Business Commons^™

Fundamental Issues With Hr Auditing, Chris Andrews

Dr Chris Andrews

Extract:

What entitles us to correctly call an evaluation of human resources an “HR Audit?” Professor Susan Nutley (2000) observed that ‘defining what an audit is and, conversely, what it is not’ was fraught with difficulties. Professor Alan Clardy (2004) observed that the term audit was used ‘rather indiscriminately’ in the literature so that ‘most any kind of study of human resources is considered an audit.’ Clearly, a human resource audit needs to be properly defined and separated from those activities that are not auditing. Clouding this is the auditing profession itself; for example, they widely use the term ‘review’ …

The "Review Of Australia's Future Tax System": Implications For Local Government In Australia And Recommendations, John Passant, John Mclaren

John Passant

The report on Australia's Future Tax System (Henry Tax Review) was delivered in December 2009 and it contained a number of recommendations that specifically effected local government in Australia. Other recommendations on road user charges and land tax indirectly effected local government. This article analyses those specific recommendations that concern local government and makes recommendations as to what may be required by local government in the future. The article also discusses road user charges and the potential for land tax to increase the revenue for local government. Within this context, the fact that Australia is facing an ageing population and …

Towards An Organizational Model Of Occupational Health And Safety Management: A Review Of The Literature, Michael Zanko, Scott Burrows

Michael Zanko

The enormous, tragic and largely unnoticed problem of workplace injuries and deaths continues to beset countries around the globe. Tripartite regulatory approaches to address the issues involved often place primary responsibility on employers’ management of health and safety (OHS) at the workplace. This paper seeks to ascertain how OHS management at the organizational level has been treated in the research literature. A review of thirteen leading management journals from 1994 to 2005 was conspicuous by the absence of interest in OHS management as the subject or field of study. An examination of six leading HRM journals over the same timeframe …

The Association Between Strategic Cost Management And Enterprise Risk Management: A Critical Literature Review, Mohamed Elsayed, Ananda Wickramasinghe, Marwa Razik

Ananda Wickramasinghe

Reviewing literature and application of strategic cost management (SCM) and enterprise risk management (ERM) are critical and significant for corporate management to facilitate top management to employ appropriate SCM and ERM processes and systems especially in occurrence of constant and regular business turn around, crises and turbulence in recent time in world of business. This paper revisits and reviews the association between strategic cost management and enterprise risk management. Based on this review, the following propositions were developed; firm, which adopted SCM, is more likely to adopt ERM approach, there is a positive relationship between audit type and the association …

Coaching And Well-Being: A Brief Review Of Existing Evidence, Relevant Theory And Implications For Practitioners, Gordon Spence, Anthony Grant

Gordon B Spence

THIS chapter is about coaching and its influence on human functioning and well-being. The chapter is presented in two sections. In the first section coaching is defined and accompanied by a brief description of its essential practices, along with a review of what is currently known empirically about its impact on human functioning and well-being. Having reviewed some evidence that supports the efficacy of coaching, the second section will focus on the important question: Why does coaching work? In proposing an answer to this question we will draw upon self-determination theory (SDT; Deci & Ryan, 1985), a metatheory of human …

Understanding Social Media Use As Alienation: A Review And Critique, James Reveley

James Reveley

The opportunities social media provide for agential expressions of subjectivity and experiential learning, relative to social media's role in reproducing digital-era capitalism, are the subject of keen debate. There is now a burgeoning academic literature which suggests that social media users are, to a greater or lesser degree, alienated by the activities of mega-corporations like Google and Facebook. Within this literature two broad perspectives are clearly identifiable. The first insists that social media platforms strongly alienate their users. To the extent that critical media scholars who advance this proposition are preoccupied with ideological hegemony, their work emblematises the idealist tendency …

A Uniform Land Tax In Australia: The Potential For This To Be A Reality Post The 'Henry Review', John Mclaren

John McLaren

No abstract provided.

