Leadership and culture are complex fields. Some researchers assert that the transactional-transformational leadership paradigm is universally effective across cultures; whereas, some argue that specific culture traditions and norms, interaction between leaders and followers, as well as core value and belief systems are bound to differentiate leadership styles. It is realized that all these suggestions are subject to challenges and criticism. Adopting a realist philosophy and a case study strategy, this study embodies both qualitative and quantitative perspectives though the quantitative material has been used as an adjunct to the case study interviews rather than as a representative and random survey. Materials have been obtained from sixty five Chinese and American executive level managers within medium to large sized wholly American-owned companies of electronics industry in mainland China. This study argues that leadership seems to be oversimplified in Bass’ two-factor theory since there are a number of flaws that exist within the literature. The case analysis indicates that the leadership styles of Chinese and American executives can be both transformational and transactional. However, the findings suggest that American executives generally exhibited obvious transformational leadership, but also transactional contingent reward; conversely, Chinese executives displayed modest transformational leadership and more transactional management-by-exception (active). Leadership styles and effectiveness are perceived by both Chinese and Americans to be rather situational. Divergent or contradictory underlying assumptions about people and organizations between cultures consequently lead to misinterpretation and incomprehension of transactional and transformational leadership between Chinese and American leaders. This study has also shown that the transactional-transformational leadership theory is, generally applicable, but is inadequate to explain all the differences and similarities between Chinese and American executives. This is the first study to discover micro and perceptual leadership styles of Chinese leaders and macro and rational leadership styles of American leaders. The identification of Chinese-American leadership differences and similarities and special cases provide insights for understanding the dynamic process of leadership. The findings additionally suggest that the probable causes become more complex when the cultural causes are overlaid by a number of situational causes leading to leadership differences, but not previously given much attention in the literature. Nevertheless, due to the influences of corporate culture and American (or Western) management theories, the probability of leadership convergence has been highlighted. Lastly, this thesis proposes a dynamic Yin Yang model of admired leadership styles for convergence and adjustment of leadership styles based upon situation, context and time.

This thesis investigates the processes of identity construction and identity work in entrepreneurial dyads. Entrepreneurial dyads are defined as two-person teams, in which members are bound both by a strong social tie and by a common commitment to start and manage a new business venture. The thesis builds on the work of Watson (2008) and adopts his conceptual framework for understanding how discourse shapes social identities and how these are used to inform the production of a coherent self. The business stories of three entrepreneurial dyads are used as case studies. Data were collected through both storytelling in interviews and direct observation. Entrepreneurs were asked to produce an individual account of their business story. In addition, the dyads' interactive dynamics were directly observed in their natural settings. The business stories produced by the dyads were analysed using the narrative method. First, the narrative styles of the business stories were assessed looking at elements such as plot, structure, and characterisation. This analysis allowed an understanding of the socially available discourses which provided the entrepreneurs with a system of meanings that shaped their presentations. Second, a process of narrative deconstruction allowed the identification of their locally meaningful discourse, uniquely created within each dyad by social interaction. What emerged shows that the entrepreneurs recounted not only traditional business stories, but enacted a unique discourse of 'being entrepreneurial'. A meta-level cross-case comparison of the different experiences of each of the three dyads facilitated the identification of distinct patterns. The tension between change and obligation is identified as the mechanism that governs the processes of identity work and the construction of social identities. On the one hand, individuals actively engage in producing original discourses and in shaping the presentations of their selves. On the other hand, they deal with an established sense of obligation. The latter encompasses both the expectations that society associates with the social structure (e.g. marriage; company), and a unique system of meanings that each dyad constructs through social interaction. The processes of identity construction and identity work are uniquely identified through the use of linguistic portals. These are theorised as cue words that populate the accounts of the entrepreneurs and signal some reflection on aspects of identity during the narration of a story. Watson's (2008) framework has been expanded from undertaking this research and generating these insights. In doing identity work, individuals transfer features of their unique and locally meaningful discourses in their selves and also in other social identities (e.g. mother, daughter, boyfriend). This occurs because of an obligation both towards society and towards the community the dyads created. The ability to balance agency and this dual obligation represents the element of coherence across different presentations. The thesis also expands Watson's five categories of social identity, through adding communal social identities in terms of those presentations of selves locally meaningful within a unique interaction.

