Talent management (TM), both as a practice and an academic sub-discipline, lacks a strong conceptual foundation. This limitation significantly inhibits understandings of TM in its international dimensions. Accordingly the overarching aim of this thesis is to contribute to an overdue reassessment of TM within the international context by redressing the empirical and theoretical deficiencies, which are a direct hindrance to development of the field. The philosophy adopted was interpretivist, involving qualitative methods, that is, semi-structured interviews and documentary analysis were employed in data collection from 17 informant companies based in several European countries. This study makes highly significant contributions in four major ways. Firstly, the empirical contribution is made through employing two phases of primary research. Phase One was an exploration of TM practices in 14 internationally operating organisations representing eight industries. Out of Phase One arose the notion of expectations as a key influence shaping TM in practice as well as indicating managerial and individual dimensions. Thus Phase Two explored the conceptualisation and operationalisation of TM from the perspective of management, on the one hand and talented employees, on the other. This was a highly significant step in the understanding of TM, because most empirical studies have tended to focus on managerial views. Secondly, the methodological contribution results from the novel adoption of narratives in analysing case studies. This approach made it possible to gain insights into TM as lived experience especially on the part of employees selected as talented. Thirdly, the conceptual contribution arose from (i) contrasting and distilling the essence of many lax definitions of talent and TM; (ii) identifying the visible and invisible elements of TM in the domain of practice and(iii) employing a dual theoretical framework which integrated human capital theory and expectancy theory. Significantly the dual framework also offers a re-conceptualisation of TM as a social process in which various stakeholders are revealed to have disparate interests. Indeed the framework led to the notion of fracture in TM as a result of misalignment of expectations of management, on the one hand, and talent-managed employees, on the other. Lastly, by dint of the dual theoretical framework the study adds to the understanding of TM a new lens through which senior managers (and researchers) can clearly identify the gap between managerial intentions and the practical reality.

There are enormous benefits for any organisation from practising sound records management. In the context of a public university, the importance of good records management includes: facilitating the achievement the university’s mandate; enhancing efficiency of the university; maintaining a reliable institutional memory; promoting trust; responding to an audit culture; enhancing university competitiveness; supporting the university’s fiduciary duty; demonstrating transparency and accountability; and fighting corruption. Records scholars and commentators posit that effective recordkeeping is an essential underpinning of good governance. Although there is a portrayal of positive correlation, recordkeeping struggles to get the same attention as that given to the governance. Evidence abounds of cases of neglect of recordkeeping in universities and other institutions in Sub-Saharan Africa. The apparent absence of sound recordkeeping provided a rationale for revisiting some universities in South Africa and Malawi in order to critically explore the place of recordkeeping in an organisation’s strategy in order to develop an alternative framework for managing records and documents in an era where good governance is a global agenda. The research is a collective case study in which multiple cases are used to critically explore the relationship between recordkeeping and governance. As qualitative research that belongs in the interpretive tradition of enquiry, it is not meant to suggest prescriptive solutions to general recordkeeping problems but rather to provide an understanding of the challenges and opportunities that arise in managing records and documents in the world of governance, audit and risk. That is: what goes on in the workplace; what are the problems; and what alternative approaches might address any existing problem situations. Research findings show that some institutions are making good use of their governance structures and other drivers for recordkeeping to put in place sound recordkeeping systems. Key governance structures and other drivers for recordkeeping identified include: laws and regulations; governing bodies; audit; risk; technology; reforms; and workplace culture. Other institutions are not managing their records and documents well despite efforts to improve their governance systems. They lack recordkeeping capacity. Areas that determine recordkeeping capacity include: availability of records management policy; capacity for digital records; availability of a records management unit; senior management support; level of education and training of records management staff; and systems and procedures for storage, retrieval and dispositions of records. Although this research reveals that the overall recordkeeping in the selected countries has slightly improved compared with the situation other researchers found a decade ago, it remains unsatisfactory and disjointed from governance. The study therefore proposes governance recordkeeping as an approach to managing records and documents in the world of governance, audit and risk. The governance recordkeeping viewpoint considers recordkeeping as a governance function that should be treated in the same manner as other governance functions such as audit and risk management. Additionally, recordkeeping and governance should be considered as symbiotic elements of a strategy. A strategy that neglects recordkeeping may not fulfil the organisation’s objectives effectively.

