Business Commons^™

Cross-Sector Research Collaboration In Australia: The Cooperative Research Centres Program At The Crossroads, Tim Turpin, Samuel Garrett-Jones, Richard Woolley

Samuel Garrett-Jones

In this article we trace changes in the institutional and social dynamics that have steered cross-sector R&D collaboration in Australia. Public policy provided the initial push toward cross-sector collaboration. The Cooperative Research Centres (CRC) Program is Australia's most longstanding national arrangement for industry-university-government research collaboration. Over the past two decades the program has grown to become the dominant model for cross-sector R&D cooperation in the country. Because of the size of the program in the Australian innovation system it has also become a major focus for debate about science policy. Universities have now institutionalised this imperative in all sorts of …

Counter Terrorism And Access To Justice: Public Policy Divided?, Mark Rix

Mark Rix

This paper will consider the manner in which Australia’s counter-terrorism strategy has been operationalised, highlighting the implications of its strategy for access to justice. Access to justice, encompassing the ability of individuals, including persons suspected of terrorism offences and non-suspects, effectively to exercise their human and legal rights, can be an important curb on state power. But, in another equally important sense, providing individuals with access to justice also protects national security by helping to ensure that the law enforcement and security agencies focus their efforts on genuine terror suspects rather than wasting their resources on investigating and prosecuting genuine …

Supply Chain Integration And Pathways Of Least Resistance, Tillmann Boehme, Paul Childerhouse, Eric Deakins, Denis Towill

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Exploratory, site-centred research used a systems theory lens to investigate real-world pathways to supply chainintegration. The longitudinal studies involved four New Zealand-based case companies and utilised a rigorous, multimethodsupply chain integration benchmarking procedure. Findings indicate that, regardless of best practicerecommendations, supply chain managers adopt the integration pathway favoured by senior management in order tosecure the level of authority they need for often cross-functional projects. Similarly when seeking to improve externalrelationships, integration pathways that would have the company negotiating from a position of strength are favoured,even though more effective negotiation strategies may be possible. In short, supply chain managers appear to …

Marketing Measurement Revolution: The C-Oar-Se Method And Why It Must Replace Psychometrics, John R. Rossiter

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Purpose – New measures in marketing are invariably created by using a psychometric approach based on Churchill’s “scale development” procedure. This paper aims to compare and contrast Churchill’s procedure with Rossiter’s content-validity approach to measurement, called C-OAR-SE.
Design/methodology approach – The comparison of the two procedures is by rational argument and forms the theoretical first half of the paper. In the applied second half of the paper, three recent articles from the Journal of Marketing (JM) that introduce new constructs and measures are criticized and corrected from the C-OAR-SE perspective.
Findings – The C-OAR-SE method differs from Churchill’s method by …

Self-Congruity And Volunteering : A Multi-Organisation Comparison, Melanie Randle, Sara Dolnicar

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

1. Purpose: To examine: (1) if individuals who prefer different volunteering organisations have different self-concepts; (2) if individuals perceive their preferred volunteering organisation as more similar to their self-concept than other volunteering organisations; and (3) if self-congruity theory correctly predicts consumer (volunteer) behaviour differences across organisations and organisational missions.
2. Design/methodology/approach: We collected data on people’s preferred volunteering organisation, their self-concept and their perceived image from eight volunteering organisations using an online self-completion survey. We then used chi-square tests and paired-sample t-tests to identify significant differences between groups.
3. Findings: Individuals who prefer different volunteering organisations differ significantly in their self-concept. For the …

Cross-Sector Research Collaboration In Australia: The Cooperative Research Centres Program At The Crossroads, Tim Turpin, Samuel Garrett-Jones, Richard Woolley

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

In this article we trace changes in the institutional and social dynamics that have steered cross-sector R&D collaboration in Australia. Public policy provided the initial push toward cross-sector collaboration. The Cooperative Research Centres (CRC) Program is Australia's most longstanding national arrangement for industry-university-government research collaboration. Over the past two decades the program has grown to become the dominant model for cross-sector R&D cooperation in the country. Because of the size of the program in the Australian innovation system it has also become a major focus for debate about science policy. Universities have now institutionalised this imperative in all sorts of …

