The Role of Gender Consciousness in Challenging Patriarchy

This action research project explored how women develop gender consciousness and use this knowledge to take “connected action” to address gendered power relations in their life and work

Executive businesswomen\u27s learning in the context of organizational culture.

Case study analysis was used to investigate executive women\u27s learning and development in corporate culture. Eleven executives were interviewed. A model of their development is proposed, detailing their learning tactics, negotiation strategies and transition characteristics over the course of their career development

“Corporate Social Responsibility”: A Site for Critical Learning in Workplaces?

Notions of social responsibility have become fashionable in businesses. While clearly a marketing ploy for some, for other firms CSR appears to represent a genuine commitment to new practices and organization-wide learning. Encouraged by these positive cases, we explored the extent to which CSR might create a site for critical learning in workplaces

Another Look at a Historical Foundation of HRD: F.R. Roethlisberger’s Foreman

F.R. Roethlisberger has been recognized as the ”father” of the human relations period of management. Historically, this period was seen as a move towards more humanism in the workplace. This manuscript presents a poststructural analysis of a classic management text from this period. Findings and implications for HRD are presented

Tracing HRD’s Rational Masculine Roots: Feminist Alternatives for a More Mindful HRD

A classic management text was deconstructed using postmodern methods to illuminate the connections between knowledge and gender. A similar analysis was performed on a selected contemporary HRD course text in order to examine how issues related to performance and gender were being addressed

Walkable Neighborhoods: Linkages Between Place, Health, and Happiness in Younger and Older Adults

Problem, research strategy, and findings: We examined whether living in a walkable neighborhood influenced the happiness of younger and older city residents. The data for this study came from a comprehensive household population survey of 1,064 adults living in 16 neighborhoods in Dublin City (Ireland) and its suburbs. We used multigroup structural equation modeling to analyze the direct and indirect effects of walkability on happiness, mediated by health, trust, and satisfaction with neighborhood appearance. We found living in a walkable neighborhood was directly linked to the happiness of people aged 36 to 45 (p¼.001) and, to a lesser extent, those aged 18 to 35 (p¼.07). For older adults, we found that walkable places mattered for happiness indirectly. Such built environments enhanced the likelihood that residents felt more healthy and more trusting of others, and this in turn affected the happiness of older people living in walkable neighborhoods. Takeaway for practice: We found that the way neighborhoods are planned and maintained mattered for happiness, health, and trust. Our findings suggest that mixed-use neighborhood designs that enable residents to shop and socialize within walking distance to their homes have direct and indirect effects on happiness. We call for an ongoing dialogue and evaluation of the way our urban and suburban neighborhoods are planned, designed, and developed, so that people can live in walkable places that better enable health and wellbeing

A Qualitative Analysis of Influential Personal and Contextual Factors

The aim of the paper was to better understand the influence of personal and contextual factors on women's career decision making and interest in undergraduate engineering students. On the basis of Social Cognitive Career Theory and utilising a qualitative approach, nine interviews were conducted with women undergraduates at a university in Northern Italy. The results reveal four major aspects: a) the women's interest in engineering is cultivated by different contextual factors in the same way across multiple cultures; b) self-efficacy affects their interest in engineering; c) this interest is nurtured by internal and external recognition; d) their career decision making is determined by an interdependence of personal and contextual factors. The paper contributes to promoting cultural changes in engineering fields. Some practical implications for education professionals and policy makers were also reported

Anxiety and human resource development: possibilities for cultivating negative capability

Our article focuses on anxiety, which is an integral but still often ignored aspect of human resource development (HRD). The context of our study is a particular HRD intervention in Higher Education (HE): the part‐time MBA, and here for a group of managers who had taken less‐typical routes into HE and for whom anxiety was often heightened. Drawing on interviews with 20 students, we offer three contributions. First, we provide in‐depth understandings of the manifestations of anxiety in MBA programs highlighting their location in self‐other relations, and so progress understandings of anxiety as a social phenomenon. Second, we provide insights into how these self‐other relations simultaneously play an integral role in the development of a capacity for “negative capability”: that is an ability to recognize the anxiety of not knowing inherent to the learning environment, and with trusted others to contain it, until it has informed us to allow for the emergence of new insights and learning. Third, we illustrate the ways in which this capacity can also be mobilized in students' everyday managerial work by providing a starting point for public reflection. We suggest that these contributions offer promise for advancing critical forms of HRD

The propensity to adopt evidence-based practice among physical therapists

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Many authors, as well as the American Physical Therapy Association, advocate that physical therapists adopt practice patterns based on research evidence, known as evidence-based practice (EBP). At the same time, physical therapists should be capable of integrating EBP within the day-to-day practice of physical therapy. The purpose of this study was to determine the extent to which personal characteristics and the characteristics of the social system in the workplace influence the propensity of physical therapists to adopt EBP.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>The study used a 69 item mailed self-completion questionnaire. The questionnaire had four major sections. The first three sections were each drawn from a different theoretical framework and from different authors' work. The instrument was developed to capture the propensity of physical therapists to adopt EBP, characteristics of the social system in the workplace of physical therapists, personal characteristics of physical therapists, and selected demographic variables of physical therapists. The eligible population consisted of 3,897 physical therapists licensed by the state of Georgia in the United States of America. A random sample of 1320 potential participants was drawn.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>939 questionnaires were returned for a response rate of 73%. 831 of the participants' questionnaires were useable and became the basis for the study. There was a moderate association between desire for learning (<it>r </it>= .36, <it>r</it>²= .13), highest degree held (<it>r </it>= .29, <it>r</it>²= .08), practicality (<it>r </it>= .27, <it>r</it>²= .07) and nonconformity (<it>r </it>= .24, <it>r</it>²= .06) and the propensity to adopt EBP. A negative correlation was found between age, years licensed and percentage of time in direct patient care. The findings demonstrated that the best three variables for predicting the propensity to adopt EBP in physical therapy were: desire for learning, highest degree held, and practicality.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>The study confirms there is no single factor to facilitate research evidence into day-to-day practice. Multiple practice change strategies will be needed to facilitate change in practice.</p