Diversities in the professional organization of accountants : a comparability study with insights from the Chinese experience

While spatial, historical and cultural variations across different countries have prevented any generalisation to be made of the professionalization process, various analytical themes can be said to have emerged in scholarly inquires relating to the professional organization of accountants. In highlighting these broad themes, this study argues that they have all revolved around one important relationship-that of the state and the accounting profession. The dynamics and the fluid nature of this intriguing relationship is further captured and contrasted in this study through an investigation of an episode of intra-professional conflict during the professionalization experience of the Chinese accountants.

Evaluating quality of life in hip and knee replacement: psychometric properties of the World Health Organization Quality of Life short version instrument

Objective: To evaluate the psychometric properties of the World Health Organization Quality of Life short version instrument (WHOQOL-BREF), and to determine its responsiveness in assessing early outcome after total hip or knee replacement surgery.

Methods: At baseline (entry to an orthopedic waiting list), 279 participants completed the WHOQOL-BREF instrument, Western Ontario and McMaster Universities Osteoarthritis Index (WOMAC), Assessment of Quality of Life (AQOL) instrument, Kessler Psychological Distress (K10) scale, and the modified Health Assessment Questionnaire (MHAQ). A total of 74 patients completed reassessments 3 months after surgery.

Results: The WHOQOL-BREF demonstrated acceptable internal consistency for all domains (Cronbach's = 0.76-0.84) and moderate concurrent validity for the physical and psychological domains (r = 0.67 for physical versus AQOL; r = -0.71 for psychological versus K10). Minimal ceiling or floor effects were identified at baseline or 3 months, except for the social relationships domain. The disease-specific WOMAC subscales were most responsive to change (relative efficiency [RE] 0.66-1.00). Apart from social relationships, all WHOQOL-BREF scores improved significantly after surgery. The physical domain was more responsive than the AQOL (RE 0.50 versus 0.42) and was similar to the MHAQ (RE 0.55 for MHAQ). The responsiveness of the psychological domain was similar to that of the K10 scale (RE 0.11 versus 0.08).

Conclusion: The WHOQOL-BREF has good psychometric properties for use in persons with severe joint disease, and by providing complementary information, it offers clinicians and researchers an additional tool for comprehensively assessing quality of life in this patient group.

Subtle sexism : re-informing intergroup bias and regulating emotion in an Australian police organization

From a liberal feminist perspective, we argue that gender can both inform and should continue to be informed by social identity studies in efforts to understand and manage subtle sexism in contemporary workplaces. We investigated the presence of a form of subtle sexism, affective aversive sexism, in an Australian male-dominated organization: a police force. To do this we surveyed 159 policemen and examined relationships between individual emotional experience, emotional intensity and emotion regulation. Results indicated that, in a subtle display of intergroup bias, policemen experienced both higher positive and higher negative emotions in the presence of other policemen than of policewomen who, we argue, may be less central in the men's identities and relationships at work. Implications for research, training, and emotion management in the workplace are discussed and it is suggested that liberal feminist research can contribute much to understanding the dynamics that reproduce structural segregation in the workplace.

New work ethics? The corporate athlete's back end index and organisational performance

Drawing on Michel Foucault’s later genealogies of the Self the paper will illustrate particular dimensions of the increasingly powerful individualizing and normalizing processes shaping the lifeworlds of worker-citizens in a globalizing risk society. Processes that require those who wish to be positively identified as professional, entrepreneurial, resilient, effective, athletic to do particular sorts of work on themselves. Here the paper argues that we can identify the emergence of what we call New Work Ethics. We illustrate this more general argument via an analysis of the ways in which a large Information Technology (IT) organization seeks to produce—via a workplace health and fitness program—employees who imagine themselves as embodying the behaviours and dispositions that mark the person as a corporate athlete. Knowledge of the Self in these terms can, it is promised, enhance the performance of the Self, and the organization.

'I am, by God, fit for high positions' : on the political role of women in al-Andalus

Narrating and explaining the fairly emancipated women in al-Andalus has been fraught with ambiguity for the approximately one century of scholarship on the subject. There has been much stereotyping depending upon the investigator's particular perspective. This paper clarifies the roles of Andalusian women in political relations from the Muslim Conquest in 711 through the fall of Granada in 1492. The interpretations used in historiography pit a traditionalist trend, in which continuity from the pre 1slamic past is stressed, against the anti-continuist trend, in which an Oriental culture of the Muslims added the distinctive features of Iberian character today. In order to evaluate the two historiographic approaches, the contributions of seven prominent women are presented and evaluated for their social contexts during the eight centuries of al-Andalus. Comparisons are then made to prominent women in other political contexts within the Arab world in order to evaluate the strength of the two competing historiographic perspectives.

Market fit, market orientation, and business performance : an empirical investigation

This thesis investigated the congruence of an organisation to its intended target markets. It was hypothesised that the internal activities of an organisation are, potentially, structured in response to its market dynamics with the ultimate aim of achieving the organisational objective(s). Market fit has been conceptualised to represent the fit of an organisation to its operating market environment. The information for this study was collected from senior marketing decision makers, using a self-administered questionnaire. The sample comprised 216 companies from a mix of industries and organisational sizes in Australia. There is evidence to suggest that the association of market orientation and business performance is inconsistent under different business operating circumstances, due to the exclusion of the influence of key environmental moderators. The model of market fit attempts to overcome this condition. The results suggest that market fit is associated with measures of business performance, and the levels of association are different from those related to the market orientation measures, reflecting the influence of moderators. The categories of environmental moderators contributing at different levels to the market fit measure include: (1) marketing planning, (2) implementation of marketing decisions, (3) market orientation, (4) market strength, (5) generic strategies, (6) organisational culture, (7) familiarity with the marketing audit, and (8) the external environment. The marketing audit procedure has been recommended as a tool to assist with the establishment and maintenance of market fit. The results of this study indicate that organisational familiarity with, and the conduct of, the marketing audit periodically are low, and that market fit may be a better predictor of business performance, than is market orientation.