Critical success factors for positioning Australian business talent in the global knowledge economy : a current research agenda

"Globalisation‟ and the "global knowledge economy‟ have become some of the most common "buzzwords‟ in Australian business, economic, and social sectors in the past decade. Further, knowledge service exports are a growing sector for Australia that utilise complex technical and creative capacities, increasingly rely on virtual work innovations, require new socio-technical systems to establish and maintain effective client relationships in global contexts; and – along with other innovations in the electronic age – may require novel coping abilities on the part of both managers and their employees to achieve desired outcomes (Bandura, 2002). Accordingly, this paper overviews such trends. The paper also includes a research agenda which is a "work-in-progress‟ with a major global company, Shell (Australia); it highlights both the objectives and proposed methodology of the study; it also outlines anticipated key benefits arising from the research.

Situating Design Research within Social Framework

This paper explores the expertise in industrial (product) design and contribution of knowledge generated trough the design research. Within this approach the research is situated within the social structure that constitutes people, activity, context and culture where an artifact is seen to be a mediator for the generation of new knowledge and its application. The paper concludes about the importance of research and practice integration and points out that situating the research around the artifacts, as mediators of knowledge, is transferable to Human-Computer Interaction field and any other area of the design research

Microfinance outcomes in the Philippines

Recent reports from Bangladesh about the Grameen Bank (GB) having to seriously review its policies and restructure its procedures have not stopped countries like the Philippines from making a success of Grameen Bank Replicas (GBRs). Women across Asia continue to benefit from microfinance initiatives and are motivated to move out of poverty through the influence of the GB and other microfinance institutes. This paper addresses specifically the microfinance activities in the Philippines and reports on some of the issues surrounding the successes and setbacks of programs in that country.