Report on relationship management and culture change

Brisbane Water (BW), a commercialised business arm of Brisbane City Council (BCC) entered into an alliance with a number of organisations from the private sector in order to design, construct, commission and undertake upgrades to three existing wastewater treatment plants located at Sandgate, Oxley Creek, and Wacol in Brisbane. The alliance project is called the Brisbane Water Environmental Alliance (BWEA). This report details the efforts of a team of researchers from the School of Management at Queensland University of Technology to investigate this alliance. This is the second report on this project, and is called Stage 2 of the research. At the time that Stage 2 of the research project was conducted, the BWEA project was nearing completion with a further 8 months remaining before project completion. The aim of this report is to explore individuals’ perceptions of the effectiveness and functioning of the BWEA project in the latter stages of the project. The second aim of this report is to analyse the longitudinal findings of this research project by integrating the findings from Stage 1 and Stage 2 of the project. This long-term analysis of the functioning and effectiveness of the alliance is important because at the current time, researchers have little knowledge of the group developmental processes that occur in large-scale alliances over time. Stage 2 of this research project has a number of aims including assessing performance of the BWEA project from the point of view of a range of stakeholders including the alliance board and alliance management team, alliance staff, and key stakeholders from the client organisation (Brisbane Water). Data were collected using semi-structured interviews with 18 individuals including two board members, one external facilitator, and four staff members from the client organisation. Analysis involved coding the interview transcripts in terms of the major issues that were reported by interviewees.

Documentary practice in a participatory culture

Debates concerning the veracity, ethics and politics of the documentary form circle endlessly around the function of those who participate in it, and the meaning attributed to their participation. Great significance is attached to the way that documentary filmmakers do or do not participate in the world they seek to represent, just as great significance is attached to those subjects whose participation extends beyond playing the part of eyewitness or expert, such that they become part of the very filmmaking process itself. This Ph.D. explores the interface between documentary practice and participatory culture by looking at how their practices, discursive fields and histories intersect, but also by looking at how participating in one might mean participating in the other. In short, the research is an examination of participatory culture through the lens of documentary practice and documentary criticism. In the process, however, this examination of participatory culture will in turn shed light on documentary thinking, especially the meaning and function of ‘the participant’ in contemporary documentary practice. A number of ways of conceiving of participation in documentary practice are discussed in this research, but one of the ideas that gives purpose to that investigation is the notion that the participant in contemporary documentary practice is someone who belongs to a participatory culture in particular. Not only does this mean that those subjects who play a part in a documentary are already informed by their engagement with a range of everyday media practices before the documentary apparatus arrives, the audience for such films are similarly informed and engaged. This audience have their own expectations about how they should be addressed by media producers in general, a fact that feeds back into their expectations about participatory approaches to documentary practice too. It is the ambition of this research to get closer to understanding the relationship between participants in the audience, in documentary and ancillary media texts, as well as behind the camera, and to think about how these relationships constitute a context for the production and reception of documentary films, but also how this context might provide a model for thinking about participatory culture itself. One way that documentary practice and participatory culture converge in this research is in the kind of participatory documentary that I call the ‘Camera Movie’, a narrow mode of documentary filmmaking that appeals directly to contemporary audiences’ desires for innovation and participation, something that is achieved in this case by giving documentary subjects control of the camera. If there is a certain inevitability about this research having to contend with the notion of the ‘participatory documentary’, the ‘participatory camera’ also emerges strongly in this context, especially as a conduit between producer and consumer. Making up the creative component of this research are two documentaries about the reality television event Band In A Bubble, and participatory media practices more broadly. The single-screen film, Hubbub , gives form to the collective intelligence and polyphonous voice of contemporary audiences who must be addressed and solicited in increasingly innovative ways. One More Like That is a split-screen, DVD-Video with alternate audio channels selected by a user who thereby chooses who listens and who speaks in the ongoing conversation between media producers and media consumers. It should be clear from the description above that my own practice does not extend to highly interactive, multi-authored or web-enabled practices, nor the distributed practices one might associate with social media and online collaboration. Mine is fundamentally a single authored, documentary video practice that seeks to analyse and represent participatory culture on screen, and for this reason the Ph.D. refrains from a sustained discussion of the kinds of collaborative practices listed above. This is not to say that such practices don’t also represent an important intersection of documentary practice and participatory culture, they simply represent a different point of intersection. Being practice-led, this research takes its procedural cues from the nature of the practice itself, and sketches parameters that are most enabling of the idea that the practice sets the terms of its own investigation.

