The theme of my research has been the relationship between partnerships in change and practitioners who aim to facilitate change in partnerships. The service delivery relationship, while being the principal object of my investigation, has also provided the means of accessing information about the preoccupations of couples and those who try to help them during periods of change. Through implementing and evaluating service initiatives I have illuminated dynamic processes operating within partnerships, and the couples' concerned have provided an illuminating perspective on the services they received. The knowledge generated has been located within an interdisciplinary framework, creating unique and innovative opportunities to link and learn from the experiences of couples, practitioners and other contributors to the field.

The aim of this research is to develop a framework to predict the cost of the resource complexities inherent in an ERP implementation. The framework comprises two phases namely complexity assessment, and dynamic cost estimation for resource complexity using agent-based modelling. The complexity assessment phase involves complexity identification, uncertainty evaluation for the complexity estimates, complexity assessment, complexity classification, and complexity correlation reporting. The framework is automated in a tool known as Complexity of Resource and Assessment Costing Tool (C-REACT). A number of activities have been undertaken in order to develop the ERP resource complexity framework. Firstly, a detailed literature review was performed in order to gain a contextual understanding of ERP implementation challenges and complexities. Secondly, a case study analysis was conducted to establish the current industrial practices concerning ERP implementation challenges. Thirdly, a framework was developed and validated to identify, assess and cost ERP complexity for each resource. The key contribution of the framework is to introduce a new cost estimation process to support ERP project cost estimation by predicting the cost of ERP resource complexities, and a new process to identify, assess and control ERP complexities inherent in the implementation stage. This framework should be used in the needs identification stage of an ERP project lifecycle. The estimate will inform an organisation of the potential costs of ERP resources from a complexity perspective, thereby enabling them to make informed decisions on ERP implementation complexity and cost reduction. Knowledge of potential complexities will also aid the elimination of substantial errors during implementation. Hence the organisation will yield benefits which they would not otherwise reap in the face of complexity.

This thesis begins by examining the concepts of civil society and social capital. Specifically, it outlines the role of health and education third sector organisations (TSOs) in building civil society and generating social capital which is conducive to democratisation. Following this, the thesis presents literature on civil society development in the context of the Russian Federation, highlighting a void in our understanding of health and education TSOs in this context. The literature review examines cultural-historic antecedents and their impact on civil society development. These antecedents result in three constraints which limit TSOs ability to establish civil society as an autonomous space. In light of these constraints, the thesis explores the present day realities faced by Russian TSOs and proposes that the all-dominant nature of the Russian state leads to managed civil society arrangements. Consequently the thesis addresses the question of how a managed civil society manifests itself in the context of the Russian Federation. Using a qualitative research design, the thesis investigates the control mechanisms created by legislative framework, the ability of third sector organisations to substitute for the state, and the organisational characteristics of TSOs within a managed civil society space. Based on interview data from 82 TSOs across three geographical regions, the empirical chapters explore these three aspects in-depth. Firstly, the thesis demonstrates how a specific legislative framework is used as a legally mandated method to manage civil society. Secondly, the thesis explores more subtle attempts by the state to manage civil society. And thirdly, the thesis highlights ways in which the state controls TSOs and coerces them to mimic marionette organisations. Overall, the evidence presented throughout the thesis highlights the idiosyncratic nature of managed civil society arrangements in Russia in which the state is able to control and direct civil society

This thesis addresses the question of how business schoolsestablished as public privatepartnerships (PPPs) within a regional university in the English-speaking Caribbean survived for over twenty-one years and achieved legitimacy in their environment. The aim of the study was to examine how public and private sector actors contributed to the evolution of the PPPs. A social network perspective provided a broad relational focus from which to explore the phenomenon and engage disciplinary and middle-rangetheories to develop explanations. Legitimacy theory provided an appropriate performance dimension from which to assess PPP success. An embedded multiple-case research design, with three case sites analysed at three levels including the country and university environment, the PPP as a firm and the subgroup level constituted the methodological framing of the research process. The analysis techniques included four methods but relied primarily on discourse and social network analysis of interview data from 40 respondents across the three sites. A staged analysis of the evolution of the firm provided the ‘time and effects’ antecedents which formed the basis for sense-making to arrive at explanations of the public-private relationship-influenced change. A conceptual model guided the study and explanations from the cross-case analysis were used to refine the process model and develop a dynamic framework and set of theoretical propositions that would underpin explanations of PPP success and legitimacy in matched contexts through analytical generalisation. The study found that PPP success was based on different models of collaboration and partner resource contribution that arose from a confluence of variables including the development of shared purpose, private voluntary control in corporate governance mechanisms and boundary spanning leadership. The study contributes a contextual theory that explains how PPPs work and a research agenda of ‘corporate governance as inspiration’ from a sociological perspective of ‘liquid modernity’. Recommendations for policy and management practice were developed.