The thesis focuses on ‘criminal entrepreneurs,’ i.e. those individuals who behave in an entrepreneurial manner who have chosen a life of crime to obtain an income or create wealth rather than setting up and running their own legitimate businesses. The research is based on male prisoners, predominantly fraudsters and drug dealers, and was motivated by the assertion that by understanding why they have chosen this way of life it may be possible to encourage such people to use their entrepreneurial skills in a legitimate context thereby reducing recidivism. Based on an epistemological constructivist approach, the methodology used was a phenomenological one and included a moral dilemma, an ethics questionnaire and personal construct psychology linked with case studies. This is a novel approach in that it uses Kelly’s (1955) personal construct theories and repertory grid techniques in order to identify the criminal entrepreneurs’ constructs and the moral stances that they adopt when making sense of their world. The findings showed that moral reasoning theories with respect to offenders do not offer a reliable guide to moral or ethical behaviour and ignore relationships which were an important feature of the criminal entrepreneur’s life. For instance a strong bond was found to exist between some of the respondents and their parents, particularly the mother, and role models were important in their lives. Some cultural differences were detected: West African participants became drugs traffickers because they were seizing an opportunity to be able to provide for their families, whereas those from UK origins tended to come from socially or economically deprived families. It was anticipated that most criminals would reason at the lower levels of Kohlberg’s progressive stages of moral development (Palmer, 2003:100-101) where offending may be justified if punishment can be avoided, but most achieved higher levels (Stages 2 and 3). (At Stage 2 offending is justified if the rewards outweigh the risks and Stage 3 implies that offending is justified if it maintains relationships.) Caring and ambition were important key constructs in making sense of their world, but circumstances such as migrant status, dysfunctional family backgrounds and discrimination meant that they had to apply these constructs in a limited criminal world, rather the broader legitimate one. To use Fisher’s (2006: 205) idea they work in a narrow ethical horizon rather than a broad one. The findings suggest that criminal entrepreneurs have constructs that would be applicable to a legitimate activity and emphasise the need for counselling and seamless mentoring which is currently absent from most prison educational programmes. This thesis contributes to an increased knowledge of entrepreneurial offenders, their beliefs and relationships and offers prison education providers with an enhanced understanding of how to meet their clients’ needs.

The researcher believes that the wide ranging use of the term business model in academic and practitioner arenas suggests that the clarification of its use rhetorically, strategically or managerially or lack of use would be of interest to both academics and management practitioners. Universities face increasingly challenging economic conditions and the identification of the use within higher education of business models using interview data, cross-referenced to institutional success, measured by a variety of metrics, may allow inferences to be drawn about the relationship of the relative success of institutions and the role, if any, of business models which may then inform future decision making. The researcher suggests that a business model approach, whilst not introducing new concepts is a useful descriptive and analytical tool for both practitioners and academics. In a discursive sense the term can act as a useful short hand whilst as a framework for value propositions it can aid the identification and development of the underlying economic reality of business activity. Furthermore, business models when viewed in the context of competing value propositions and business model innovation provide a link to and an aid in, the development of strategy. The researcher found that the term business model was frequently described in interview as inappropriate and no evidence of significant explicit usage of the term business model was found in university strategic plans. Further evidence from interview and the analysis of strategic plan documentation highlights the use of business-like language and practices suggesting that implicit, rather than explicit, business model approaches are being adopted in universities for decision making purposes. No evidence of a correlation between the use of business models, business like terms or reference to Hefce strategic aims and financial or league table success was noted. Whilst relative institutional income levels remained largely static over the period 1994-95 – 2006-07, the income patterns of institutions interviewed indicated that as the level of success as measured by researcher increased, as a proportion of total income grant and fee income reduced and research and other income increased. In addition the top twenty-five universities measured by average surplus over the period 1994-5 to 2003-04 tended to have a higher than average proportion of their total income represented by research and other income. To aid the realisation of potential benefits to be gained by universities from the adoption of a more explicit business model approach the research findings suggest the consideration of three factors. Firstly the clarification of the location of business models in relation to the more traditional management tools of strategy development and resource planning. Secondly, the lack of appetite for the explicit adoption of a business model approach, in at least some parts of the sector, suggests that the language of business models needs adapting to a higher education context. The researcher suggests the language of social enterprise which would explicitly recognise the societal dimension of university activity. Finally, but related to the second point is that the constrained economy of higher education needs to be recognised in the development of a business model approach with complex stakeholder relations recognised in value propositions and outcomes and financial sustainability as a necessary facilitator rather than primary driver.

