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There are an increasing number of articles written by Indigenous and First Nation authors about their worldviews, cultures, research and ways of being and knowing in relation to Indigenous theories and pedagogies. As a result, their experiences, philosophies and approaches emphasize the increasing borders for understanding the importance, value and rightful place of Indigenous theories and pedagogies in research, teaching and practice. Additionally, non-Indigenous authors are also writing messages of encouragement and support for Indigenous theories and pedagogies and highlight ways for non-Indigenous practitioners/teachers to reframe a worldview that incorporates Indigenous worldviews in a "good and respectful way". / Volume 8, August 2012: Indigenous Social Work Practices and Theories / School of Native Human Services

There are an increasing number of articles written by Indigenous and First Nations authors about their worldviews, cultures, research and ways of being and knowing in relation to Indigenous theories and pedagogies. As a result, their experiences, philosophies and approaches emphasize the increasing borders for understanding the importance, value and rightful place of Indigenous theories and pedagogies in research, teaching and practice. Additionally, non-Indigenous authors are also writing messages of encouragement and support for Indigenous theories and pedagogies and highlight ways for non-Indigenous practitioners/teachers to reframe a worldview that incorporates Indigenous worldviews in a “good and respectful way”.

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A dissertation submitted to the Faculty of Arts in fulfilment of the requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of Social Work at the University of Zululand, 2017 / An analysis of the social service practitioners’ practice tools in Africa towards the enhancement of professional responsibility to the client system is essential including investigating the ethical dilemmas experienced by the practitioners daily. These tools serve as sources of evaluating social work practice and administration that spur practitioners to provide a virtuous professional service and as enlightenment for the effective, efficient and reflective practice. The National Association of Social Workers (2008) and the South African Council of Social Service Professional (SACSSP, 2005) and their ethical values and principles served as this study principal document that directed this research venture. The researcher sought to understand the nature and extent of the challenges facing social work practitioners and administrators and compared their experiences within two different geo-political zones of Africa. Hence, the research philosophy engaged the “diamond metaphor,”in the sense it is multifaceted and within a blended research paradigm. It depicts the uniqueness and value of each study area. The study employed the comparison-evaluative approach depicting a Multi-Phase-Transformative mixed methods research design characterised by a six way dimensionalapproach of explorative, evaluative, descriptive, comparative, qualitative and quantitative approaches in order to reconnoiter the experiences of social work practitioners 135 and 47 administrators which in total 182 respondents from three different regions namely: KwaZulu-Natal (South Africa) and Lagos State and Imo State (Nigeria). Each setting for data collection differs within a multi-level mode and each data including the tested hypotheses were refined to actualise the subject situation and the analytical discussion of the methodology components. Data that was gleaned from the dispersed research tools used for the study were analysed by the utilisation of descriptive statistics, multiple comparisons and post hoc test correlations in testing the stated hypotheses with the Statistical Programme for Social Sciences (SPSS Version 21.0). However, the thematic gleaning of the responses was deciphered through discourse analysis (Soini and Birkeland, 2014:215-216; Gross, Alba, Glass, Schellenberg and Obrist, 2012:3). The findings of the study revealed that rural social work interventions are directly weakened by a poor support system that the social workers experience, thus, the lack of proper literacy and qualification levels in the rural areas largely contributes to weaker social work interventions in both Nigeria and South Africa. Furthermore, the study revealed that administrators avail themselves to more continuous professional development than the social workers do, while the overall qualification attributes for the respondents needed upgrading to cater for specialised areas. The study revealed that the lack of the analysed and aligned training needs of individual practitioners serves in fact to clog personal development plans which the subsequently affects the development of work plans and the signing of performance agreement job descriptions, thus, the policies are not then applied. The study’s results indicated that the administrators’ gendered pattern impacted significantly on the ethical code outcome in the study areas. Outcome analysis confirmed that thesocial workers’ understanding of ethical code application has significantly correlated with their integer years of practice experience, whereas, the perceived difficulties presumably had partial correlations within the study areas. Moreover, the ethics concerning the integrity of profession, the professional responsibility, the service delivery and the competence/confidentiality explained for the integer years of practice experience. Furthermore, the integer years significantly ensure that social workers are coping with ethical dilemmas on familiarity and their professed complaint anxieties on the Ethical Code in the three study areas. Conversely, the study advocated for the assimilation of interactional justice approach that would enhance advocacy on social justice, human rights and professional accountability as well as stimulate competence within the bucolic social worker’s career. Social justice cognizance should be visible within the equity on performance. The study’s recommendations included advocating for quality rural social work interventional support and improvement on qualification and literacy level in the rural areas; also that there should be the recognition of a greater prioritisation of NASW/SACSSP ethical codes. As such, experienced practitioners should mentor newer practitioners to enhance effective and efficient professional responsibility with client-systems. Additional studies should explore the professional responsibility of practitioners amid the Service Charter for Victims of Crime (victims’ charter) designed to uphold social justice and to nurture a human rights philosophy in guaranteeing the material, psychosocial and emotional needs of victims. Hence, further research on utilising the study’s finding models for urban domain and proper professional training, adherence to these models and awareness of legal ethics is recommended. Further studies should focus on examining administrators-practitioners relationship outcome to policies regulations as they are geared towards the Code; likewise to inspect social entrepreneurial activity using the Service Delivery Model to re-bolster industrial social work.

