Comparing the impact of management support on police officers’ perceptions of discretionary power and engagement: Australia,USA and Malta

Abstract

This paper uses Social Exchange Theory as a lens for comparing the impact of management support upon police perceptions of discretionary power and employee engagement, across three countries. A survey-based, self-report process collected data from 193 police officers in Australia, 588 from the USA, and 249 from Malta. Structural equation modelling was used to analyse the data. The findings suggest a significantly different management support context across the three countries, as well as significantly different perceptions of discretionary power. Across the three countries, police perceived relatively poor satisfaction with organizational management support and only some engagement levels. However, USA police perceived significantly more discretionary power than the other country samples. These findings provide greater clarity about the link between management support, discretionary power and engagement for the police officers. Since employee engagement likely affects policing outcomes, the findings suggest that poor management support of police officers could negatively affect the provided service. Potential strategies to enhance police engagement include (a) training police managers about how to manage so as to promote greater engagement, and (b) modifying police managers’ performance indicators in line with achieving better police engagement.     

需求多样化下非会计专业本科会计学教学改革探索

本文从对学生和社会本科会计学教学需求的调查中发现,社会与学生对本科会计学教学的需求具有多样性。这种多样性导致了严格的教学学时限制与教学内容丰富性要求的矛盾,难以简单地以增加授课内容的方式来满足。教学实践表明,在主要传授会计学基础内容的前提下,适当引导学生进行形式多样、内容丰富的自主学习,是解决这一矛盾的有效方式。     

论推行高校职务聘任制的有效框架

教师评聘工作是高校人事管理的重要组成部分,而高校教师职务聘任制是高校人事制度深化改革的一项重要内容。有效地推行教师职务聘任制需要一个合理有效的框架作支撑。提出了以下基本框架模型:以工作分析,科学设岗为根基;以公开招聘、绩效考评为核心;以激励机制、竞争机制为强化手段,以探讨高效推行教师职务聘任制的科学框架。     

Subordinated Market Index Models: A Comparison

The paper compares various processes subordinated to the Wiener process tomodel the leptokurtic characteristics of index returns. Empirical analysisis performed on the Dow Jones and Nikkei 225 indexes. A good model to capturethe typical tail behaviour of these indexes turns out to be a long Studentt distributed one.     

Are there major differences in the attitudes and service quality of standard and seasonal employees? An empirical examination and implications for practice

Despite the increased use of seasonal employees by organizations, few studies have been completed on the attitudes and service quality of seasonal office workers. Using Lautsch's classification model, we analyzed the organizational context in which the standard and seasonal workers in this study were employed. Hypotheses were developed based upon the organizational analysis and social exchange theory. Results from archival data obtained from a web‐based organizational survey of 205 clerical and professional workers indicated contrary to expectations, standard and seasonal employees did not significantly differ in terms of perceptions of overall job conditions, perceived organizational support (POS), or job engagement. However, seasonal employees did report significantly fewer opportunities to work on challenging tasks, less comfortable physical working conditions, and less job security than the standard workers. As predicted, standard employees reported significantly higher levels of service quality performance than seasonal employees. Additionally, job engagement mediated the relationship between POS and service quality for both the standard and seasonal employees. Implications for managing seasonal employees are discussed.     

Government Engagement,Environmental Policy,and Environmental Performance: Evidence from the Most Polluting Chinese Listed Firms

This study empirically examines the implementation of environmental policies and how government engagement impacts on a firm's environmental performance based on a sample of Chinese listed firms in the eight most polluting industries over a 10‐year period. The findings of the study demonstrate that government engagement, measured as ownership structure, is positively correlated with environmental performance, measured by environmental capital expenditure, for state‐owned firms, but no significant relation is found for non‐state‐owned firms. In addition, non‐state‐owned firms are more likely to perform better in terms of environmental investment after the 2006 enactment of a new policy explicitly linking environmental issues with political incentives to regional governments. This study also reports that corporate environmental performance impairs firm value for state‐owned firms but has no impact on firm value for non‐state‐owned firms, suggesting that investors negatively respond to environmental investments made by state‐owned firms as a result of government engagement/political pressure. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.     

Why Do People Leave? a Study Of Nonsupervisory Restaurant Employees’ Polychronic Time Use Preference and Turnover Intention

ABSTRACT

The purpose of the study was to present a comprehensive view on the associations among polychronicity, job satisfaction, work engagement, and turnover intention within a restaurant context. Using a sample of 252 servers in full-service restaurants, structural equation modeling results found that polychronicity positively linked with job satisfaction, work engagement, and turnover intention. An indirect effect from polychronicity to job satisfaction to turnover intention was found. Results can assist restaurant managers in selecting candidates that best fit their organization. It will also assist employees in determining which career path best matches their personality traits.     

Stakeholder Engagement: Defining Strategic Advantage for Sustainable Construction

Although sustainable development is increasingly becoming a part of business plans, it is unclear what makes the economic, social and environmental dynamics strategically compatible. This research examines which of the following in sustainable development – government policy, managerial attitude and stakeholder engagement – is the most influential on the profitability of companies in the UK construction sector. Quantitative and qualitative analyses were rendered through a survey and semi‐structured interviews. Patterns of ambiguity in legislation were discovered as an obstacle for changing the sector's mind‐set. Stakeholder engagement was identified as the defining factor increasing managers' awareness, helping legislation to be effectively implemented and making sustainability highly appealing to clients. These findings indicate that to gain competitive advantage, companies should embark on long‐term strategic alliances which adopt the proposals of environmental non‐governmental organisations and closely follow public opinion. This, strengthens brand equity, allows for premium pricing, increases market share and maximizes profit. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.     

Does reading scenarios of future land use changes affect willingness to participate in land use planning?

Scenarios of future outcomes often provide context for policy decisions and can be a form of science communication, translating complex and uncertain relationships into stories for a broader audience. We conducted a survey experiment (n = 270) to test the effects of reading land use change scenarios on willingness to participate in land use planning activities. In the experiment, we tested three combinations of scenarios across two time periods, comparing survey responses of individuals reading a set of scenarios with individuals who did not read scenarios. Reading scenario narratives increased willingness to participate in land use planning activities and perceived self-efficacy. Measures of interest and sense of community also increased willingness to participate. Tests of an indirect mediation model found self-efficacy partially mediated the effect of reading scenarios on willingness to participate. This latter relationship may be a mechanistic explanation for the effect of reading scenarios. Envisioning the future with brief, bulleted scenarios of land use change in a print format appears to increase self-efficacy in planning for the future. Our results suggest scenarios can serve as a vehicle for changing public participation in land use planning.     

Social media affordances: Enabling customer engagement

Despite the acknowledged importance of social media for customer engagement, our understanding of this phenomenon is limited and new theories can help shed further light on the unique features of social media in the tourism context. Our work contributes to the literature by adopting an affordance perspective that leads us to identify three distinctive social media affordances for customer engagement in tourism: persistent engagement, customized engagement, and triggered engagement. Our work also extends prior research on customer engagement by examining the process of recognition (proprioception, exteroception and coperception) through which organizations engage customers in social media.