Employer evasion of worker entitlements 1986-95 : what and whose?

Employer non-compliance with workers’ entitlements is an area seldom explored in Australian industrial relations, generally considered uncommon or the province of ‘rogue’ employers. This paper provides a picture of the categories of entitlements against which complaints of evasion were made in the federal industrial relations jurisdiction in Australia, between 1986 and 1995 and the characteristics of complainants. The “top 30” awards ranked by extent of underpayment recovered by the federal enforcement agency (1987-95) are also explored to support arguments that intense competition, reduced union density, precarious employment, youth and being female are strongly associated with employer evasion. The increasing prevalence of these factors in the labour market suggests that employer compliance should be more carefully explored in the Australian context.

Knowledge management for ERP success

The business value of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems and in general large software implementations has been extensively debated in both popular press and academic literature for over three decades. Despite the positive motives for adoption, various organizations have reported negative impacts from these large investments. This ‘disconnect’ between large IS investments and firms’ organizational performance may be attributable to the economic transition from an era of competitive advantage based on information to one that is based on Knowledge. This paper discusses the initial findings of a two-phased study that focuses on empirically assessing the impact of knowledge management on the success of Enterprise Resource Planning systems. The research study uses information gathered from twenty-seven public sector organizations in Queensland, Australia. Validation of the a priori model constructs through factor analysis identified two dimensions of knowledge management. Further analysis assessed the comparative differences in perceptions of knowledge management in ERP, across four employment cohorts.

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.