In this thesis I study how socio-economic background – seen as the socio-economic conditions while growing up and the resources someone has access to – affects the labour market outcomes of young adults. Through three distinct chapters I show that young adults from a disadvantaged background are substantially less likely to be employed and when employed tend to find worse jobs than their more advantaged peers, even when keeping education constant. I first discuss how being out of work is transmitted over generations in the UK. Children whose father did not work are substantially less likely to be employed themselves and tend to work fewer hours, but are no different in earnings or contract. I show how this may be partly due to differences in how work is experienced. A disadvantaged background does not always pose the same limits to labour market opportunity. I show that in Germany background does not negatively affect labour market outcomes during good economic times, but becomes more important as labour market conditions worsen. In the final chapter I study ethnic penalties in the labour market. Ethnic minorities in the UK are highly qualified but even among British university graduates there are ethnic penalties in employment and – to a lesser extent – in earnings. Having access to support and assistance through socio-economically advantaged parents or a highly-skilled co-ethnic community can shelter young ethnic minority graduates. Those who lack these resources are at a substantial disadvantage. It is important to recognise the different ways in which disadvantage affects young adults and that differences exist even among those with similar qualifications. The main hurdle the disadvantaged face is finding employment which is where additional help could be offered to the disadvantaged.

This thesis reports on a study of outcome-focused care for older people in one English local authority. The aim of the research was to examine whether altering the delivery of care to an outcome-focused model would improve service delivery and save money for the organisation in the long term. In order for this to be established, a longitudinal study was conducted over 18 months, utilising a mixed-method design. The sample consisted of 40 service users aged 65 years and over who all had critical and substantial care needs. The study also included interviews with and observations from social services staff responsible for the commissioning and delivery of care. The focus of this case study was to examine the impact of two models of home care delivery for older people, and how these two models impact on the older persons’ self-reported well-being. The research established that there was a greater improvement in well-being in the group receiving outcome-focused care, when compared with the comparison group receiving the traditional task-focused model. Managers’ and social workers’ perceptions were also that outcome-focused care improved service users’ sense of well-being, in comparison with those receiving task-focused care. The overall cost (service provision only) of providing the new style of intervention was 17% more than the traditional task-focused model. The main conclusion was that outcome-focused care allowed a meaningful relationship to be established between the home care worker and the service user, whereas the opportunity for such relationship building was limited in the traditional task-orientated model.

Recognising quality to be a key focus for competitiveness, Total Quality Management (TQM) was established and used in developed countries as a continually evolving philosophy for managing organisations. However, TQM in developing countries has received little attention and little research has been conducted into the successful implementation of TQM system in these countries in comparative with developed countries. The research described in this thesis assesses the adoption of TQM factors in the Construction industry in the UK and Jordan. This comparative study aimed to investigate if TQM implementation is fundamental for the Construction industry and to identify the critical success factors for successful implementation. In addition this research explores the benefits of applying TQM system and the main impediments to successful adoption, also the impact of TQM in improving competitiveness. In order to understand the reasons behind low competitiveness level by the Jordanian companies against international construction companies operating in Jordan, and to investigate the reason behind the sudden drop of the quality scale in the Jordanian Construction industry, both questionnaires and face-to-face individual semi-structured interviews were employed to fulfil the study objectives. The semi-structured interviews aimed to gain deep understanding of TQM implementation by targeting general managers, project managers and project supervision team, while the questionnaires aimed to investigate the implementation of TQM implementation, TQM implementation benefits and impediments, and TQM implementation impact on competitiveness (profitability, market share, quality services) from employees, clients, and final users’ perspectives in the UK and Jordan. Analysis of the data revealed that time and cost, juxtaposed with the non-implementation of TQM and learning practices, can further vex quality failure in the Jordanian Construction companies, which in turn manifest themselves as customer dissatisfaction, rework, bad reputation, and reduce turnover. Construction companies have not pro-actively embraced TQM system because it is mistakenly considered to be an extra cost and perceived as programme of change. While in the United Kingdom the results show that TQM system is being increasingly adopted in the Construction companies to solve quality problems. The implementation of a TQM based on cultural change in addition to changing management behaviour, to move the organisations toward TQM culture that focuses on quality as a key strategy to satisfy customers. The study has made a significant contribution to the knowledge of TQM. This research helps to understand the TQM implementation in the Jordanian Construction companies based on the UK construction companies experience in TQM implementation. Some recommendations for further research have been derived from this research, such as, Contractors need to focus on aspects of performance, time, the establishment of long-term partnerships with subcontractors and maintenance of a well-trained workforce to improve overall performance and quality services, Jordanian construction companies should embrace a degree of transformational change by adopting a customer focus strategy instead of a price focus strategy, Jordanian construction companies need a cultural change which cannot be achieved without changes to norms, beliefs and values, and more attention is needed in the marketing element within the Jordanian construction as it has a direct impact on improving organisational market share.