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The overall purpose of this study is to contribute to the discussion of eGovernment implementation by making the implicit organisational micro dynamic processes involved in the framing and implementation of eGovernment explicit. I want to highlight the important process trough which eGovernment is framed and translated by organisational members and in what way it effects different divisions of practice. To do so, two different analytical aspects of organisational life, the rhetoric of management and the reality of work practices are used as a theoretical context for analysing some implications of eGovernment implementation. These analytical dimensions of organisational life are used to discuss a case study looking at the implementation of eGovernment in a local Swedish municipality.   The main contribution of this thesis is a theorisation of how to understand the organisational micro dynamic processes involved in the implementation of eGovernment in public administration. New insights could be gained, for researchers and practioners, by analysing the transformation of practice as an ongoing process characterised by micro-political translation processes involving actors as well as actions and meanings in both rhetoric and practice.

Bakgrund & Problemdiskussion: Inköpsfunktionen har på senare år fått en ökad strategisk betydelse inom organisationer och har idag en mer aktiv roll i att skapa och bidra till konkurrensfördelar. Inköpsfunktionen är en viktig del i kedjan från leverantör till kund och bidrar till att denna inte bryts. Inköpsfunktionen har därmed fått axla en mer komplex och strategisk roll som kan antas påverka inköpsfunktionens arbetssätt och struktur. Sambandet mellan dessa ses som komplext där roll anses vara en första bestämmande faktor som påverkar hur arbetssätt och struktur utformas. Syfte: Syftet med denna studie är att kartlägga en strategisk inköpsfunktions roller, arbetssätt och struktur samt utifrån denna kartläggning identifiera problem och förändringsmöjligheter. Metod: Denna studies resultat är baserat på en kvalitativ fallstudie för ett fallföretag inom verkstadsindustrin. Totalt genomfördes 15 intervjuer med medarbetare både inom och utanför fallföretagets avdelning för strategiskt inköp. Resultat: Studien visar på att en avdelning för strategiskt inköp utför arbetsuppgifter som är operativa, stödjande samt strategiska där det operativa arbetet inte är önskvärt av fallföretaget. Det är heller inte något som beskrivs vara del av en strategisk inköpares arbete enligt teorin. Tre roller har identifierats utifrån detta resonemang; Firefighter, Leverantörsansvarig samt Leverantörsutvecklare där den förstnämnda inkräktar på de andra två. En anledning till varför det operativa arbetet tar sådan plats är att gränserna mellan vad som är operativt, stödjande och strategiskt arbete inte är helt tydliga. Det finns arbetssätt som bemöter den oönskade rollen som Firefighter men det tar tid att införa rutiner. Vidare har studien även visat att strukturen bidrar till den strategiska inköpsfunktionens strategiska fokus. / Background & Problem definition: In recent years the purchasing department has been the subject of increased strategic importance and has taken an active role in creating and contributing to competitive advantage. This due to the fact that the department is an important part of the supplier-customer-chain and contributes to make sure that it does not break. Consequently, the department has taken a more complex and strategic role and this can be assumed has had an impact on the department’s work practices and structure. The connection between role, work practices and structure is complex where the role is the determinant variable and affects how work practices and structure are designed. Aim: The aim of this study is to describe a strategic purchasing department’s roles, work practices and structure and to identify problems and potential changes from the description. Method: The result of this study is based on a qualitative case study of an organisation that operates in the engineering industry. In total, 15 interviews were performed with employees both at the strategic purchasing department and other departments in the organisation. Results: The study has shown that a department for strategic purchasing performs tasks that are operative, supportive and strategic where the operative work is not described in theory as part of the strategic buyer’s work description. It is also not wanted by the organisation. Three roles have been identified this; Firefighter, Supplier-Responsible and Supplier-Developer where the first of them intrudes on the other two. One reason for the existence of operative work is that the difference between what is operative, supportive and strategic work is not always clear. There are ways of undermining the unwanted role Firefighter but implementing routines takes time. Furthermore the study has shown that structure contributes to the strategic focus of the strategic purchasing department.

