships into a folk taxonomy. Tourism and hospitality practitioners and academics can use the taxonomy for word of mouth activities and research.

Hotel Guest E-Questionnaires: Implications For Feedback And Relationships, Alfred Ogle, Nadine Henley, Michelle Rowe, Sybe Jongeling, Stephen Fanning

Research outputs 2013

This paper examines the reliability and efficacy of hotel guest e-mail questionnaire compared to the paper questionnaire in the Asian Pacific context. Conducted in Perth, Singapore and Penang, cities with mature hospitality and tourism industries and a representation of chain and independent deluxe hotels, this exploratory qualitative study examines hotelier views of e-mail guest communication derived from content analysis of guest questionnaires format and content and in-depth interviews with senior hoteliers. The findings indicated that e-questionnaires manifested as e-mails, as a direct replacement of the paper questionnaire, appear to be premature given divergent hotelier views and shortcomings in email response …

'Shut Up And Bill': Workplace Bullying Challenges For The Legal Profession, Maryam Omari, Megan Paull

Research outputs 2013

Competition, work intensification and requirements for efficiency are some of the hallmarks of the modern work environment. Pressures in such settings can result in stress caused by long work hours, a lack of work-life balance and interpersonal conflict. The legal profession is prone to negative impacts due to its highly competitive environment. This, coupled with established hierarchical structures, significant power imbalances and pressure to measure work input rather than output (billable hours), can create 'toxic' settings. This paper reports the findings of a study of dignity and respect in the legal profession. Results indicate that many of the issues arise …

Student Perceptions Of The Importance Of Employability Skill Provision In Business Undergraduate Programs, Denise Jackson

Research outputs 2013

Studies examining student perceptions of employability skill development in business undergraduate programs are limited. Assurance of student buy-in is important to ensure learners engage with skill provision; to enable them to articulate their capabilities to potential employers and to facilitate the transfer of acquired skills. This study examines 1019 students’ perceptions of the importance of employability skill development, the relative importance of skills and the influence of certain demographic/background characteristics. Findings indicate undergraduates value skill development, most particularly communication and team-working, and some significant variations in importance ratings. Alignment with other stakeholder perceptions and the influence of context are discussed.

Generational Differences And Fly-In-Fly-Out (Fifo) Employee Turnover, Pattanee Susomrith, Alan R. Brown, Glenda B. Scott, Helen B. Sitlington

Research outputs 2013

Fly-in, fly-out (FIFO) mining has experienced significant growth in the past decade and is now a typical form of employment in the sector in Australia. Evidence suggests that there are relatively high turnover levels amongst these employees. Whilst there are many contributing causes to this, there may be variances between different generational cohorts at work as arguably their workplace expectation differs. This paper investigates whether turnover intentions vary between different generations of employees. Using a questionnaire, employees were asked about their turnover intentions and this was compared against the groups of Baby Boomers, Generation X and Generation Y. Findings show …

Modelling The Volatility-Timing Of Funds Under Cpf Investment Theme, X Shen, Albert K. Tsui, Zhaoyong Zhang

Research outputs 2013

The performance measure of funds has been an important topic in the past few decades. In recent years the conditional models on return and volatility have become popular in studying the funds’ performance measure, but most of these studies focus on the US funds and a few on the Asian-based funds. The purpose of this study is to examine the volatility-timing performance of Singapore-based funds under the CPF (Central Provident Fund) Investment Scheme and non-CPF linked funds by taking into account of the currency risk effect on internationally managed funds. The CPF investment scheme was introduced in 1986 by the …

Risk Blindness Among Temporary Migrant Workers In Australia, Susanne T. Bahn

Research outputs 2013

Workers can suffer from risk blindness in that they fail to recognise workplace hazards or their severity, thereby jeopardising their health and safety and their organisation’s performance. This problem is exacerbated in organisations who employ temporary migrant workers because not only do ‘home country’ cultural factors influence the way they understand and see risks; more critically the temporary nature of their work contract can reduce their commitment, and perceived responsibility, to acknowledge risk. The result of which could expose temporary migrant and domestic workers to increased incidents of work-related injury, disease and fatalities. This paper presents this problem through the …

Business Graduate Employability – Where Are We Going Wrong?, Denise Jackson

Research outputs 2013

Persistent gaps in certain non-technical skills in business graduates continue to impact on organisational performance and global competitiveness. Despite business school’s best efforts in developing non-technical skills, widely acknowledged as fundamental to graduate employability, there has been considerably less attention to measuring skill outcomes and even less on their subsequent transfer to the workplace. It appears stakeholders are assuming transfer occurs automatically in graduates, neglecting the influence of learning program, learner and workplace characteristics on this complex process and its potential impact on graduate employability.

This paper unpacks the concept of transfer and proposes a model of graduate employability which …

The Relationship Between Human Capital And Social Capital In Professional-Client Relationships, Yuliani Suseno

Research outputs 2013

Professionals in knowledge-intensive firms rely on their human capital and social capital to deliver value in their professional services to clients. In this study of corporate lawyers and clients, we examine the construct of knowledge acquisition, representing a professional’s human capital, and its relationship with social capital. Quantitative analyses on the survey data reveal significant evidence of relationships between human capital and social capital. The application of both the human and social capital theories to the study of professionals therefore has the potential to advance our knowledge and understanding of the relationships between professionals and their clients.

