Executive and organisational leadership development in universities : exploring key elements and perceptions

Organisational and leadership development is said to be one of the most challenging and important activities facing universities, particularly in the current environment of fast-paced change and accelerated age-related attrition. Succession leadership development being timely, the purpose of this study was to explore the nature of leadership development most suited to meeting the leadership and organisational development challenges for contemporary universities. A blend of literature-based and empirical research was undertaken. This resulted in seven papers submitted to internationally refereed journals; five papers published, one in press, and one under review. Six of these are sole authored papers and one is a co-authored paper. The papers identify some of the issues and challenges facing the tertiary sector. They shed light on factors influencing executive and organisational leadership development deriving from the literature review and from empirical research reporting the views of current university leaders. The papers and submission document herein include recommendations and suggested models informing executive and organisational leadership development in universities. The "Lantern" model - an Illuminated Model for Organisational Leadership Development - is a key original conceptual model framing the study.

Student perceptions of the impact of online discussion forum participation on learning outcomes

Choosing the “right” type of technology, either synchronous or asynchronous, to facilitate learning outcomes is a new challenge as the pace of emerging technologies increases and diversifies. Teachers are encouraged to design courses that require collaboration in online learning communities to facilitate the development of higher order thinking skills for life long learning. It is therefore important to gather evidence of the kinds of opportunities afforded to students and whether the students themselves endorse collaborative online tools as a legitimate method of assisting in their learning. This paper outlines the way in which one secondary school has used an online discussion forum to support students in the International Baccalaureate (IB) Diploma Program in enhancing research skills and skills for lifelong learning. The paper considers whether online collaborative tools are perceived by students as a positive way to improve learning outcomes.

Students’ perceptions, experiences and beliefs about Facebook in subjects at an Australian university

This paper reports on students’ perceptions, experiences and beliefs about the voluntary use of Facebook in Advertising, Law, Nursing and Creative Industries’ subjects at an Australian University. The researchers conducted in-depth interviews with students and the transcriptions were analysed using the constant comparison method. This resulted in a number of emergent themes, of which six are explored in this paper. The findings suggest that students are quite divergent in their responses to academics using Facebook in their subjects. They do not always see its relevance to the subject and are somewhat ambivalent about how it facilitates peer-to-peer relationships or a better relationship with the lecturer. The study also identifies themes relating to cynicism and intrusion into social spaces.

The role of the board of directors : perceptions of managerial elites

We highlight how directors and senior managers perceive the roles of a board to involve overseeing risk and compliance, strategy, governance, developing the CEO and senior management and managing stakeholders. We find that managers and directors perceive board effectiveness as linked to different combinations of these roles and that there appear to be differences in perceptions between different types of firms. We conclude that clarity around the board’s role set is critical to furthering the corporate governance research agenda, and that the relationship between board roles and perceived board effectiveness differs between managers and directors.

Foreign wine consumption in Australia : the influence of consumer perceptions to foreign cultures on wine choice

Research has shown that while some people favor foreign- sourced products, others prefer to purchase goods made in their own country. From the perspective of the Australian wine market, consumption of wine has been consistently increasing in recent years. While sales of Australian made wine is booming, sales of imported sources is also increasing in terms of dollar value. This paper examines the effect of consumer ethnocentrism and animosity on willingness to buy foreign wine products, in an effort to better understand the factors involved in the consumer decision making process when purchasing wine products.

Willingness to buy GM food products : the role of uncertainty orientation, consumer risk perceptions and information search in consumers from Australia

Genetically modified (GM) food products are the source of much controversy and in the context of consumer behaviour, the way in which consumers perceive such food products is of paramount importance both theoretically and practically. Despite this, relatively little research has focused on GM food products from a consumer perspective, and as such, this study seeks to better understand what effects consumer willingness to buy GM food products in Australian consumers.

Anxiety among high school students in India : comparisons across gender, school type, social strata, and perceptions of quality time with parents

The broad objective of the study was to better understand anxiety among adolescents in Kolkata city, India. Specifically, the study compared anxiety across gender, school type, socio-economic background and mothers’ employment status. The study also examined adolescents’ perceptions of quality time with their parents. A group of 460 adolescents (220 boys and 240 girls), aged 13-17 years were recruited to participate in the study via a multi-stage sampling technique. The data were collected using a self-report semi-structured questionnaire and a standardized psychological test, the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory. Results show that anxiety was prevalent in the sample with 20.1% of boys and 17.9% of girls found to be suffering from high anxiety. More boys were anxious than girls (p<0.01). Adolescents from Bengali medium schools were more anxious than adolescents from English medium schools (p<0.01). Adolescents belonging to the middle class (middle socio-economic group) suffered more anxiety than those from both high and low socio-economic groups (p<0.01). Adolescents with working mothers were found to be more anxious (p<0.01). Results also show that a substantial proportion of the adolescents perceived they did not receive quality time from fathers (32.1%) and mothers (21.3%). A large number of them also did not feel comfortable to share their personal issues with their parents (60.0% for fathers and 40.0% for mothers).

Medications and driving : community knowledge, perceptions and experience

There is increasing awareness of the potential for any medication that acts on the central nervous system to impair judgement and motor functioning, including driving performance. This paper reports community knowledge, perceptions and experience in relation to driving while taking medications. A community-based survey (n=316) revealed that of those who had taken any type of medication in the last 7 days (n=193), a quarter (24%) had driven while taking a medication that they thought could affect them. Of those who drove for work, a quarter (26%) of the respondents reported that they had changed or stopped their work-related driving because they were taking a medication that displayed a warning label about driving. Outside of work, a third (35%) of the total number of respondents reported that they had done so. Of those who had taken any type of medication in the last 7 days, 62 were taking on a daily basis one or more medications classified as being likely to have a warning label about driving, such as sedatives, tranquilizers, antidepressants, analgesics and anticonvulsives. This paper will examine community knowledge, perceptions and experience surrounding medications and driving with particular reference to those persons who were taking drugs with a warning label, and the barriers to following such warnings.