The Role Of The Government In Financial Sector Development, Arusha Cooray

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

This study examines the impact of two dimensions of the government, namely, size and quality, on two dimensions of the financial sector, size and efficiency, in a cross section of 71 economies. The study finds that increased quality of the government as measured by governance and legal origin positively influences both financial sector size and efficiency. The size of the government proxied by government expenditure and the government ownership of banks has a negative effect on financial sector efficiency, and a positive impact on financial sector size, particularly in the low income economies.

Active Ageing: Using An Arcon Framework To Study U3a (University Of The Third Age) In Australia, Ronald C. Beckett, Michael Jones

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

There are more than 200 U3A groups in Australia where senior citizens collaborate to provide recreational learning opportunities to more than 60,000 other senior citizens. The movement continues to grow through the efforts of thousands of volunteers with very limited government support. We chose to use a collaborative network organisation modelling framework, ARCON, to both guide questions we asked in our research and to represent data from different instances in a consistent way. This provided a coherent view of the status quo, but supplementary questions were needed to consider the future viability of U3A groups. Spinoff network activities associated with …

Institution Building And Organizational Diversity: Evidence From Australian Woolbrokers’ Associations, 1890‐1939, David Merrett, Simon Ville

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Between 1890 and 1914 Australia became the world’s largest market for wool. Wresting this title from London required local brokers to create an ordered market with a central auction room, a uniform sale contract and standard arbitration procedure across a number of separate selling centres. This paper explores the various governance structures created by the Associations in Melbourne, Brisbane and Sydney, to bind co‐operative behaviours. We argue that the dual objects of the Associations, adherence to a uniform price and the operation of a central auction, provided different levels of incentives to firms to co‐operate in each centre. Firms took …

Is For Government Climate Change Adaptation Activities: An Exploratory Case Study, Stephen Smith, Donald Winchester, Helen M. Hasan, Patrick Finnegan

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

This paper reports a case study of climate change adaptation activities of the New South Wales Government’s Climate Change Working Group where ten agencies have responsibility for thirty-five long-term activities. A concurrent Data-Centre Consolidation project has highlighted the mammoth amount of data held by different agencies that must be integrated into information to adequately support these adaptation activities. Our analysis of data collected from interviews and documents reveals the potential of a retrospective ontology capability, and a unique citizen record in enabling this integration. Adaptation activities require resolution of differences in the perspectives of government agencies and citizens and changes …

The Impact Of Job Loss On Family Dissolution, Denise Doiron, Silvia Mendolia

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

The impact of involuntary job displacements on the probability of divorce is analysed using discrete duration models. The analysis uses the sample of couples from the British Household Panel Survey and distinguishes between types of displacements. Results show that couples in which the husband experiences a job loss are more likely to divorce. Redundancies have small, positive, often insignificant and short-lived effects while dismissals and temporary job endings have larger positive impacts. This is consistent with the interpretation of redundancies as capturing negative income shocks while other types of job loss also convey new information about potential future earnings and …

Political Connection And Managerial Entrenchment: Evidence From Ceo Turnovers In China, Jerry Cao, Xiaofei Pan, Meijun Qian, Gary G. Tian

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Firms seek political connection by hiring politicians and ex-bureaucrats as top executives in China, especially in privately controlled firms. One unintended consequence of establishing political connection is management entrenchment. Political connected CEOs have smaller equity holding than CEOs without political background. Political connection significantly lowers the CEO turnover probability and turnover-performance sensitivity. Firm performance improves after political connected CEOs are replaced, particularly if replaced by new ones not politically connected. Overall, our findings suggest that political connection in association with management entrenchment destroys shareholder value, harms firm performance, and exacerbates corporate governance in emerging economies.