[Taken from document 5] This thesis has the main objectives of identifying the route selection process, used for choosing a method of strategic projects’ implementation, used in practice and assessing the relevant Key Decision Factors (KDF) in that decision making process. The study is based on conclusions from previous research documents and the latest findings from literature review. Past literature relied on neoclassical normative project management theory to provide a set of guiding principles, and focused on proximity to specific implementation directions. In modern literature, however, to the topic has been viewed through the prism of a different paradigm. Moreover, the qualitative research chosen in this study adopted a realist approach, attempting to understand the implementation routes phenomenon. This methodology comprised semi-structured interviews of participants, observation of three Greek organisations in the service sector, and collection of documents. Subsequently, data analysis called for results from qualitative research related to, and triangulated with, findings of literature review. As a result, a list of Key Decision Factors and the route selection framework was developed. Managers may have the intention to act rationally and systematically when choosing a method of project implementation, but they mostly cannot achieve this because of the slightly chaotic (unpredicted) nature of organisations and business life. The findings revealed the use of the hybrid-mutant route as the flexible solution for the implementation of strategic projects in reflection to emergent strategy and influences from various factors and phenomena. In conclusion, the research contributes to the knowledge of organisational innovation in strategic projects implementation. The literature on project management implementation is extended as a result of this study.

It has been suggested that marketers must understand cultural differences in order to develop their marketing programmes across borders. Conversely, it is also argued that defined groups, in different countries, can be targeted in a similar way. These two perspectives raised the question that ‘to which extent should marketing programmes be standardised across the world’. The issues of Standardisation versus Adaptation in global marketing have received substantial attention from researchers over the past three decades. Opinions have varied, and the debate continues, lively, today. This has stressed the importance of cross-countries marketing programme research for practical and academic alike. This research sets out to investigate how suppliers of global companies presently interpret the need for adaptation in an emergent and increasingly relevant market (Libya) and how Libyan consumers react to their decisions through identify the influence of foreign marketing programmes on their buying behaviour. Also, to determine how Libyan consumers are influenced by marketing programmes according to individual characteristics to build a model for their buying behaviour. The research consists of two phases to study the foreign marketing programme in Libya from two different points of views. Firstly, using structured interviews with the managers of four home appliances subsidiary agents in Libya, the actual degree of marketing programme standardisation currently adopted for fast-moving consumer/household goods was determined in Libyan market. Secondly, using a survey of 805 randomly chosen consumers, located in three major urban conurbations (Tripoli, Benghazi and Sabha), the research identifies what factors should be taken as significant variables in understanding the impact of foreign marketing programmes on Libyan consumers. The findings showed that foreign companies tend to apply a standardisation perspective to their marketing activities, but that this is neither consistently, nor – to some degree – effectively applied. Furthermore, the research revealed that buying behaviour of Libyan consumers was more a function of individual difference than of localised adaptation variables. In conclusion, the thesis may be stated that the understanding of consumer characteristics within the regional context (Arab/Islam) is the key consideration in designing marketing programme for this part of the world.

