No description available.

This doctoral thesis presents an analysis of the context in which creativity and innovation emerges. It is based on an investigation of a single case organisation. The theoretical framework for the study derived from a number of fields, including organisational studies, social science and systems theory. Of particular importance were studies of organisational systems, their function, and the dynamics that allow creativity and innovation to emerge. Autopoietic system theory is relevant here. The empirical work was conducted in a single large case study organisation based in Germany. Daimler AG, served as the site of data collection. The data for analysis was generated from a survey, focus groups and interviews. The study identified large organisational structures such as organisational design, culture and information and knowledge, which constrain or enable the fluid process of routines, individuals' interactions, and knowledge and idea creation. These structures are highly interrelated and correlate with the organisational innovation performance. These structures turn into fluid patterns of individual and group creativity. Nine patterns were identified, which build a pattern language of creativity in organisations. This pattern language consists of three main "pattern rules". The contribution of the study is the identification of three main factors or "pattern rules" that underpin creativity and innovation. These are (1) diverse experienced experts within the "thick of the action"; (2) innovation willingness to create and support change; (3) "free space" where employees can explore, create and prototype new ideas. In this thesis this concept is labelled "Freiraum", which is the German word for "free space" in which individuals and teams can achieve their potential. These rules build a model of two spaces, which facilitate a spiral of creativity driven by the innovation willingness. This model provides explanation of how creativity and innovation emerges within the context of an organisation. This work draws particular attention to the dynamics of creativity and innovation, and the influence of organisational control on redundancy of the system, where high control leads to low redundancy and vice versa.

An increasing number of companies are reporting their environmental performance, impacts, and activities. The objectives of such reports are many including, in particular, reacting to external pressures from company stakeholders demanding more information about environmental performance. This might also be matched by management requiring information to better run the business - hence an internal requirement for information that would then be available for publication. Because, this environmental reporting serves multiple objectives and satisfies different needs of different readers, it varies in the type of information provided, the scope and depth of material disclosed, presentation formats used, the credibility of the information provided and its overall quality. Although richness of report content, scope of topics covered, presentation and credibility of this content have all been used to assess the quality of corporate environmental reporting (CER), to date most prior studies have looked simply at the volume of and/or the types of information when assessing the quality of CER. Studies have used two main indices to measure disclosure quality; subjective analysts' indices and semi-objective indices. Subjective indices such as the Association of Investment Management and Research (AIMR), formerly the Financial Analysts Federation (FAF) disclosure ratings, are built on corporate disclosures' ratings weighted by a panel of leading analysts in each industry. In semi-objective indices, on the other hand, a pre-determined list of items (topics of disclosure) is developed and tested for their presence (absence ) and/or the richness of their content. It is noted that most disclosure studies adopt this second approach in the form of disclosure index studies, a partial type of content analysis. Other disclosure measures have included textual analysis such as thematic content analysis, readability studies, and linguistic analysis. However, there is no consensus about the best measure for assessing reporting quality. One of the most important limitations encountered in the disclosure literature is the difficulty in assessing the quality of disclosure (Healy and Palepu, 2001; Urquiza et al., 2009). For example, these studies identify three key limitations. Firstly, there is inherent subjectivity involved in the selection of the quality measure and in the coding scheme to assess this 'quality' generally researchers choose their own methods or proxies. Secondly, there is an ignorance of the quality perceptions of preparers and users of corporate disclosure. Hammond and Miles (2004) argue that we cannot assess the quality of disclosure independently of a detailed understanding of users' need of disclosure. Thirdly, it has been common to use annual reports (ARs) to assess the extent and quality of corporate responsibility disclosure, ignoring the other reporting media such as corporate responsibility reports (CRRs), websites, home advertisings, etc (Forst et al., 2005; KPMG, 2011). Thus considering the fact that robust, reliable, and replicable quality assessment is problematic, the objectives of this research are threefold. Firstly, to build a more representative quality model based on the findings of a questionnaire ascertaining the views of both preparers and distinct categories of readers of ARs and/or CRRs. Secondly, to apply this model to FTSE 100 CER in both ARs and CRRs to ascertain whether the proxies frequently used in prior literature yield similar results to those derived from this more complex model. Thirdly, to investigate whether the common use of ARs, rather than more detailed CRRs in assessing CER quality is giving a misleading picture of the level and richness of disclosure available to stakeholders.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.