Investigating Chinese And Australian Student's Awareness And Interpretation Of Csr, And The Influence Of Studying 'Socially Innovative Commerce' Over Time, Zhengfeng Li, Alan A. Pomering, Gary I. Noble

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

This study compares Chinese students studying in Australia and Australian domestic students on awareness and interpretation of, and attitude and behavioural intention towards the concept of corporate social responsibility (CSR), and the influence on both of studying within an environment termed "socially innovative commerce". While previous research has found that age, gender, and study major of students may influence perceptions of CSR, this rsearch found these variables are not as significant as cultural background. These findings are presented and discussed along with future research directions.

Reflections On Interpretive Supply Chain Research, Tillmann Boehme, Paul Childerhouse, Eric Deakins, Denis Towill

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

A key purpose of this paper is to stimulate researchers into utilising a more balanced portfolio of research methods when generating supply chain theory. The supply chain/logistics literature overwhelmingly exhibits objectivist/positivist philosophical assumptions, indicating that this is what researchers believe constitutes valid discipline knowledge. In contrast, this paper demonstrates that an interpretive perspective is capable of yielding a comprehensive picture of the relationship between the supply chain and the ‘messy’ environment within which it is embedded (contingency theory). By reflecting on lessons learned through many years of practical researcher experience with such a methodology, this paper serves to motivate the …

A Comparison Of Corporate Social Responsibility (Csr) Practiced With Employees In Chinese And Multinational Private Financial Intermediation And Accounting Companies In China, Zhengfeng Li, Shaun Powell, Alan Pomering

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) has been introduced to the Chinese in the past decadethrough requirements to comply for example with Social Accountability 8000 (SA8000 is astandard of behavior deemed suitable to show respect for and accountability to society).Compliance has been required by buyers in western markets and by multinational companiesas they have entered the Chinese market. Still a clear concept of CSR is not yet widespreadamong Chinese corporations and employers. Problems raised by unethical behaviors ofcorporations continue to exist in China. As Klein (2002)1 once famously stated, it couldperhaps be argued that the entire western society has been influenced by …

The Effect Of Corporate Governance, Corporate Financing Decision And Ownership Structure On Firm Performance: A Panel Data Approach From Kuwait Stock Exchange, Helen M. Hasan, Mohammad Al Mutairi

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

The aim of this paper is to examine the effect of corporate governance, corporate financing decision, and ownership structure on firm performance. The study uses panel based regression approach; the analysis is based on a sample of 80 listed Kuwait Stock Exchange Market firms, over a period of 9 years, from 2000 to 2008. Findings suggest that there is no association between ownership structure (identity, types or mix) and firm performance, using both measures of firm performance, ROA and Tobin’s Q. This study also finds that government ownership is insignificantly positively related to ROA using pool data; the result for …

Professional Learning In The Business Curriculum: Engaging Industry, Academics And Students, Michael Zanko, Theo Papadopoulos, Tracy Taylor, Eveline Fallshaw, Romy Lawson

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Professional Learning has become a feature of business curricula in universities around the world. The term "professional learning" (PL) is often used to encapsulate dimensions of educational programs that highlight contemporary industry issues explicitly linked to industry and professional bodies. PL encompasses the skills, qualities and attributes that are required by industry and the processes through which those skills are acquired. It encourages deep learning in relation to the student's future profession, and includes industry engagement, work-integrated learning and authentic learning environments.This paper describes a typology of approaches to PL derived from a national study of good practices in business …

A Centre Of International Trade And Transport Logistics, Eric Deakins, Paul Childerhouse, Tillmann Boehme

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Achieving superior productivity and growth, and understanding how to best manage cost-efficient, environmentally-friendly modes of integrated transport is of vital importance to a nation's strategic interests. Yet in an era of increasing sensitivities toward greenhouse gas emissions and the ‘greening’ of business many countries lack educational facilities which are dedicated to understanding multi-modal transport logistics and sustainable supply chains that can extend to international trading partners. This paper explains in detail a proposed centre of excellence concept that was developed for the New Zealand Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport (CiLT). By facilitating intensive business collaborations and engaging industry directly …