This thesis explores female entrepreneurship within peripheral tourism SMEs in NI, ROI and NZ. The research specifically focuses on the characteristics of the female entrepreneur, their motivating factors, barriers encountered and coping mechanisms employed. Female entrepreneurship is a relatively recent research phenomenon, and is regarded as one of the most significant, yet quietest, revolutions of our time. Female-owned tourism SMEs have the potential to contribute social and economic outcomes to peripheral communities in which they are located by offering sustainable solutions to economic and social challenges in terms of providing employment and service; purchasing goods and services from local suppliers and trades at community level; attracting inward investment from those persons seeking a lifestyle change; and adding value to the community as a whole. As a single industry study, the tourism industry has been deliberately selected as an illustrative context for this research due to the low degree of entrepreneurial behaviour that it has traditionally exhibited. Theoretically, underpinning this study is a combination of both traditional teleological (RBV jKBV) entrepreneurial approaches, and emerging pragmatic models of entrepreneurship (effectuation and bricolage). This research appreciates the importance of counterbalancing relationships between 'traditional' and 'emerging' theories. Methodologically, a three-phase, multi-stage and multi-method approach is adopted. An initial exploratory qualitative stage consisted of formulating an online database and shallow case instrument (Phase One). Qualitative exploration is conducted through email/telephone followup constructs utilising the shallow case instrument (Phase Two). Further explanations of pertinent themes are provided through in-depth interviews (Phase Three). Through confirmation, disconfirmation and extension of knowledge, the research makes a number of pertinent theoretical contributions to the areas of RBV/KBV, effectuation, bricolage, female entrepreneurship and to the context of peripheral tourism SMEs. A number of practical recommendations are forwarded for the interest of key stakeholders (Le. government and SME providers). Future studies may consider extending their scope to include other regions and employ a longitudinal approach in their research.

This research is concerned with the investment decision making process in small manufacturing enterprises in the printing and clothing industries. The focus is on the actual decision-making behaviour of owner-managers. The study uses' Insider accounts' as a qualitative and innovative methodology, which involves in-depth, semi-structured interviews and direct observation,conducted longitudinally in 8 case study companies. It is a research method which includes detailed accounts from the actors themselves, incorporating the actual motives and behaviour of owner-managers based on the philosophy that the 'objects' studied are in fact 'subjects', who produce accounts of their world. The results of the study suggest that owner-manager use 'bootstrapping' techniques for their investment appraisal instead of formal methods such as those recommended in the financial management literature. Bootstrapping represents an approach to decision making that is grounded in previous experience of key decision-makers and their organisations and the largely informal routines that they develop from this. These techniques include a combination of experience judgement and gut-feeling,budgets and forecasts and the tendering process. The concept of bootstrapping is not simply a way of owner-managers finding a solution to a problem or a sort of 'fire-fighting' it is a concept of actions grounded in experiential leaming. In this sense, bootstrapping is a particular form of learning behaviour. It is essentially a trial and error learning process which brings knowledge, skills, values and attitudes together and provides owner-managers with an opportunity to evaluate outcomes associated with investment based on previous experience. Therefore, the researcher believes that conceptualising small firm investment decision making within the context of an organisational learning approach holds promise as an explanatory framework for investment behaviour in small firms.

