Pedagogical learnings for management education : developing creativity and innovation

This paper argues that management education needs to consider a trend in learning design which advances creative learning through an alliance with art-based pedagogical processes. A shift is required from skills training to facilitating transformational learning through experiences that expand human potential, facilitated by artistic processes. This creative learning focus stems from a qualitative and quantitative analysis of an arts-based intervention for management development, called Management Jazz, conducted over three years at a large Australian University. The paper reviews some of the salient literature in the field, including an ‘Artful Learning Wave Trajectory’ Model. The Model considers four stages of the learning process: capacity, artful event, increased capability, and application/action to produce product. Methodology for the field-based research analysis of the intervention outcomes is presented. Three illustrative examples of arts-based learning are provided from the Management Jazz program. Finally, research findings indicate that artful learning opportunities enhance capacity for awareness of creativity in one’s self and in others, leading, through a transformative process, to enhanced leaders and managers. The authors conclude that arts-based management education can enhance creative capacity and develop managers and leaders for the 21st century business environment.

Development of lifetime warranty policies and models for estimating costs

In today's fiercely competitive products market, product warranty has started playing an important role. The warranty period offered by the manufacturer/dealer has been progressively increasing since the beginning of the 20th Century. Currently, a large number of products are being sold with long-term warranty policies in the form of extended warranty, warranty for used products, service contracts and lifetime warranty policies. Lifetime warranties are relatively a new concept. The modelling of failures during the warranty period and the costs for such policies are complex since the lifespan in these policies are not defined well and it is often difficult to tell about life measures for the longer period of coverage due to usage pattern/maintenance activities undertaken and uncertainties of costs over the period. This paper focuses on defining lifetime, developing lifetime warranty policies and models for predicting failures and estimating costs for lifetime warranty policies.

Cosmopolitanism, the nation-state and imaginative realism

Contemporary writing on cosmopolitanism has asserted the need for a new sociological toolkit to deal with an emergent post-national social order. At the heart of this agenda is a misunderstanding about the role of the nation-state, which has led to some rather unhelpful theorizations. The state is assumed to be a dead hand in the development of post-national sentiments or an increasingly irrelevant social structure. We argue that the superseding of the nation-state is not necessary for the development of cosmopolitan sentiments of solidarity. In addition to classical sociology, it is work surrounding the concepts of cosmopolitan democracy and constitutional patriotism and the public sphere that can assist us in theorizing cosmopolitanism. What distinguishes this tradition is the utilization of social science concepts such as democracy, state, public sphere and law in an attempt to ground the idea of cosmopolitanism within the context of existing social structures.

The effect of national governance codes on firm disclosure practices : evidence from analyst earnings forecasts

This study examines whether voluntary national governance codes have a significant effect on company disclosure practices. Two direct effects of the codes are expected: 1) an overall improvement in company disclosure practices, which is greater when the codes have a greater emphasis on disclosure; and 2) a leveling out of disclosure practices across companies (i.e., larger improvements in companies that were previously poorer disclosers) due to the codes new comply-or-explain requirements. The codes are also expected to have an indirect effect on disclosure practices through their effect on company governance practices. The results show that the introduction of the codes in eight East Asian countries has been associated with lower analyst forecast error and a leveling out of disclosure practices across companies. The codes are also found to have an indirect effect on company disclosure practices through their effect on board independence. This study shows that a regulatory approach to improving disclosure practices is not always necessary. Voluntary national governance codes are found to have both a significant direct effect and a significant indirect effect on company disclosure practices. In addition, the results indicate that analysts in Asia do react to changes in disclosure practices, so there is an incentive for small companies and family-owned companies to further improve their disclosure practices.