<p>Osnovno pitanje ovog istraživanja se može formulisati na sledeći način: da li adolescenti sa izraženim smislom za humor ispoljavaju i vi&scaron;i nivo subjektivnog blagostanja? Smisao za humor je određen kao klaster osobina koji obuhvata karakteristike koje se tiču individualnih razlika u pona&scaron;anjima vezanim za humor kao &scaron;to su produkcija humora, razumevanje i doživljavanje humora važnim (engl. humor appreciation; Martin, 1998; Ruch &amp; Hofmann, 2012). Subjektivno blagostanje je definisano preko tripartitnog Dinerovog modela subjektivnog blagostanja i to kroz: često doživljavanje pozitivnog afekta, retko doživljavanje negativnog afekta i zadovoljstvo životom (Diener, 1984; 2012). Ovim istraživanjem je ispitivano kakva je povezanost između smisla za humor i indikatora subjektivnog blagostanja i da li na tu vezu utiču stilovi humora i osobine ličnosti. Takođe, ispitivana je i moderatorska uloga smisla za humor na povezanost između broja negativnih životnih događaja i subjektivnog blagostanja. U istraživanju su kao mera smisla za humor kori&scaron;ćene samoprocena i procena od strane drugih. Činjenica da humor predstavlja izuzetno poželjnu karakteristiku u okviru self koncepta i da većina ljudi veruje da je njihov smisao za humor u najmanju ruku prosečne vrednosti (Allport, 1961; Lefcourt &amp; Martin, 1986) navela je na odluku o kori&scaron;ćenju dva načina procene. Takođe, različiti autori ukazuju na socijalnu prirodu smisla za humor kao i na to da se najče&scaron;će javlja<br />spontano u interpersonalnim relacijama (npr. Martin, 1998). Istraživanje je sprovedeno na uzorku srednjo&scaron;kolaca (357 devojaka i 172 mladića). Prosečna starost uzorka iznosi 17.36 (SD = .64), raspon godina od 15 do 20. Na osnovu spiskova sa imenima učenika iz svih razreda, koji su prikupljeni uz pomoć &scaron;kolskih psihologa, pristupljeno je sastavljanju Skale procene smisla za humor (SzH). Svaki učenik je u okviru svoje baterije testova popunjavao SzH skalu sastavljenu od imena svih učenika njegovog razreda i četvorostepene skale procene. U okviru pomenute skale, svaki učenik je procenjivao i stepen svog smisla za humor. Od instrumenata, uz SzH skalu, kori&scaron;ćeni su: Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS; Diener, Emmons, Larsen, &amp; Griffin, 1985); Scale of Positive and Negative Experience (SPANE; Diener et al., 2009); Humor Style Questionnaire (HSQ; Martin et al., 2003); Big Five Inventory (BFI; John &amp; Srivastava, 1999); Skala depresivnosti, preuzeta iz Depression, Anxiety and Stress Scale (DASS-21; Lovibond &amp; Lovibond, 1995) i Serbian Life Events Check-List-Adolescent Form (SLEC-AF; Gavrilov-Jerković, Jovanović, Žuljević, &amp; Brdarić, 2012). Rezultati istraživanja su pokazali da postoji pozitivna povezanost između smisla za humor i subjektivnog blagostanja, da samoporažavajući stil umanjuje jačinu date povezanosti, da ekstraverzija i savesnost pojačavaju njihovu povezanost, dok otvorenost umanjuje jačinu date povezanosti. Takođe je utvrđeno je da samopomažući stil humora predstavlja značajan protektivan činilac u relaciji između broja negativnih životnih događaja i subjektivnog blagostanja. Dodatno, nalazi su ukazali na jaču povezanost smisla za humor sa indikatorima blagostanja kada je kao mera kori&scaron;ćena procena od strane drugih. U teorijskom smislu, dobijeni rezultati pomažu obja&scaron;njenju nedosledne uloge smisla za humor u subjektivnom blagostanju. Sa praktičnog stanovi&scaron;ta, nalazi dobijeni u ovom istraživanju mogu pomoći unapređenju programa vezanih za razvoj strategija prevladavanja i jačanju psiholo&scaron;kih resursa pojedinca.</p>

No description available.