The research for this study started in April 1993. It is a study of the status of financial reporting, accounting education and profession, in developing countries in general and in Jordan in particular. The general study is a literature survey which examines the nature and problems of accounting education, profession and practices in developing countries. In addition, a review of the development of national accounting standards in the UK and USA, and the International Accounting Standards Committee (IASC) was undertaken and reported upon. The main purpose of the study is to evaluate the accounting profession and corporate financial reports in Jordan with reference to national and international practice and to elicit and investigate the views of various constituencies in Jordan about the use of international accounting standards (IASs) recommended by the accountancy profession in Jordan, as a basis for preparing financial statements of Jordanian enterprises. The study also elicited and reports upon the opinions of Jordanians on the current accounting education programmes in Jordan, and how they can be improved if deficient. Two approaches were used in this study. The first was a questionnaire survey of the perceptions of various users regarding the status of corporate annual reports, accounting profession and education to determine whether the opinions of different user-groups on such status diverge or converge. The second was a content analysis of annual reports of a sample of Jordanian companies listed on Amman Financial Market (AFM) to determine the extent and scope of information provided by them and to reveal the gap between what is disclosed and what is required to be disclosed by the IASC. A disclosure index methodology was adopted in the study. Some corporate characteristics were selected and tested to discover if any of them can explain the variation in disclosure index. In addition, face-to-face interviews with selected individuals were carried out to clarify confounding results from the responses to the questionnaire and the analysis of annual reports and accounts. The study revealed that the accounting profession in Jordan is in its infancy and much more resources and attention than is presently devoted to it is needed to develop this profession to the level required to enable it to function effectively and efficiently. The results suggest that slightly over 50% of the respondents support the suggestion that graduates from Jordanian Universities are inadequately prepared. The results also reveal a strong support for the establishment of Accounting Development Centres to improve accounting education in Jordan. Moreover, there is a general agreement by all respondent user-groups that the IASC's standards are appropriate for Jordan when modified to take account of the needs of the local environment. When compared with reporting practices before the adoption of IASs in Jordan, the disclosure indexes of the sampled companies after adoption of IASs in Jordan revealed a strong improvement in the level of disclosure. The results of multivariate regression reveal that there is no significant association in 1988 between any of each of balance sheet index, income statement index, other financial statement index, measurement and valuation methods index and overall index on one hand and the firms characteristics, namely, assets size, gearing, type of industry, liquidity ratio, proportion owned by the government and size of annual sales on the other hand. Regarding 1992, it seems that the type of industry determine the extent of disclosure in Jordan. The results indicate a highly significant association between each of the indexes conveying the quality of reporting in the balance sheet, profit and loss accounts and the notes relating to measurement and valuation methods on one hand and the type of industry. The results for 1992 show that corporate reporting in Jordan is becoming systematic, responding to industry behaviour, gearing ratio and the level of government investment, compared to the circumstance in 1988. Moreover, the mean score disclosure indexes for 1988 and 1992 reveal that there is a strong improvement in "other financial statement index" in 1992 over 1988. Again this improvement may suggest a positive influence of the adoption of IASC's standards on disclosure behaviour in Jordan. Compared to 1988, the indexes of disclosure in the income statements and in the balance sheets of 1992 fell. This fall may suggest that IASC's standards are lower than normal standards in Jordan. However, changes in corporate disclosure between 1988 and 1992 vary from company-to-company. The correlations between the 1988 and 1992 ranks of each company in respect of different types of financial statements indicate a low correspondence between the ranks. For example the coefficient of rank correlation between the 1988 and 1992 balance sheet indexes is the weakest at 0.5120. That for the 1988 and 1992 indexes for income statement is 0.3626; measurement and valuation methods is 0.4530 and overall disclosure is 0.4839. Furthermore, the results highlight the items of information in the annual reports where disclosure is poor (such as proportion of fixed assets pledged, unexpired useful life of fixed assets). Several suggestions are offered for the improvement of the accounting profession, education and practices in Jordan.

The world has witnessed the emergence of a great number and variety of social entrepreneurial activities in recent years. In the United Kingdom, the SE sector has experienced considerable growth and nowadays is at the centre of academic and political debate. Yet, very little is known about the extent and nature of ethnic minority involvement in social enterprise activity. Critical to an understanding of this is the reduction of grant funding to third sector organisations as well as the change in race relations and equality policies. Moreover, the social enterprise political discourse that has seen social enterprises as an alternative to move towards market-led provision and the privatisation of public services is relevant to understand the development of ethnic minority social enterprise activities. This research produces insights into the nature and extent of ethnic minority social enterprise activities in the East London Olympic Boroughs and provides a fundamental contribution to the development of policy thinking. This thesis also contributes to theory building in the area through the development of a conceptual framework. Structuration and Mixed Embeddedness theories are considered to explain how the development of ethnic minority social entrepreneurial activities depends on the complex interaction between ethnic minority entrepreneurs (as agents) and the context (as structures) in which they are embedded. This research draws upon evidence from a case study in the East London Olympic Boroughs using a mixed-methods approach, which includes literature and policy review, telephone survey, semi-structured interviews and an in-depth study of organisations. Through analysis of the case study, what is discovered is that there are challenges in defining and measuring ethnic minority social enterprise activities. This thesis also reveals that the role of individual ethnic minority entrepreneurs is crucial for the development of social enterprise activities as well as the context in which they are embedded in terms of their access to resources, market opportunities and the political context that determines this development. Finally, findings demonstrate that the current policy discourse provides little scope for engagement for the majority of small-scale ethnic minority social enterprise organisations.