Is the sum more than the corporate entrepreneurship parts? the different effects of social capital on innovation, venturing, and renewal processes

Principal Topic Although corporate entrepreneurship is of vital importance for long-term firm survival and growth (Zahra and Covin, 1995), researchers still struggle with understanding how to manage corporate entrepreneurship activities. Corporate entrepreneurship consists of three parts: innovation, venturing, and renewal processes (Guth and Ginsberg, 1990). Innovation refers to the development of new products, venturing to the creation of new businesses, and renewal to redefining existing businesses (Sharma, and Chrisman, 1999; Verbeke et al., 2007). Although there are many studies focusing on one of these aspects (cf. Burgelman, 1985; Huff et al., 1992), it is very difficult to compare the outcomes of these studies due to differences in contexts, measures, and methodologies. This is a significant lack in our understanding of CE, as firms engage in all three aspects of CE, making it important to compare managerial and organizational antecedents of innovation, venturing and renewal processes. Because factors that may enhance venturing activities may simultaneously inhibit renewal activities. The limited studies that did empirically compare the individual dimensions (cf. Zahra, 1996; Zahra et al., 2000; Yiu and Lau, 2008; Yiu et al., 2007) generally failed to provide a systematic explanation for potential different effects of organizational antecedents on innovation, venturing, and renewal. With this study we aim to investigate the different effects of structural separation and social capital on corporate entrepreneurship activities. The access to existing and the development of new knowledge has been deemed of critical importance in CE-activities (Floyd and Wooldridge, 1999; Covin and Miles, 2007; Katila and Ahuja, 2002). Developing new knowledge can be facilitated by structurally separating corporate entrepreneurial units from mainstream units (cf. Burgelman, 1983; Hill and Rothaermel, 2003; O'Reilly and Tushman, 2004). Existing knowledge and resources are available through networks of social relationships, defined as social capital (Nahapiet and Ghoshal, 1998; Yiu and Lau, 2008). Although social capital has primarily been studied at the organizational level, it might be equally important at top management level (Belliveau et al., 1996). However, little is known about the joint effects of structural separation and integrative mechanisms to provide access to social capital on corporate entrepreneurship. Could these integrative mechanisms for example connect the separated units to facilitate both knowledge creation and sharing? Do these effects differ for innovation, venturing, and renewal processes? Are the effects different for organizational versus top management team integration mechanisms? Corporate entrepreneurship activities have for example been suggested to take place at different levels. Whereas innovation is suggested to be a more bottom-up process, strategic renewal is a more top-down process (Floyd and Lane, 2000; Volberda et al., 2001). Corporate venturing is also a more bottom-up process, but due to the greater required resource commitments relative to innovation, it ventures need to be approved by top management (Burgelman, 1983). As such we will explore the following key research question in this paper: How do social capital and structural separation on organizational and TMT level differentially influence innovation, venturing, and renewal processes? Methodology/Key Propositions We investigated our hypotheses on a final sample of 240 companies in a variety of industries in the Netherlands. All our measures were validated in previous studies. We targeted a second respondent in each firm to reduce problems with single-rater data (James et al., 1984). We separated the measurement of the independent and the dependent variables in two surveys to create a one-year time lag and reduce potential common method bias (Podsakoff et al., 2003). Results and Implications Consistent with our hypotheses, our results show that configurations of structural separation and integrative mechanisms have different effects on the three aspects of corporate entrepreneurship. Innovation was affected by organizational level mechanisms, renewal by integrative mechanisms on top management team level and venturing by mechanisms on both levels. Surprisingly, our results indicated that integrative mechanisms on top management team level had negative effects on corporate entrepreneurship activities. We believe this paper makes two significant contributions. First, we provide more insight in what the effects of ambidextrous organizational forms (i.e. combinations of differentiation and integration mechanisms) are on venturing, innovation and renewal processes. Our findings show that more valuable insights can be gained by comparing the individual parts of corporate entrepreneurship instead of focusing on the whole. Second, we deliver insights in how management can create a facilitative organizational context for these corporate entrepreneurship activities.