Interest Rate Sensitivities Of Externally And Internally Managed Australian Reits, Jaime L. Yong, Abhay Singh

Research outputs 2013

Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs) in Australia experienced tremendous growth and investor interest following the crash of unlisted property funds in the 1990s. Since 2001, management structures have shifted from external property management to an internally advised model. The sector’s returns had been notably rewarding up till the Global Financial Crisis but rising costs of debt and years of aggressive borrowing to fund expansions have eroded the values of REITs. Externally managed trusts had relatively higher levels of debt than their internally managed counterparts thus increasing the sensitivities to interest rate risks. Yet internally managed REITs engage in a wider …

Intraday Volatility Forecast In Australian Equity Market, Abhay Singh, David E. Allen, Robert Powell

Research outputs 2013

On the afternoon of May 6, 2010 Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) plunged about 1000 points (about 9%) in a matter of minutes before rebounding almost as quickly. This was the biggest one day point decline on an intraday basis in the DJIA’s history. An almost similar dramatic change in intraday volatility was observed on April 4, 2000 when DJIA dropped by 4.8%. These historical events present very compelling argument for the need of robust econometrics models which can forecast intraday asset volatility. There are numerous models available in the finance literature to model financial asset volatility. Various Autoregressive Conditional …

The Road To Damascus Leads To One Infinite Loop: An Introspective Adventure Into Apple Computer Customer Evangelism, Nathalie S. Collins

Research outputs 2013

This paper draws on a literature review, conceptual development and an introspective narrative to explore “quintessence” and Customer Evangelism (CE). Quintessence, a mystical connection between the customer and a product, elevates a profane product experience to the sacred. This paper argues that the quintessential moment, the root of the Customer Evangelism conversion experience, awakens or redirects a propensity toward evangelistic behaviour. As the moment of conversion, quintessence is as pivotal as it is mystical. Tourism entities can attempt to nurture a seemingly religious experience, and for some entities quintessence is an unexpected by-product. An introspective narrative, through one of the …

Access To Training And Development In Small And Medium-Sized Enterprises: Employee's Perspectives, Pattanee Susomrith, Alan J. Coetzer

Research outputs 2013

This paper provides an overview of a proposed study that aims to identify the perceived factors that prevent employees from initiating requests and participating in formal external employer-funded training and development opportunities within small and medium enterprises. While training and development has the potential to improve an employee's remuneration and increase their employability, the level of training and development in small and medium enterprises is well below that of larger organisations. Although the small business owners retain the final decision regarding employee access to training and development, the outcome is also dependent upon employees' decisions to intiate requests to participate …

Workers On Temporary 457 Visas: Challenges They Face When Working In The Western Australian Resources Sector, Susanne T. Bahn, Llandis G. Barratt-Pugh, Ghialy Choy Lee Yap

Research outputs 2013

As a response to the shortage of specialised workers in the Western Australian (WA) resources sector, business has resorted to employing workers on temporary 457 visas. This paper provides an insight into some of the challenges workers on 457 visas reported while working in Australia in a study that collected data in 2012. While the study focussed on costs and benefits of employing workers on 457 visas to business, the migrant worker and the larger Australian community, part of the data included the social and financial costs to these workers. It is this data that is reported in this paper. …

An Exploratory Study Of Factors Influencing The Participation In Training And Development Of Engineers In Small Businesses, Pattanee Susomrith, Alan J. Coetzer

Research outputs 2013

The provision of workforce training and development (T&D) has the potential to provide benefits to both employers and employees. However, employees in small businesses receive less access to T&D than employees in large businesses. Prior research into reasons for the relatively low levels of employee participation in formal T&D in small businesses has typically involved surveys of owner-manager opinions regarding ‘barriers’ to T&D. This study explored factors influencing employee participation in T&D from the perspective of employees. Data were collected through semistructured interviews with 15 employees in small engineering businesses. Consistent with the main aim of exploratory research, the study …

The Relationship Between Personal Financial Wellness And Financial Wellbeing: A Structural Equation Modelling Approach, Paul Gerrans, Craig P. Speelman, Guillermo J. Campitelli

Research outputs 2013

We examined the construct of financial wellness and its relationship to personal wellbeing, with a focus on the role of financial literacy. Gender comparisons are made using a structural equation modeling analysis including personal wellbeing, financial satisfaction, financial status, financial behavior, financial attitude, and financial knowledge. Males ranked higher in financial satisfaction and financial knowledge whereas females ranked higher in personal wellbeing. Joo’s (2008) concept of financial wellness as multidimensional is supported though the result is improved when a causal model of sub-components is estimated. The relationship of all variables to personal wellbeing is mediated by financial satisfaction, with gender …

The Determinants Of Capital Structure: Evidence From Thai Banks, David E. Allen, Napaporn Nilapornkul, Robert Powell

Research outputs 2013

The aim of this study is to examine the determinants of the capital structure of Thai banks. The data spans a ten year period from 1999 – 2008. The differentiation point of this study is that, whereas most studies on capital structure focus predominantly on internal bank variables, this study, in addition to internal variables includes market-based risk variables. A range of market-based default and value at risk variables were considered which were then narrowed down to improve the model. Fixed effects panel data analysis is employed, with both market and book leverage used as dependent variables. The Thai bank …

Modelling The Term Structure Of Japanese Bond Yields With The Nelson-Siegel Model, A. Tsui, J.X. Wu, Zhaoyong Zhang

Research outputs 2013

The Nelson-Siegel (1987) (NS) model has been credited for its high efficacy in the in-sample fitting and out-of-sample forecasting of the term structures of interest rates. The term structure of interest rates, popularly known as the yield curve, is a static function that relates the time-to-maturity to the yield-to maturity for a sample of bonds at a given point in time. The conventional way of measuring the term structure is by means of the spot rate curve, or yield curve, on zero-coupon bonds. Yet in reality, the entire term structure is not directly observable, which gives rise to the need …