Research concerning administrator effects and the wider field of experimenter expectancy effects (Rosenthal, 1976) has established the theory that the hypotheses and knowledge held by an experimenter can unconsciously influence their results. Therefore, in a novel use of a photographic line-up from an actual police investigation, this research aims to explore the impact of administrator effects without the memory component of a recalled event. Previous research in this area has used a traditional memory paradigm to test administrator effects, however this has clouded the issue of whether the witness is being influenced by the administrator or is actually remembering the event. This research removes the memory component and therefore concentrates on the expectancy effect of the administrator. In order to further the understanding of administrator effects, this research examines whether there is an aspect of interpersonal behaviour which predisposes some individuals to be more susceptible to inferences from others, or predisposes some to be more likely to influence individuals than others. In order to do this the Fundamental Interpersonal Relations Orientation: Behaviour (FIRO-B) instrument is utilised to examine the interpersonal relationship behaviour of the administrator and the participant. This research also identifies the cues emitted by the administrator by audio-recording the interaction between the administrator and the participant. Using an experimental design, which manipulated the knowledge of the location of the target, five hundred and twenty six participants were asked to identify the person responsible for the Lockerbie bombing. Line-up administrators, who were either informed of the location of the suspect, informed of the location of an alternative suspect, or uninformed of the location of the suspect, presented the participants with the photographic line-up of twelve men, one of which is believed to be the person responsible for the Lockerbie bombing. Participants were asked to pick the person they thought was the suspect from the line-up, they then completed the FIRO-B questionnaire. Analysis of the frequency of identifications suggests the presence of an experimenter expectancy effect. A chi-square goodness of fit test indicates that significantly more participants identified the target suspect when the administrator was informed of the location of the target, than when the administrator was uninformed. Analysis of the FIRO-B data found that target identifiers in the informed condition reported significantly higher received control scores than non-identifiers from an informed condition matched comparison group. Target identifiers also reported significantly higher social interactivity and received inclusion scores than non-identifiers. Analysis of the FIRO-B data from the line-up administrators found subtle differences in the FIRO-B scores of the administrators achieving a high number of target identifications compared to administrators achieving a low number of target identifications. In particular, administrators achieving a high number of target identifications reported higher levels of expressed control and lower levels of received control than administrators achieving a low number of target identifications. Analysis of the transcripts of the line-ups indicate that administrators in the informed condition interacted with their participants for longer, and exhibited more verbal cues. Administrators who obtained a target identification also spoke to their participants for longer. Those administrators who spoke to their participants for longer reported higher levels of expressed control and lower levels of received control. The results of this study point to an experimenter expectancy effect. Beyond that though there appears to be an aspect of interpersonal behaviour that may be responsible for a predisposition to influence or to be influenced. This thesis, in line with previous research advocates the use of ‘double-blind’ line-up procedures in order to eradicate the possibility of an administrator effect. However, it also highlights the importance of considering the social interaction between the experimenter and the participant that is at the heart of social psychology research with human participants. In particular, the damning effect on the results of research conducted by an experimenter who assumes the dominant role in a social interaction, with a participant who assumes the submissive role.

The publications chosen for inclusion for this PhD by publication comprise three books, three book chapters and four articles published in peer-reviewed journals. There are three major themes in this work. The first concerns the role and nature of practice knowledge and its contribution to effective relationship-based social work practice with vulnerable children and families. Practice knowledge is created by, and for, social workers operating under conditions of uncertainty, risk, emotion and anxiety. These publications can be located within, and aim to make, a significant contribution to social workers’ practice knowledge. The second major theme concerns the process by which the practice knowledge described by these publications was created. The analysis identifies the author’s role as a scholar-facilitator in facilitating the generation, testing and dissemination of this practice knowledge. The scholar-facilitator contributes to practice knowledge and theory generation by bridging the worlds of practice, academia and policy. Finally the significance and authority of the contribution to social work knowledge developed by these publications is demonstrated by reference to the ways in which they directly address contemporary challenges to child protection policy and practice in England.