Impeding good governance implementation in Indonesian regional government : the effect of a bureaucratic generation gap

The implementation of ‘good governance’ in Indonesia’s regional government sector became a central tenet in governance research following the introduction of the national code for governance in 2006. The code was originally drafted in 1999 as a response to the Asian financial crises and many cases of unearthed corruption, collusion, and nepotism. It was reviewed in 2001 and again in 2006 to incorporate relevant political, economical, and social developments. Even though the national code exists along with many regional government decrees on good governance, the extent of implementation of the tenets of good governance in Indonesia’s regional government is still questioned. Previous research on good governance implementation in Indonesian regional government (Mardiasmo, Barnes and Sakurai, 2008) identified differences in the nature and depth of implementation between various Indonesian regional governments. This paper analyses and extends this recent work and explores key factors that may impede the implementation and sustained application of governance practices across regional settings. The bureaucratic culture of Indonesian regional government is one that has been shaped for over approximately 30 years, in particular during that of the Soeharto regime. Previous research on this regime suggests a bureaucratic culture with a mix of positive and negative aspects. On one hand Soeharto’s regime resulted in strong development growth and strong economic fundamentals, resulting in Indonesia being recognised as one of the Asian economic tigers prior to the 1997 Asian financial crises. The financial crises however revealed a bureaucratic culture that was rife with corruption, collusion, and nepotism. Although subsequent Indonesian governments have been committed to eradicating entrenched practices it seems apparent that the culture is ingrained within the bureaucracy and eradication of it will take time. Informants from regional government agree with this observation, as they identify good governance as an innovative mechanism and to implement it will mean a deviation from the “old ways.” Thus there is a need for a “changed” mind set in order to implement sustained governance practices. Such an exercise has proven to be challenging so far, as there is “hidden” resistance from within the bureaucracy to change its ways. The inertia of such bureaucratic cultures forms a tension against the opportunity for the implementation of good governance. From this context an emergent finding is the existence of a ‘bureaucratic generation gap’ as an impeding variable to enhanced and more efficient implementation of governance systems. It was found that after the Asian financial crises the Indonesian government (both at national and regional level) drew upon a wider human resources pool to fill government positions – including entrants from academia, the private sector, international institutions, foreign nationals and new graduates. It suggested that this change in human capital within government is at the core of this ‘inter-generational divide.’ This divergence is exemplified, at one extreme, by [older] bureaucrats who have been in-position for long periods of time serving during the extended Soeharto regime. The “new” bureaucrats have only sat in their positions since the end of Asian financial crisis and did not serve during Soeharto’s regime. It is argued that the existence of this generation gap and associated aspects of organisational culture have significantly impeded modernising governance practices across regional Indonesia. This paper examines the experiences of government employees in five Indonesian regions: Solok, Padang, Gorontalo, Bali, and Jakarta. Each regional government is examined using a mixed methodology comprising of on-site observation, document analysis, and iterative semi-structured interviewing. Drawing from the experiences of five regional governments in implementing good governance this paper seeks to better understand the causal contexts of variable implementation governance practices and to suggest enhancements to the development of policies for sustainable inter-generational change in governance practice across regional government settings.

Achieving better stewardship of major infrastructure assets through configuration of governance arrangements utilising Stewardship Theory

Major infrastructure assets are often governed by a mix of public and private organizations, each fulfilling a specific and separate role i.e. policy, ownership, operation or maintenance. This mix of entities is a legacy of Public Choice Theory influenced NPM reforms of the late 20th century. The privatization of the public sector has resulted in agency theory based ‘self-interest’ relationships and governance arrangements for major infrastructure assets which emphasize economic efficiency but which do not do not advance non-economic public values and the collective Public Interest. The community is now requiring that governments fulfill their stewardship role of also satisfying non-economic public values such as sustainability and intergenerational responsibility. In the 21st century governance arrangements which minimize individual self-interest alone and look to also pursue the interests of other stakeholders have emerged. Relational contracts, Public-Private Partnerships (PPP’s) and hybrid mixes of organizations from the state, market and network modes (Keast et al 2006) provide options for governance which better meet the interests of contractors, government and the community there is emerging a body of research which extends the consideration of the immediate governance configuration to the metagovernance environment constituted by hierarchy, regulation, industry standards, trust, culture and values. Stewardship theory has reemerged as a valuable aid in the understanding of the features of governance configurations which establish relationships between principal and agent which maximize the agent acting in the interests of the principal, even to the detriment of the agent. This body of literature suggests that an improved stewardship outcome from infrastructure governance configurations can be achieved by the application of the emerging options as to the immediate governance configuration, and the surrounding metagovernance environment. Stewardship theory provides a framework for the design of the relationships within that total governance environment, focusing on the achievement of a better, complete stewardship outcome. This paper explores the directions future research might take in seeking to improve the understanding of the design of the governance of major, critical infrastructure assets.