Objectives: This project seeks to reduce duplication of effort in finding data for NHS healthcare quality indicators, to resolve issues identified in previous efforts to develop quality-monitoring ontologies and to identify areas for future computer-interpretable quality indicator development for the United Kingdom’s Department of Health and National Health Service (NHS). Outcomes will include specification of inclusion and exclusion criteria for a set of healthcare quality indicators, along with categorisation beyond screening and prevention and identification of levels of indicator relationships Methodology: Following an exploration of potential methods for ontology development, Methontology was the method chosen to develop the ontology. This involved a conceptual analysis to inform the development of an ontology for a 2009 set of healthcare quality indicators made available on the NHS Information Centre website. Indicators were categorised by NHS Dimension, NHS-specified clinical pathway and by United States Institute of Medicine purpose. Relationships between indicators were identified, as well as an initial set of inclusion and exclusion criteria. Protégé 3.4.1 was the platform used to develop a pilot ontology. Results: NHS quality indicators that share some of the same criteria were made searchable, along with broader and narrower related criteria. Up to six layers of inclusion and exclusion criteria were specified and incorporated into the ontology. Search capabilities were created for indicators originating from the same source and from more than one source, along with indicators assigned to specific care pathways. It was shown that indicators have purposes other than prevention and screening, rendering Arden Syntax, intended for computer-interpretable guidelines and previously tested on a specialised set of healthcare quality indicators, unsuitable for a large, diverse set of quality indicators. A large number, 222, of quality indicators with different purposes justified the development of a separate ontology. Conclusions: This ontology could reduce duplication of effort in finding data for NHS healthcare quality indicators. There is potential to link to components of queries currently in use in the NHS, as an interim step away from the need to develop separate queries for each indicator. Areas for future computer- interpretable quality indicator development include resolving Electronic Health Record compatibility issues and improved indicator metadata quality. The ontology could be useful to NHS indicator developers, NHS data xtractors and vendors of electronic health records who supply to the NHS.

This research investigates the relative effectiveness of different modes of regulation of access to personal data on social networking services in the UK. A review of the literature demonstrated that there was a gap in research comparing different regulatory modes applied to online social networking services (SNSs). A model of regulation was developed based on Lessig’s four modes of regulating the internet. Risk to individual users was selected as a way of testing different regulatory approaches, using the premise that risk-based regulation has become a key consideration in European regulation. The regulatory effects were tested using: online surveys, interviews with industry experts, content analysis of privacy policies, and a legislative review. The research data are appended to the main body of the thesis. The research demonstrated the potential of risk as a means of distinguishing between different regulatory modes and concluded that a combination of regulatory approaches was the most effective way of protecting individuals against abuse of personal data on online SNSs. Further research suggested includes: looking at risk from the perspective of companies, and of society; further development of the regulatory model; and country comparisons to discover whether the findings of this study are more generally applicable.

Cluster is not a new phenomenon, having existed in different forms for a long time. Although a large amount of work has been dedicated to cluster research (Marshall, 1920; Krugman, 1995; Schmitz 1997; Porter, 1998; Wilson and Popp, 2003), there is still a lack of convincing explanations as to how and why clusters are created. Reviewing the different definitions of ‘cluster’ from previous studies, produces the interesting finding that most of the cluster definitions neglect one key element – the ‘actor’ – that is, the individuals who are involved in the process of founding new businesses that give rise to cluster formation. Recognising the values and shortcomings of the extant studies on clusters, this thesis aims to establish a conceptual framework and attempt to advance the understanding of the cluster formation process from an alternative view. The purpose is to answer the research questions of how and why cluster are formed, how different actors interact with key institutional factors relevant to cluster creation and how these actors themselves make sense of the cluster creation process, particularly in the Chinese context. This research employs a qualitative approach comprising semi-structured in-depth interviews, which seek to uncover the depth and richness of the living experiences of different actors with the SME clusters. Fieldwork was completed in multi-phases involving a preliminary data collection in phase one, followed by a further data collection in the second and subsequent phases through re-interviewing the key informants. The findings of the three empirical case studies echoed the claims that the very notion of a cluster is a dynamic, and for some a ‘Chaotic’ one (Martin and Sunley, 2003). This highlights the importance of a comprehensive framework to address the complex web of elements that are involved in cluster formation. The result of the thesis also indicates that individual (entrepreneurs & social relations), and the social interactions among individuals and their institutional context are the key ingredients for forming clusters. It is suggested that the established conceptual framework, based upon the theories of institutionalisation, social embeddedness and sensemaking, can help to fill the gap in the extant cluster research and pave the way for future research.