Adopting a case study approach (Yin, 1984; Stake, 1995;) this study aims to explore the experiences of 'self-harm' by women who have been given a diagnosis of 'borderline personality disorder' (BPD) within one area of a Mental Health NHS Trust. By taking a material-discursive-intrapsychic approach (Ussher, 1999; 2000) this research explores the accounts that have been constructed around 'self-harm' and 'BPD' by mental health professionals working with women and women themselves. This research looks at the ways in which 'self-harm' and the diagnosis of 'BPD' are operationalised by professionals and the implications arising from these constructions and discourses when delivering services to women. The study also explores the narrative accounts of women who access the mental health care arena in relation to their experiences of 'self-harm' and 'BPD', and in particular how they have constructed and experienced such responses in their everyday lives. The process of data gathering for this project was organised in two phases. In the first phase of data gathering eight mental health professionals participated in conversational interviews (Nichols, 1991; Conrad and Schober, 1998). These professionals worked for the Mental Health NHS Trust and each of them aimed to provide care, support and treatment for individuals accessing mental health services. The second phase of the research involved the participation of four women, living in the locality of the NHS Trust, in lengthy narrative interviews (Reissman, 1993). Data analysis for phase one drew upon the guidelines developed by Willig (1999; 2001) and for phase two Reissman's (1993) thematic narrative analysis and Langellier's (1989) personal narrative guided the analytical process. 5 Unlike previous research that has explored 'self-harm' and 'BPD' the present study draws upon social constructionism, critical realism and post-modern thinking. This approach has made it possible for an alternate way of considering 'self-harm' and 'BPO'. Individual women at material, discursive and intrapsychic levels experience this phenomenon. It's meaning to women, and to the mental health care professionals, has to be understood in relation to the specific historical and cultural contexts in which both are positioned and the dominant cultural discourses that exist at these times. By drawing upon a critical realist epistemological standpoint and adopting a materialdiscursive- intrapsychic analysis the present study has been able to incorporate these different layers of the women's subjective experience, and the different types of expert knowledge about 'self-harm' and 'BPO', into one framework. The present study has been able to explore 'self-harm' and 'BPO', both as discursive constructs and a set of symptoms experienced by individual women.

The principle aim of this study was to uncover and produce a phenomenological description of the experiences involved when reading and discussing with others a book about death and dying. Although fictional literature is frequently used within bereavement services, there is a dearth of research to support evidence based practice. The methodological design was based on the work of Edmund Husserl, in particular his transcendental phenomenological approach to enquiry. The participants for the study consisted of 11 bereaved young people, four of whom had Down’s syndrome. A therapeutic bereavement session was attended by the group, during which a member of staff read Michael Rosen’s SAD BOOK (Rosen, 2004). Afterwards a series of questions guided and stimulated discussion, gradually leading onto an exploration of their unique experiences. The participants listened, discussed, debated and shared stories, not only about reading the book but of their own grief. The main therapeutic session was video recorded and provided data that included verbal and non-verbal language, together with details of the context in which the interactions took place. The analysis uncovered findings that included: 1) a connection to other bereaved people 2) discussion of crying and sadness 3) a focus on prose and illustrations, especially one page which read: This is me being sad Maybe you think I’m being happy in this picture Really I’m being sad but pretending to be happy I’m doing that because I think people won’t like me if I look sad The findings were transformed to produce a phenomenological description of the experience when reading and discussing with others a book about death and dying. It is anticipated that this research will be of benefit to a wide range of multi-professional staff working with bereaved young people, some of whom may have a learning disability.

A research study has been completed to explore notions of community, participation and practice in relation to organisational learning. Finding that existing organisational learning literature was only able to partially explain the learning process, literature is drawn from non-organisational contexts and mapped across to the workplace in order to comprehensively explain the mechanisms of learning. In doing this, learning is positioned a social process; this thesis contributes to existing literature by unpicking the intricacies of social interaction and the nuanced nature of participation in the case study organisation to develop an understanding of the learning process. The research project was undertaken in a debt recovery agency in the Huddersfield area, Smart Debt Recovery. Using an ethnographic research style, research involved participant observation, interviews and document collection. The initial analysis was completed on the observation notes and involved the data being constructed into a story that enables the reader to get a real feel for what working at Smart Debt Recovery is like. Additionally, it served as a valuable analytic tool that informed the interview schedule that followed. Analysis after this was completed thematically; the data were coded in such a way that all aspects of participation in Smart Debt Recovery’s practices were understood in terms of learning. The research has developed understandings of learning within an organisation by making use of non-organisational learning theories and applying them within a workplace context. Notably, social constructivist understandings of learning, such as progression through a Zone of Proximal Development are applied to learning instances and notions of participation in multiple communities of practice, and the multi-faceted nature of this, is used to reflect on individual levels of learning and performance. The key outcome of this research is a thorough, unique and detailed exploration of learning happening within an organisation.