The differential effects of organizational antecedents on dimensions of corporate entrepreneurship

This study seeks to further delineate how organizational antecedents differentially influence the three components of corporate entrepreneurship: innovation, venturing or strategic renewal. We argue that structural differentiation may help organizations to maintain multiple and often conflicting demands of entrepreneurial and mainstream activities. Taking a social capital perspective, our study further examines two contingencies in the form of informal integration mechanisms (i.e. connectedness and TMT social integration). Our findings show structural differentiation has a positive effect on all three components of corporate entrepreneurship, yet the effect is moderated by integration mechanisms. Interunit connectedness has a positive moderation effect regarding innovation and venturing, and TMT social integration has a negative moderation effect regarding strategic renewal. This reveals that innovation is influenced by informal integration mechanisms on the organizational level, strategic renewal on top management team level, while venturing is influenced by integration mechanisms on both levels.

The reputation of the corporate social responsibility industry in Australia

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is increasingly seen as an imperative for sustainable business and there is a growing literature on the effect of CSR on corporate reputation. Despite this, a pall of ambiguity and uncertainty remains around what CSR means and how it should be practiced. This paper offers a unique addition to the body of literature to date by revealing that CSR is an emerging industry in Australia, which is in the process of developing its own reputation as a set of business practices. The paper is based on exploratory qualitative research using a case study methodology. Interviews were conducted with key actors within the industry to investigate shared understandings of what CSR means, perceptions of CSR practice and of the industry as a whole, and who is involved in shaping these perceptions. The research revealed that the CSR industry in Australia is in its early stages of development and is therefore in need of increased internal cooperation if it is to develop a strong reputation.

Multilineage differentiation potential of bone and cartilage cells derived from explant culture

To date, mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) from various tissues have been reported, but the yield and differentiation potential of different tissue-derived MSCs is still not clear. This study was undertaken in an attempt to investigate the multilineage stem cell potential of bone and cartilage explant cultures in comparison with bone marrow derived mesenchymal stem cells (BMSCs). The results showed that the surface antigen expression of tissue-derived cells was consistent with that of mesenchymal stem cells, such as lacking the haematopoietic and common leukocyte markers (CD34, CD45) while expressing markers related to adhesion (CD29, CD166) and stem cells (CD90, CD105). The tissue-derived cells were able to differentiate into osteoblast, chondrocyte and adipocyte lineage pathways when stimulated in the appropriate differentiating conditions. However, compared with BMSCs, tissue-derived cells showed less capacity for multilineage differentiation when the level of differentiation was assessed in monolayer culture by analysing the expression of tissue-specific genes by reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) and histology. In high density pellet cultures, tissue-derived cells were able to differentiate into chondrocytes, expressing chondrocyte markers such as proteoglycans, type II collagen and aggrecan. Taken together, these results indicate that cells derived from tissue explant cultures reserved certain degree of differentiation properties of MSCs in vitro.

High Culture as Subculture : Brisbane's Contemporary Chamber Music Scene

The aim of the dissertation is to discover the extent to which methodologies and conceptual frameworks used to understand popular culture may also be useful in the attempt to understand contemporary high culture. The dissertation addresses this question through the application of subculture theory to Brisbane’s contemporary chamber music scene, drawing on a detailed case study of the contemporary chamber ensemble Topology and its audiences. The dissertation begins by establishing the logic and necessity of applying cultural studies methodologies to contemporary high culture. This argument is supported by a discussion of the conceptual relationships between cultural studies, high culture, and popular culture, and the methodological consequences of these relationships. In Chapter 2, a brief overview of interdisciplinary approaches to music reveals the central importance of subculture theory, and a detailed survey of the history of cultural studies research into music subcultures follows. Five investigative themes are identified as being crucial to all forms of contemporary subculture theory: the symbolic; the spatial; the social; the temporal; the ideological and political. Chapters 3 and 4 present the findings of the case study as they relate to these five investigative themes of contemporary subculture theory. Chapter 5 synthesises the findings of the previous two chapters, and argues that while participation in contemporary chamber music is not as intense or pervasive as is the case with the most researched street-based youth subcultures, it is nevertheless possible to describe Brisbane’s contemporary chamber music scene as a subculture. The dissertation closes by reflecting on the ways in which the subcultural analysis of contemporary chamber music has yielded some insight into the lived practices of high culture in contemporary urban contexts.