The Tax Offset For Entrepreneurs: A Critical Review Of The 25% Tax Offset Concession For Small Business, John Mclaren

John McLaren

From 1 July 2005, small business taxpayers using the Simplified Tax System and with a turnover of $50,000 or less are allowed a tax offset of 25 per cent on their tax payable. If turnover exceeds $50,000, the tax offset phases out at 1 per cent until the turnover reaches $75,000. This tax concession was part of the government's election statement made on 26 September 2004 in which the government stated that it wanted to assist and encourage small business entrepreneurs, particularly those set up from home. The steps involved in calculating the amount of tax offset that can be …

What Does The Future Hold For Pacific Tax Havens: A Critical Review Of The Campaign Being Mounted Against These Small Nations By The Australian Government And The Oecd?, John Mclaren

John McLaren

No abstract provided.

The "Review Of Australia's Future Tax System": Implications For Local Government In Australia And Recommendations, John Passant, John Mclaren

John McLaren

The report on Australia's Future Tax System (Henry Tax Review) was delivered in December 2009 and it contained a number of recommendations that specifically effected local government in Australia. Other recommendations on road user charges and land tax indirectly effected local government. This article analyses those specific recommendations that concern local government and makes recommendations as to what may be required by local government in the future. The article also discusses road user charges and the potential for land tax to increase the revenue for local government. Within this context, the fact that Australia is facing an ageing population and …

What Does The Future Hold For Pacific Tax Havens: A Critical Review Of The Campaign Being Mounted Against These Small Nations By The Australian Government And The Oecd, John Mclaren

John McLaren

No abstract provided.

Gainsharing: A Critical Review And A Future Research Agenda, Theresa Welbourne, Luis Gomez Mejia

Theresa M. Welbourne, PhD

This paper provides a critical review of the extensive literature on gainsharing. It examines the reasons for the fast growth in these programs in recent years and the major prototypes used in the past. Different theoretical formulations making predictions about the behavioral consequences and conditions mediating the success of these programs are discussed and the supporting empirical evidence is examined. The large number of a theoretical case studies and practitioner reports or gainsharing are also summarized and integrated. The article concludes with a suggested research agenda for the future.

The Australian Corporate Closet, Why It's Still So Full: A Review Of Incidence Rates For Sexual Orientation Discrimination Gender Identity Discrimination In The Workplace, Ian Smith, Lindsay G. Oades, Grace Mccarthy

Grace McCarthy

The paper reviews the extant Australian literature on sexual orientation (SO) discrimination within the Australian workplace. In the research, there is variation in organisational workplace and a bias towards health and educational sectors as a research setting, which raises some methodological considerations such as poor generalisability to other organisational contexts. The small body of Australian research into SO discrimination encompasses; (i) varied methodological and theoretical approaches, (ii) disparate authors selecting a varied range of aspects of discrimination thus absenting a unifying framework to guide research and lacking as yet seminal authorship providing focus, iii) limited sampling of participants making comparisons …

What Do 15 Years Of Review And Evaluation Projects And Routine Outcome Measurements Add Up To?, Alan Owen

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 …

Online Information Values For Recreational Travellers: A Review Of Online Sources In Decision Making For An Unfamiliar Long Haul Destination, Robert Grant

Robert Grant

Acquisition or purchase of travel arrangements involves an exchange of information which is theoretically suited for transfer from offline to online interaction. The ability to digitise material and ease access through searchability based on metatags (Reedy and Schullo, 2004, p 276) make the internet a potentially ideal medium for information gathering and exchange. This paper reviews the value of information sources for consumer decision making for a high involvement experience product with multiple and variable components and points to further research which help our understanding of the value of electronic networks.