Social entrepreneurship (SE) is a phenomenon of growing interest around the world. However, little is known regarding the characteristics of social entrepreneurs and social entrepreneurial behaviour also remains poorly understood. Although the need for research on particular groups of social entrepreneurs has been acknowledged, there currently is a dearth of literature specifically on older social entrepreneurs. This mixed methods study provides important insight into the diversity of social entrepreneurs over 50 and their SE activities, taking into consideration the different ways in which individual experiences are embedded in social, cultural and educational/professional backgrounds. The focus on older people in this research has also brought to light how individual pathways into SE are shaped by stages and events in people’s lives. The life course approach adopted reveals the complex and evolving nature of SE motivations which cannot be understood in isolation from other aspects of individuals’ past, present and plans for future lives. A related key question addressed is whether social entrepreneurs become more or less risk averse with age. The research contributes to knowledge in three main ways. First, an empirically based typology is developed which reflects the spectrum of social entrepreneurial activity. Three main types are identified (‘Volunteer Activists’, ‘Rationalising Professionals’ and ‘High Aspirers’) which demonstrate the diversity of (50+) social entrepreneurs beyond their demographic characteristics, i.e. including with respect to their expectations, the nature of their contributions, challenges and related support needs. Second, it demonstrates the importance of life stages for better understanding the link between (social) entrepreneurial intentions and actual behaviour, and presents a model of the role of motivations in the SE process which is integrated with a life course perspective. Third, it provides a more holistic insight into the nature of risk and its various dimensions, including financial (the main focus of the ‘mainstream’ literature) as well as reputational or other personal (e.g. physical) risks. It also demonstrates that individuals’ risk taking propensity often changes over time and in response to changing circumstances in form of life stages.

Since the late 1970s successive UK governments, have attempted to implement reforms across the English and Welsh police services. Poor management practice, scandals and reductions in budgets have directed observers to call for a more business-like approach, focusing upon operational as well as organisational reform. Paradoxically although public attitudes towards the police are generally positive it is evident that the social context of policing is changing. The police in England and Wales face the problem of reducing costs while at the same time satisfying the demands and expectations of a society which has become far more divisive and fragmented. The challenge for the police therefore is to introduce innovative ways of improving efficiency and productivity, whilst at the same time improving public opinion as to their effectiveness in their 'fight against crime'. This will require significant reform, which will have a major impact on police organisations in England and Wales, calling into question their values and future role. This thesis describes influential elements of the reform process through a meta-analysis (an objective and quantitative methodology for synthesizing previous studies and research on a particular topic into an overall finding), comprising eight papers. These are put forward to provide the platform for understanding the apparent difficulty in reforming the police in England and Wales. To provide a framework for discussion three key themes are identified - 'Environment', 'Occupational Culture' and 'Lean', that may contribute to future strategic consideration within the police. Through this lens it is clear that they are not mutually exclusive but overlap as the police reform agenda has evolved over time. The first theme therefore takes an 'environmental' perspective and locating discussions within the backdrop of the 2008 global financial crisis, I have highlighted how the UK coalition government’s Comprehensive Spending Review (CSR, 2010) demanded a major review of the strategic and operational functions of the police service. As a result significant budgetary cuts have been made across the police service in England and Wales resulting in significant structural changes and reform of many operational processes. The second theme identifies that radical reforms across the police service have been long overdue and it has been the ability of the police, to a large extent through the strength of their 'occupational culture' to resist reform that has often led to a situation of spiralling costs but little evidence of successful implementation of improvement frameworks. Of the improvement frameworks available, the 'lean' perspective is often favoured due to its emphasis on easily understood tools and techniques that can be quickly and relatively cheaply acquired. This area of 'lean' constitutes the third theme within this thesis and draws upon research within the established domain of lean manufacturing. The key themes are therefore orientated to reflect on research that l have been conducting over the past ten years and the eight journal articles published in support of this research. As such they make their own contribution to the existing conceptual and empirical literature relating to the police. Beyond this I also provide some context to the underlying difficulties in implementing police reform and from my research findings I highlight four areas for consideration. First, the importance of human resource management (HRM) practices in developing the workforce and creating an environment for change. Second, all papers share an interest in improving performance. Third, the adoption of continuous improvement and a lean thinking approach. Fourth and finally, the financial impact of the UK govemment’s Comprehensive Spending Review (CSR, 2010) and changes to the governance structures of the police with the election of Police and Crime Commissioners in 2012 have the potential to provide a significant impact on the reform of the police in England and Wales.