Identity, relationships and culture

The purpose of this paper is to consider contemporary developments in the knowledge area dealing with culture, relationships and individual identity. It has three main objectives: the first is to examme the ways in which knowledge is currently produced within the discipline; the second is to look at an alternative approach to the issues, an approach which stresses more piecemeal and contingent ways of understanding; finally, this paper looks at how this new theoretical knowledge is being applied, or can be applied, to areas which impact directly upon educational practices.

Whither culture? Australian horror films and the limitations of cultural policy

Cultural policy that attempts to foster the Australian film industry’s growth and development in an era of globalisation is coming under increasing pressure. Throughout the 2000s, there has been a substantial boom in Australian horror films led by ‘runaway’ horror film Saw (2004), Wolf Creek (2005), and Undead (2003), achieving varying levels of popularity and commercial success worldwide. However, emerging within a national cinema driven by public subsidy and valuing ‘quality’ and ‘cultural content’ over ‘entertainment’ and ‘commercialism’, horror films have generally been antithetical to these objectives. Consequently, the recent boom in horror films has occurred largely outside the purview and subvention of cultural policy. This paper argues that global forces and emerging production and distribution models are challenging the ‘narrowness’ of cultural policy – a narrowness that mandates a particular film culture, circumscribes certain notions of value and limits the variety of films produced domestically. Despite their low-culture status, horror films have been well suited to the Australian film industry’s financial limitations, they are a growth strategy for producers, and a training ground for emerging filmmakers.

Measuring quality : how does this improve construction performance?

The paper charts the history and development of the Hong Kong Housing Department (HKHD) Performance Assessment Scoring System (PASS) from 1990 to the present day and examines its effect on facilitating change to the quality of construction work of building contractors engaged in the production of public sector housing projects Hong Kong. The paper builds partly on empirical research carried out by the author as part of a doctoral thesis from 2000 to 2005, on experiential knowledge and also on some relevant case studies. The outcomes from this earlier research and validation of PASS based on results derived from the system since the research was originally undertaken are of benefit to practitioners and academics working and studying in the areas of performance assessment and organisational culture and change. The conclusions presented in the paper further underpin the connection established in previous research between strong organisational culture and project and corporate success. Organisational culture was measured using a survey instrument originally developed by Denison and Neale (1994), adapted for the environment of the study, and corporate success was measured by the PASS system mentioned above. The major results of the original study indicate that there is significant linkage between strong organisational cultures and business success and the detailed findings were that, (1) strong organisational culture was positively associated a high level of company effectiveness, (2) a high level of company effectiveness was positively associated with the cultural traits of ‘consistency’, ‘adaptability’ and ‘mission’, and (3) a high level of company effectiveness was positively associated with the combined cultural traits represented by the dimensions of ‘external focus’ and ‘stable culture’. Several opportunities to take forward this research have been identified, including extending the study to other countries and also longitudinally re-evaluating some of the original case studies to ascertain how organisational cultures have changed or further developed in relation to the changing construction climate in Hong Kong.

Assessing organizational culture? value management to the rescue

As part of a Doctor of Business Administration degree programme jointly run by Curtin University, Perth, Australia and Lingnan University, Hong Kong, a research thesis relating organizational effectiveness to the organizational culture of Hong Kong construction firms involved in public housing is being undertaken. Organizational effectiveness is measured by the Housing Department (HD) Performance Assessment Scoring System (PASS) and organizational culture traits and strengths have been measured by using the Denison Organizational Culture Survey (OCS), developed by Daniel Denison and William S. Neale and based on 16 years of research involving over 1,000 organizations. The PASS scores of building contractors are compared with the OCS scores to determine if there is any significant correlation between highly effective companies and particular organizational strengths and traits. Profiles are then drawn using the Denison Model and can be compared against ‘norms’ for the industry sector on which the survey has been carried out. The next stage of the work is to present the results of the survey to individual companies, conduct focus group interviews to test the results, discover more detail on that company’s culture and discuss possible actions based on the results. It is in this latter stage that certain value management techniques may well prove very useful.