Tag recommendation algorithms aid the social tagging process in many userdriven document indexing applications, such as social bookmarking and publication sharing websites. This thesis gives an overview of existing tag recommendation methods and proposes novel approaches that address the new document problem and the task of ranking tags. The focus is on graph-based methods such as Folk- Rank that apply weight spreading algorithms to a graph representation of the folksonomy. In order to suggest tags for previously untagged documents, extensions are presented that introduce content into the recommendation process as an additional information source. To address the problem of ranking tags, an in-depth analysis of graph models as well as ranking algorithms is conducted. Implicit assumptions made by the widely-used graph model of the folksonomy are highlighted and an improved model is proposed that captures the characteristics of the social tagging data more accurately. Additionally, issues in the tag rank computation of FolkRank are analysed and an adapted weight spreading approach for social tagging data is presented. Moreover, the applicability of conventional weight spreading methods to data from the social tagging domain is examined in detail. Finally, indications of implicit negative feedback in the data structure of folksonomies are analysed and novel approaches of identifying negative relationships are presented. By exploiting the three-dimensional characteristics of social tagging data the proposed metrics are based on stronger evidence and provide reliable measures of negative feedback. Including content into the tag recommendation process leads to a significant increase in recommendation accuracy on real-world datasets. The proposed adaptations to graph models and ranking algorithms result in more accurate and computationally less expensive recommenders. Moreover, new insights into the fundamental characteristics of social tagging data are revealed and a novel data interpretation that takes negative feedback into account is proposed.

This thesis presents an investigation into the role played by laboratory records in the disciplinary discourse of academic molecular biology laboratories. The motivation behind this study stems from two areas of concern. Firstly, the laboratory record has received comparatively little attention as a linguistic genre in spite of its central role in the daily work of laboratory scientists. Secondly, laboratory records have become a focus for technologically driven change through the advent of computing systems that aim to support a transition away from the traditional paper-based approach towards electronic recordkeeping. Electronic recordkeeping raises the potential for increased sharing of laboratory records across laboratory communities. However, the uptake of electronic laboratory notebooks has been, and remains, markedly low in academic laboratories. The investigation employs a multi-perspective research framework combining ethnography, genre analysis, and reading protocol analysis in order to evaluate both the organizational practices and linguistic practices at work in laboratory recordkeeping, and to examine these practices from the viewpoints of both producers and consumers of laboratory records. Particular emphasis is placed on assessing variation in the practices used by different scientists when keeping laboratory records, and on assessing the types of articulation work used to achieve mutual intelligibility across laboratory members. The findings of this investigation indicate that the dominant viewpoint held by laboratory staff other than principal investigators conceptualized laboratory records as a personal resource rather than a community archive. Readers other than the original author relied almost exclusively on the recontextualization of selected information from laboratory records into ‘public genres’ such as laboratory talks, research articles, and progress reports as the preferred means of accessing the information held in the records. The consistent use of summarized forms of recording experimental data rendered most laboratory records as both unreliable and of limited usability in the records management sense that they did not form full and accurate descriptions that could support future organizational activities. These findings offer a counterpoint to other studies, notably a number of studies undertaken as part of technology developments for electronic recordkeeping, that report sharing of laboratory records or assume a ‘cyberbolic’ view of laboratory records as a shared resource.

Title: The relevance and sustainability of Investors in People. Purpose: The purpose of this research project is to explore and challenge the relevance and sustainability of Investors in People (IIP) involvement and recognition within seven case studies. Research design: Seven in-depth case studies combining thirty-eight semi-structured interviews are used to gather the appropriate insights. Findings: In essence, it is the studied organizations themselves that generate what the Leitch Report describes as the “untapped and vast” potential of their employees, not IIP involvement or recognition. The data collected challenges the direct relationship frequently proposed between IIP recognition and increases in business performance. The sample organizations have delivered performance improvements and success independently of IIP consideration, raising serious questions over the relevance and sustainability of the standard. These insights are supported by the lack of knowledge and understanding of the standard within the workforce. In addition, other quality improvement tools and techniques and industry standards are found to have a significant detrimental influence on the standing of IIP. Other influences are also found to impact negatively on the standing. Thus, this research project questions what contribution IIP can make towards national competitiveness when the standard is so withdrawn from the business performance improvements integrated. Even as a badge or plaque of external recognition, the assumptions surrounding the perceptual value of IIP are questioned when the impact of the standard’s logo/ symbols is considered to be nominal. A theoretical framework and alternative definition for IIP are developed to represent the findings within the seven organizations studied. Research limitations: Research is needed beyond the case samples studied to further explore and generalize the rhetoric and realities concerning the insights developed. Practical implications: HR practitioners and managers need to exhibit caution before considering IIP involvement and recognition. Indeed, practitioners need to consider that the asserted benefits associated with IIP may not match their expectations and provide the impact they seek. Originality/value: This research project provides HR practitioners and managers with a valuable and timely alternative discourse and perspective when considering employee development towards IIP recognition and the possibility of improved business performance and customer/employee perceptual value. In addition, the theoretical exemplars developed from the data set provide visual representations that can be used as pragmatic comparisons to develop the field of IIP further.