Research on workplace violence has mostly studied organisational and personal consequences of the phenomenon, and has focussed on specific “at risk” occupations (e.g. A&E), offering very little data on other elements such as disclosure, victims’ individual characteristics, the range of violence involved, and victimisation in ‘low risk’ occupations. This research examines a new perspective of the nature of violence in the context of home-visit settings by looking at victimisation in a “low risk” occupation: loan sellers. It offers a more in-depth definition of workplace victimisation “outside office” settings by studying violence experienced by taxi drivers. Based on the Interpersonal Transaction model of offending put forward by Canter (1989) suggesting a certain degree of interpersonal interaction between the offender and the victim, the present study investigates the possible relationship between victims’ interpersonal tendencies and victimisation and crime disclosure. By using the Fundamental Interpersonal Relations Orientation-Behavior (FIRO-B) scale (Schutz, 1958) analyses were conducted to look at relationships between victims’ interpersonal tendencies and victimisation (types of incident experienced) and crime disclosure. Two samples were recruited: 1) 1,868 Polish home-visit loan sellers, 2) 47 British taxi drivers. All participants completed a questionnaire with the FIRO-B scale and two British taxi drivers were interviewed for case studies. Quantitative analyses revealed that victims scored significantly higher on Received Control and Socio-Emotional Affect than non-victims. Significant relationships were found between certain types of incidents and interpersonal tendencies: Expressed Control and physical threat from an intoxicated customer (Kendall’s tau b=.237, p<.05), actual violence from an intoxicated customer (Kendall’s tau b=.279, p<.05), and multiple victimisations (Kendall’s tau b=.227, p<.05). Differences were observed between samples. Loan sellers were more frequently victimised by customers who did not appear intoxicated compared to taxi drivers who were more likely to be victimised by inebriated customers. The latter also seemed to be more at risk of more serious forms of violence. As to disclosure, loan sellers who reported an incident obtained significant higher scores on Received Control and lower scores on Socio-Emotional Affect and Expressed Control than those who did not report an incident. Taxi drivers obtained a significant Kendall tau correlation between reporting and Expressed Control (Kendall’s tau b=.283, p<.05), which is opposing results from the loan sellers sample. Qualitative analyses revealed “inaction from the police” and “waste of time” as the two main reasons for not reporting an incident. Interactions with the offender and behaviours leading to escalation were also dominant themes within the two case studies. By examining the relationship between victims’ interpersonal tendencies and workplace victimisation and disclosure, the current study offers a foundation for the development of an Interpersonal Transaction model of Victimisation and opens new research avenues on personality correlates of crime disclosure.

This research addresses the question “When is a bully not a bully?” through grounded theory using a purposive sample of volunteer participants who had been accused of workplace bullying. The aim of the study was to critically evaluate the lived experience and organisational implications of being accused of being a workplace bully, from the perspective of the (alleged) bully. The research did not set out to consider if an (alleged) bully had been guilty or innocent of the allegation put to them; it was considered that if this was deemed a criteria by the potential participant it may reduce engagement with the study. This study will contribute to the body of knowledge around the phenomenon of bullying and offers an insight into both research and further development of good organisational practice. Whilst the research on other parties involved in the issue and management of workplace bullying have developed, Einarsen (2014), Jenkins, Zapf, Winefield and Sarris (2012), Notelaers (2014) and Samnani and Singh (2012) express concern that research which explores and examines the perpetrator’s experience is scarce and needed as a priority in acknowledging the gap in current research and to develop a fuller understanding of the phenomena of workplace bullying. In a qualitative study with eight participants from a particularly difficult to access group, the researcher offers an early contribution to the current gap in literature, research and understanding of the perspective of the alleged workplace bully. Participants engaged in individual, confidential, unstructured interviews with the researcher and spoke candidly about their perceptions and the impact the accusation had on them. This was then analysed, evaluated and developed through a classical grounded theory approach to develop the theoretical model guilty until proven innocent. In discussing the participants’ concerns in this model, the research widened understanding and academic knowledge and narrowed the gap of information of the (alleged) bully’s perspective. In dealing with allegations, (alleged) workplace bullies identify with concerns of feeling bullied back, emotional reactions, self-coping mechanisms and managerial responsibility and action, from which the grounded theory guilty until proven innocent emerged. The main findings of the research emerged from the participant’s interviews; key highlights included being isolated by their organisations and subject to negative acts which would, in themselves be considered bullying behaviours. Participants then described how they would separate themselves from the organisation, despite feeling a sense of disconnected loyalty towards it. The structure of HR functions and the anti-bullying related policy had a significant influence on the negative treatment participant’s experienced, with a continual theme around the presumption the participant was guilty from the outset, by virtue of an allegation being raised. This perception was reinforced in the different way (alleged) bullies were supported and treated by their organisations from the claimants. The participants had been negatively affected by identifiable victim effect (Hamilton & Sherman, 1996), dispute-related claims (Einarsen, 1999; Keashly & Nowell, 2003) and the claimant being managed under a separate formal management procedure. The study also suggested that allegations of bullying could in themselves be a form of bullying and that there may be an element of discrimination in this on the grounds of protected characteristics. The main recommendations consider the structure of HR functions and the need for a visible and accessible personnel element necessary to begin to balance the support available for all parties, including the alleged, the alleger, bystanders, witnesses, line managers, HR and investigation managers. Further research, which tests the grounded theory of guilty until proven innocent with larger samples will extend and develop this study and test some of the resolutions and solutions offered.