Suggesting A Practical Agenda For Green Is - Recent Solutions Within A Framework Of Efficiency, Information, And Effectiveness, Helen M. Hasan, Irit Alony

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Awareness of environmental sustainability and ecological issues is growing, and different industry sectors are seeking ways to address them effectively. The Information Systems (IS) community is in a position to make a significant contribution to environmental efforts, not only by mitigating its own impact, but also by guiding the activities of other communities. To support environmental efforts, or to become more ―Green‖, several Green fields and research streams have emerged. Previous Green IT research focused on mitigating and reducing the impact of IT production and manufacturing, whereas Green IS research has the ability to re-design modern activities to support environmental …

Accounting For Corruption: Abuse Of Rank And Privilege, Kathleen A. Cooper, Ian K. Fargher

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Rank, privilege and responsibility should be inseparable. However, investigations ofcorporate scandals typically reveal rank, privilege and irresponsible behaviour gohand in hand. The publicity and recriminations surrounding corporate scandals tendto focus first on corporate executives implicated in poor management or otherinappropriate behaviour and then on the relevant regulators. Where financialmanipulation is revealed, the external auditor also comes under scrutiny. Thedeficiencies in corporate regulation including accounting and audit standards aresubject to less public inspection but are often the subject of enquiry by governmentappointedbodies. Recommendations for regulatory reform follow and the public isassured the risk of similar scandals is minimised or at least …

Rivers And Puddles: Metaphors For Explaining The Need For Continuous Change And Development In Modern Organisations, Ann M. Rogerson

Sydney Business School - Papers

Metaphors are popular with academics and researchers to explain organisational phenomena including change, but these metaphors may not be as useful when explaining the need for continuous change to employees. This paper proposes the use of rivers and puddles as metaphors for leaders, managers and organisations to use to explain the shift required in accepting day to day change as the norm rather than a process. These relatable metaphors provide an approach to differentiating between process and adaptive change and how to explain this in terms that having meaning to individual employees and organisations.

The Aging Workforce: How Can Australian Universities Address Future Workforce Challenges?, Susan Loomes, Grace Mccarthy

Sydney Business School - Papers

Australia is facing major demographic challenges fueled by low workforce participation rates and the exit of the baby boomers from the workforce. Universities are likely to face the same workforce challenges. However, they may be in a better position than mainstream businesses due to the skills required, the flexibility of hours, and the nature and casualization of the workforce. This opens the door to attract retiring business professionals and aiding them to transition into academic teaching roles. For this non-traditional recruitment pathway to succeed, universities will need to ensure they have appropriate education and training pathways, mentoring along with peer …

Corporate Governance In Sri Lanka: The Status Quo, Walter Gunathilake, Anura De Zoysa, Palli Mulla K. A. Chandrakumara

Sydney Business School - Papers

This paper examines the existing corporate governance environment, practices, and institutional framework in Sri Lanka and evaluates their effectiveness to identify current issues and challenges. Sri Lanka is an emerging and rapidly growing market economy in South Asia with a liberalised economic and trade policies associated with FDI, international trade, and export-led development policies. Sri Lanka's corporate governance (CG) systems and practices have been largely influenced by both colonial economic policies and post-independence govt policies. Its CG practices consists of promoting dispersed ownerships, increasing size of a board and decreasing directorship per director, greater involvement of internationally recognized few audit …

Sustainable Supply Chain Management: Using The Sri Lankan Tea Industry As A Pilot Study, Pradeepa Jayaratne, Lee Styger, Nelson Perera

Sydney Business School - Papers

Genuine sustainable supply chain management is now critical to achieve competitive advantage. Risk, uncertainty, strategy, innovation, relationship, infrastructure, regulation and technology are typically historically important areas that have a strong impact on sustainable SCM. These factors have been studied within manufacturing sector in developed countries; there is a lack of research on agri-supply chain in developing countries with respect to the concept of sustainable SCM. Therefore, this research tries to map the tea supply chain and identify the influencing factors and their performance on sustainable SCM in the tea supply chain in Sri Lanka. Importantly, early research suggests that mapping …

