Research
Research grants
Research staff within the Department are consistently successful in all categories of Australian Research Council grants, as well as other industry based research funds.
Projects
Strengthening Corporate Governance Behaviour in the Public Sector: Evaluating the Benefits of a Knowledge Systems Approach
Dr N Subramaniam, Professor AD Shulman, Professor JD Stewart and Professor AC Ng
There is considerable pressure on government agencies to improve corporate governance and become more accountable. But there is a lack of systematic data and analyses on the efficacy of the range of governance structures and arrangements in practice. In addressing this void, this study is of national significance. Building upon knowledge management and group behaviour processes, the research will lead to the development and testing of best practice models and guidelines for corporate governance management in the public sector.
The Impact of Emotional Intelligence and Styles of Conflict Resolution on Performance in High and Low Stress Situations
Associate Professor Peter Jordan and Dr Ashlea Troth
Research from 1980 reveals that organisations in Australia do not deal well with conflict (Hollis and Cunnington, 1980). Recent research has revealed similar shortcomings within Australian organisations (Lewis et al., 1997). Improving the effectiveness of individuals in resolving conflict is vital for organisational effectiveness in both the private and public sectors. In particular, functional conflict can contribute to organisational innovation, creativity and productivity. The understanding gained about the links between emotions and conflict resolution in this research will assist in identifying and improving the skills that contribute to better conflict resolution and consequentially better performance within organisations.
Workplace participatory practices: Learning through and for work
Associate Professor SR Billett and Associate Professor MC Barker
The project aims to examine the relationship between individuals’ participation in and their learning through paid work. This is warranted because current conceptions of learning throughout working lives fail to fully account for the reciprocal processes of workplace affordances and individual engagement that together shape participation in and learning from work. The study seeks to illuminate participatory practices across different kinds of workplaces and also those within workplaces for different categories of workers. The procedures comprise an investigation of the participation in and learning of 6 groups of workers employed in distinct kinds of work over an eighteen month period.
Emotional reactions to job insecurity, emotional intelligence, and their effects on employee behaviour
Dr PJ Jordan and Professor NM Ashkanasy
Insecurity at work is a major experience for many Australian workers and research reveals that perceptions of job insecurity are increasing. A new model of employees’ emotional and behavioural reactions to perceptions of job insecurity has been developed that focuses on the emotional aspects of job insecurity and describes how employees cope with job insecurity. This project develops an original program of research to empirically explore the impact of emotional reactions to job insecurity and extend the model to look at the effect on individual and team decision-making with the aim of improving businesses response to this increasingly common phenomenon.
A generic decision-making design environment to enable end users in rural industries to develop expert systems
Professor JG Gammack, Dr DV Kerr and Professor RT Cowan
Successful decision support systems developed by end-users has been limited: our proposed approach advances this capability. Using natural representations of industry knowledge, this project will specify a generic design environment in which industry end-users can develop relevant decision support systems. It extends expert systems technologies to overcome known limitations, increasing context and relevance and encouraging user uptake. Key industry stakeholders will select relevant problems to identify decision categories, leading to specification of the generic design environment. This promises improved decision quality for dairy farmers in the recently deregulated dairy industry; the design environment will be transferable to other rural industries.
Voice, Representation and Recognition in the Information Economy
Associate Professor BS Russell
Workers in new information industries are not highly unionised. This research explores why this is the case in call centre employment. Union densities may reflect workforce demographics or preferences. They may also parallel the use of new managerial tools including recruitment, training and cultural programs, or new work designs. This project will test these propositions. Providing employees wish to have some say over the determination of employment conditions, this project examines possible scenarios for voice, representation and recognition in a rapidly growing industry. This has important implications for the smart use of new technologies in the workplace.
Employment Relations Practices and Business Outcomes in a Chain of Hotels
Professor GJ Bamber, Dr N Timo and Dr CR Allan
We will investigate links between organisational behaviour and business outcomes by using employment-relations key performance indicators. This is significant as we will develop such key performance indicators (building on the balanced score card approach) and evaluate the practices of Accor, a chain of hotels in Australia. Later, we will conduct international collaboration to draw international comparisons too. This research is valuable because hotels are important employers, especially in regional areas. The results should contribute to debates about high-performance work systems. We should be able to help to improve the quality of working lives, organisational performance, business outcomes, competitiveness and job opportunities.
Improving Team Performance: The Role of Emotional Intelligence in Team Training
Dr PJ Jordan and Professor NM Ashkanas
Increasingly organisations are searching for ways of improving team performance. Recent research shows that emotions play a central role in increasing organisational commitment and performance. In particular, the newly developed notion of emotional intelligence is promoted as a method of enhancing performance however these claims often lack empirical support. In this project, the role of emotions in team-based work settings will be examined, together with the impact of emotions on performance. The study will assess interventions designed to assist employees in public and private organisations to gain the necessary emotion-based skills to improve their performance in teams.
Research awards and grants
Our research staff consistently succeed in receiving awards and funding from Australian Research Council grants and other industry-based research funds.