High-Tech industries in Taiwan realize that employees with professional knowledge and skills are the core advantage to competition, therefore implement so call Strategic Human Resource Management(SHRM). Recently, ¡§high performance work practices(HPWPs)¡¨, one of SHRM, becomes more and more emphasized. It is one of management systems that help employees to get needed competences through commitment, involvement, and incentives and to enhance the contributions to organization. However, are employees in high performance work organization feeling well-being? The purpose of this study is to realize the relevance of these two variables, and also if mediating variables, work motivation and work-family balance, work. Literatures about HPWPs are all about the outcomes of organization, however, this study emphasizes on individual with mediating variables, work motivation and work-family balance. Questionnaires was adopted for this study and 301 valid samples are collected from individuals in high-tech industry. Through statistics analysis, the main results are as below: 1. HPWPs separately have partial positive effect on work motivation, work-family balance, and well-being. 2. HPWPs have positive effect on work motivation and this work motivation mediates the effect of HPWPs on well-being. 3. the positive effect of HPWPs on well-being is mediated by work-family balance.

Research question: Is adopting flextime, remote work, and four-day workweeks advantageous to employees and organizations?  Purpose: Advances in technology and the changing nature of work have led to organizations adopting remote work, flextime, and a four-day workweek. The aim is to comprehend how these could affect employees and organizations, then advise organizations on whether to implement them. Employee productivity, satisfaction and well-being are assessed, as well as potential benefits and challenges. The result demonstrates an understanding of advantages, disadvantages, personal interests and critiques, followed by recommendations on facing emerging challenges and suggestions for further research.  Method: The research development is of an inductive nature. A mixed-method technique is used, with 7 respondents contributing to the qualitative research and 120 participants to the quantitative. Most respondents are dispersed around Sweden, but a few from foreign nations are also included to get a global viewpoint. The results are evaluated and contrasted with theoretical data from prior research.  Conclusion: The concepts have proven to be of great interest to employees, with a minority being against some. Many employees feel burned out and unsatisfied with a traditional 5-day workweek, and thus support a 4-day one that would allow more quality time for themselves and to socialize. A vast majority are interested in companies that grant the flexibility to work remotely and schedule their own hours, over those that do not. Trials of the concepts have resulted in increased productivity, and efficiency, better mental and physical health, higher job satisfaction, equality, work-life balance, as well as reduced turnover, burnout, stress and resentment towards management. The concepts would not work for every business or location, but they are highly advantageous to employees and organizations where they suit.