As the construction industry faces increased pressures to act in a more socially responsible way, the concept of "supplier diversity" is one of several topics that have found its way to the corporate social responsibility agenda. Often seen as a strand of the notion of ethical sourcing, the supplier diversity debate relates to the issue of promoting greater diversity in the supply chain by providing opportunities for traditionally under-represented suppliers to engage with large purchasing organisations. This thesis is an account of the final stage of a wider exploratory study assessing whether there is a business case for supplier diversity in the construction housing sector. Utilising an in-depth interview approach, it focuses on the merits of the "business case" for supplier diversity from the perspective of the minority business owner operating as a contractor (typically a small firm), in the construction housing sector. The research evidence presented stimulates a discussion about some very sensitive yet serious issues with the aim being to crystallise and create greater awareness of the business case for supplier diversity in the construction housing sector. The research findings provide a detailed insight to the key issues why minority business owners feel larger construction companies should act to implement effective measures to ensure they are managing diversity in their supply chain – these are examined through the lens of social exclusion, corporate social responsibility, diversity management, supplier diversity, and buyer-minority supplier relationships. The research concludes that from the minority contractor's point of view, there is a compelling business case for supplier diversity. The minority contractor‟s perspective on the impact that a positive action scheme such as supplier diversity could achieve in terms of addressing the numerous barriers and obstacles faced by these SMEs is thought to be significant. The research reports on the minority contractor's perspective of supplier diversity and highlights a number of significant benefits which include amongst others: large construction companies demonstrating they are socially responsible; minority contractors believe they are more competitive than non-minority owned businesses with their pricing; supplier diversity programmes push buyers to engage more with the minority business community; minority contractors contribute significantly to the local economy; and, larger construction companies, have a duty to ensure a level playing field exists for all. The research evidence also reveals that there are a large proportion of minority business owners operating in the construction housing sector that choose to exclude themselves from accessing contract opportunities with the larger construction companies – referred to in this study as an example of „self exclusion‟. A number of factors are highlighted which contribute towards this decision made by minority contractors to „opt-out‟ and exclude themselves. This could be one explanation for why buyers for large construction companies report that their view is that it is hard to find qualified and capable minority businesses, thereby illuminating further reasons why the diversity record of the construction sector has been reported by many as being „poor‟ Based on both the minority contractor‟s and procurers perspectives of the business case for supplier diversity in the construction housing sector, the researcher recommends that supplier diversity programmes can certainly go some way to help address some of the issues and barriers to contract opportunities unveiled as a result of the research evidence. In particular, a well designed and successful supplier diversity initiative can help overcome much of the negative issues outlined in this study which includes: addressing the industry image in relation to diversity and sending out the right „signals‟ to the minority business community; enabling procurement directors for large construction companies to demonstrate they are serious and willing to engage with minority contractors; large construction companies will be able to select from a larger pool of contractors thereby increasing their competitive advantage; supplier diversity enables „doors to be opened‟ for minority contractors by inviting them to engage more with the larger construction companies, and, encouraging Tier 2 level contractors to implement supplier diversity further strengthens the industry‟s action response to the diversity agenda. In looking beyond the business case, the researcher concludes that industry leaders and diversity practitioners, might do better to recognise that while there is no reason to believe diversity will naturally translate into better or worse results, diversity is both a labour market imperative and societal expectation. Therefore, managers for the larger construction companies might do better to focus on building an organisational culture, procurement practices, and the managerial and group process skills needed to translate diversity into positive organisational, group, and individual results.

This research is a research into the perceptions of senior public administrative leaders in the Republic of Ireland regarding their own leadership at the time when Ireland was facing a significant socio-economic crisis. The research examines the senior Irish administrative leaders’ own perspectives on how leadership should be exercised, and explores how they perceived the environment they were in and on how they made sense of their own leadership responses to the perceived environment. The research takes the Republic of Ireland as a national case study, and focuses on the public administrative leadership, which is the leadership of the implementation of public policies, rather than on the political leadership, which is the leadership of the selection of public policies (Montesquieu 1748, Ostrom 1973, Osborne and Plastrik 1997, Alimo-Metcalfe and Alban-Metcalfe 2003, Van Wart and Dicke 2008). The research is preluded by a conceptual discussion on leadership, morality, ethics and values (Chau 2007b); a qualitative research on leadership values in the Irish public services (Chau 2008); and a quantitative research on public service delivery perspectives in Ireland (Chau 2009). The research interviews were conducted amongst the top two echelons of public administrative leaders, with participation drawn from the Secretary General or Assistant Secretary levels of the Irish civil service, or their equivalent amongst the State Agencies. The research employs an interpretivist approach (Mason 2002, Willis 2007), exploring how these senior Irish public administrative leaders made sense of their own leadership during the crisis period. In particular, the interpretive approach explores how the leaders perceived their own leadership, explores how they interpreted the environment they perceived themselves to be in, and explores how they made sense of their own leadership in response to the perceived environment. The findings of the research reveal evidence pointing towards a social construction process (Berger and Luckmann 1966) through which the senior Irish public administrative leaders constructed their realities of leadership. The finding reveals that in their constructed realities, which were constructed through their dialectic social interactions, the senior Irish public administrative leaders considered that they made 4 appropriate responses to the socio-economic crisis. The approach which they considered appropriate could be described as a heroic (Ford et al 2008) approach, with particular emphasis on a number of positivistic leadership traits (Stogdill 1974, Gardner 1989, Méndez-Morse 1992, Spears 2000). Further, the findings indicate that in their constructed reality, the senior Irish administrative leaders had interpreted their environment as a significant crisis one, and had internalised a need to implement significant changes in response. However, the findings reveal that despite the perception of a crisis and despite the acknowledgement of a need for change, the leadership response seen as the appropriate response by the leaders themselves was one that reflects a degree of conservatorship (Selznick 1984, Terry 1995) – which is a leadership perspective that emphasises the conserving of various values and institutions (Scott 1995, Terry 2003), and is therefore a perspective that sees activating incremental change (Nadler 1988, Tushman 1988, Dunphy and Stace 1993, Senior 2002, Burnes 2004), even in the face of a perceived crisis of magnitude, as making more sense than pursuing disruptive reform or radical change (Grundy 1993, Kotter 1996). The findings therefore had revealed the existence of multiple constructed realities, some of them even appear to contradict each other. The contribution of this research to knowledge within public sector leadership and management is the contribution to the understanding of how leadership realities could be constructed, and to understand the extent to which, in a particular constructed leadership reality, the driving of disruptive change should be balanced by the maintaining of unwavering continuity even when faced with significant national socio-economic crises. The contribution to practice is to have fostered a less positivistic view of what Irish public administrative leadership should look like, and with a constructionist perspective, to suggest a viable construct of a public administrative leadership perspective that reflects a preference for responding to a significant crisis with a degree of conservatorship rather than responding only with a bias for radical reform.