A Literature Analysis On Business Performance For Smes - Subjective Or Objective Measures?, Siti Nur 'Atikah Zulkiffli, Nelson Perera

Sydney Business School - Papers

The study examines the basic research methodologies and approaches for assessing business performance. It provides a critical literature analysis on how perception-based evaluation can be used to evaluate performance, specifically for SMEs. The analysis of the literature covers articles from major journals related to the topic. The methodology followed during the conduct of this paper involves starting with the broad case of articles in general business performance measurement, then focusing on the indicators used to study SMEs. Next, the review screens the list, focusing on the differences between subjective and objective measures. The validity issue related to subjective measures is …

Modelling Corporate Competitive Capabilities For Smes In The Malaysian Manufacturing Sector: An Exploratory Study, Siti Nur 'Atikah Zulkiffli, Nelson Perera

Sydney Business School - Papers

This study empirically tests the relationship between the four factors of corporate competitive capabilities (CCC) (cost leadership, differentiation, innovative marketing and customer service) and business performance. The study specifically emphasises small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in Malaysia. The study’s quantitative approach is based on the responses of 135 Malaysian manufacturing SMEs responded to a postal questionnaire. Empirical results from structural equation modelling (SEM) demonstrate an insignificant relationship between CCC and business performance.

The Influence Of Levels Of Supply Chain Integration On The Relationship Between Corporate Competitive Capabilities And Business Performance: Evidence From Malaysian Smes, Siti Nur 'Atikah Zulkiffli, Nelson Perera

Sydney Business School - Papers

This study aims to empirically investigate the influence of levels of supply chain integration (SCI) as a moderating variable on the relationship between corporate competitive capabilities (CCC) and business performance. Data was collected from a postal questionnaire from 135 Malaysian manufacturing SMEs. The data was tested using confirmatory factor analysis, cluster analysis and multi-group SEM analysis. The findings confirm that the levels of SCI in a given firm moderate the relationship between CCC and business performance for that firm. The study also contributes to the body of knowledge by expanding the understanding of levels of SCI as a moderator.

Influential Organisational Capabilities For Smes’ Export Performance: An Exploratory Study, Majidah Hassan, Grace Mccarthy

Sydney Business School - Papers

Organisational capabilities that influence the export performance of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) have been identified and discussed in previous studies which mostly have used SMEs in developed countries as their research sample. Thus, the empirical evidence from developing countries is still lacking. This exploratory study employs a resource-based view (RBV) perspective to understand how a set of organisational capabilities can influence the export performance of SMEs in Malaysia (a developing country). Based on in-depth interviews with CEOs or top level managers from twenty-three SMEs in Malaysia, the study found that capabilities to develop business networking, innovation capabilities, and capabilities …

The Role Of The United States Coast Guard In Marine Environmental Protection: The Uscgc Alex Haley Example, Ted Watts, Carol J. Mcnair-Connolly

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Few countries in the world task their military with the role of marine pollution response in addition to its responsibility as a military service. One country that does is the United States of America. The United States Coast Guard has, in addition to its military and security missions, the task of marine pollution response and enforcement. This program includes the prevention of oil and chemical spills, unauthorized ocean dumping and to prevent the introduction of invasive marine species into the maritime environment . This paper considers the operational and environmental costs associated with a major oil spill and the revenue …

Guiding The Use Of Grounded Theory In Doctoral Studies – An Example From The Australian Film Industry, Michael Jones, Irit Alony

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Selecting the most appropriate research method is one of the most difficult problems facing a doctoral researcher. Grounded Theory is presented here as a method of choice as it is detailed, rigorous, and systematic, yet it also permits flexibility and freedom. Grounded Theory offers many benefits to research in Information Systems as it is suitable for the investigation of complex multifaceted phenomena. It is also well equipped to explore socially related issues. Despite existing criticism, it is a rigorous and methodical research approach capable of broadening the perceptions of those in the research community. This paper provides detailed and practical …