Accounting, New Public Management And American Politics: Theoretical Insights Into The National Performance Review, Ann Watkins, Cecil Arrington

Ed Arrington

Borrowing from the work of political theorists Sheldon Wolin and William Connolly, this essay seeks to provide additional rationalization for the expansion of accounting within domains like the public sector. We suggest that such an expansion is intimately linked to social and cultural transitions which have led political theorists to not only question modern political theory but to also recognize the political significance of practices like accounting to political theory. We contend that these same transitions also make possible expansions of accounting through NewPublicManagement (NPM) initiatives like the U.S.'s NationalPerformanceReview (NPR). Seen in this way, accounting theory begins to move …

Book Review: Financial Reporting By Local Authorities In Scotland: Icas And Cipfa - L. Kilgour And I. Lapsley, John Glynn

John J Glynn

This short book reports the results of the first of a two part research investigation - an evaluation of accounting practices by Scottish local authorities. Part II will, in due course, consider what information the users of local authority accounts actually want (as opposed to what they receive).

Australian Federal Financial Control And Accountability - A Review, J Glynn, M Mccrae

John J Glynn

Westminster systems of government are often typified by public sector organisations which act as agents of production and distribution. Their activities may be limited either to the provision of ‘public’ goods in situations of market failure or, as is more popularly the case under Westminster systems of government, they may be required to act as direct instruments for the implementation of the economic and welfare policies of the government of the day, as in the United Kingdom, Canada and Australia. Recent years have seen severe criticism in all these countries of the effectiveness of the financial control and accountability processes …

Book Review: Performance Measurement In The Public Sector And Private Sectors: Icas And Cipfa, John Glynn

John J Glynn

This publication comprises the proceedings of the first joint research conference of the ICAS and CIPFA. The conference was convened with three principal objectives: -Understanding the objectives of performance measurement. -Examining the mechanisms of accountability, both financial and non-financial. -The study of specific cases to illustrate performance measurement in action. The style of this short book is to provide a summary of the nine papers together with a short note of discussion points raised. The contributions to the day’s proceedings were provided by three academics, three public sector representatives, two speakers from private industry, and one politician.

Value For Money Auditing - An International Review And Comparison, J Glynn

John J Glynn

Value for money (VFM) auditing is not new, in many ways the United Kingdom is now only embarking explicitly upon a path that other countries have already followed. This paper reivews developments in six countries. The first country reviewed is the United Kingdom where two recent pieces of legislation have been introduced which have given statutory recognition to VFM auditing. In only a few years important moves have been made with respect to two important aspects of value for money: economy and efficiency. However, the third and most important element, that of effectiveness, appears so far to be only of …

Book Review: Public Sector Accounting And Financial Control: D. Henley, C. Holtman, A. Likierman And J. Perrin, John Glynn

John J Glynn

Since the second edition of this book was published in 1986 the rapid pace of development and change in public sector finance, fmancial control and accounting has continued apace. In the field of central government, the financial initiative has matured and there has been progress in developing improved performance indicators, reporting and individual accountability. The phased privatisation of nationalised industries and utilities continues. In local government the plans to replace domestic rates by the community charge, and new capital controls and possible changes in capital accounting pose new problems and challenges for financial managers. In the National Health Service attempts …

Public Management Failing Accountabilities And Failing Performance Review, John Glynn, Michael Murphy

John J Glynn

Throughout the 1980s and 1990s there have been major reforms with regard to the mode of operation of the public sector. The pervading theme running through these reforms is that of attempting to make the management of public services more accountable for the efficient and effective deployment of public resources. Focuses on how successful the reforms have been in engendering this enhanced accountability. First reviews the meaning of accountability and the different level of accountability in the public sector. Then reviews the principal changes in the accountability processes caused by the reforms of the 1980s and 1990s and questions whether …

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 …

What We Know About Employer-Provided Training: A Review Of Literature, John H. Bishop

John H Bishop

While the importance of on-the-job training is recognized by everyone, it is a phenomenon that is very difficult to study. Most training is informal and hard to measure and its effects on productivity are even more difficult to quantify. An elegant theory explaining how the quantity of training is determined and who pays for and benefits from it has been available for more than a third of a century (Becker 1962). However, the absence of data on the key theoretical constructs of the theory--general training, specific training, informal training and productivity growth--means that the only predictions of the theory that …

Fedtax-L, Raleigh Muns

Raleigh Muns