Over two decades, the globalisation of research and development (R&D) has become a subject of considerable academic interests. The majority of studies concerning it describe this phenomenon in developed countries. Little is known about it in technologically underdeveloped countries. No study has systematically identified the possible obstacles to the R&D globalisation process in these countries. This suggests that this research topic is a distinctive topic for study. This study takes Libya as an example of a technologically underdeveloped country and aims to investigate the obstacles to the R&D globalisation process in Libya. To achieve this aim and in fulfilling the research objectives, the thesis utilises both qualitative and quantitative approaches. They were conducted through case studies of two transnational corporations (TNCs) working in Libya and an interview-based survey with three R&D related managers located in their offices there. Additionally, a questionnaire-based survey was conducted on 30 R&D related managers at 10 Libyan organisations. These methods are complemented by an archival analysis of several sources, related to both TNCs selected and the Libyan business environment. Key findings of this thesis include; corporate R&D activities are limited and often confined to one way technology transfer, oriented towards resolving and fixing technical problems. Libya does have a domestic R&D capability, but it does not translate to innovations, with many obstacles hindering the practice of R&D activity. Libyan science and technology (S&T) and industrial policies have failed to provide concrete ways and means to reinforce R&D or to encourage the evolution of R&D subsidiaries. There is a lack of and weakness in the institutional mechanisms for encouraging and attracting foreign R&D activities. The conclusion drawn suggests that some TNCs have begun conducting modest corporate R&D activities in Libya and most of these activities can be linked to the development phase of R&D. However, Libya was found to have a low technological capability and R&D capacity as well as weaknesses in relevant core competences. Thus, the foreign R&D activities are driven by demand rather than supply factors, based mainly on a market seeking strategy. Major obstacles hindering the corporate R&D activities were identified, including institutional, human resource, management and technological factors. Most of them link to weaknesses in and limitations of the national innovation system (NIS) in Libya. A key contribution of this thesis is that it provides both TNCs and host country perspectives on the possible obstacles to the R&D globalisation process in technologically underdeveloped countries. It also addresses possible improvement opportunities for these countries to join the global R&D networks.

Within the corporate branding and Higher Education (HE) literature there are few studies which explore university branding, particularly in more specialist university departments. While corporate branding has been conducted in a number of different commercial settings, this is the first study of its kind to conduct research into corporate branding in a specialist area of education in a university. This research study therefore attempts to address this gap in knowledge by exploring the different interpretations of corporate branding, and its implementation, in the context of a post-92 University, and more specifically in an education department particularly in relation to its teacher training provision. Corporate branding is an important topic as the marketplace for universities is becoming increasingly competitive and there are key components of corporate branding that can provide an organisation with a competitive edge. It is felt that understanding these components, and how they relate to corporate branding in a university, will alleviate some of the confusion that exists in the literature. Useful recommendations are provided for the HE sector and to the wider service sector, particularly in terms of policy and professional practice. An interpretivist approach is adopted for the research through the development of a single revelatory case study which draws on primary sourced data within a qualitative paradigm. This includes documentary evidence, fourteen semi-structured interviews with employees and three focus groups with seventeen students in a University’s Faculty of Education. What has emerged from the research is a new theoretical framework which suggests that programmes have developed as sub-brands brought about by seven key antecedents: the changing environment, sub-cultures, the vision for a teacher, staff, shared values, partnerships and brand ambassadors. This study contributes to the academic knowledge by extending the concept of a sub-brand to the academic teaching programmes and related to this is the fact that creative and innovative graduates are contributing to the employability levels as well as to the reputation of a Faculty. Subsequently it is Faculties, or specialist areas, that contribute to the competitive advantage of a University.